Veni, vidi, vici

I went, I did 75(ish) salutations, I'm sore...

The Free To Breathe Yogathon on Sunday was rad! Who knew I could have so much fun doing yoga? Oh, you did? Well, ok, you were right.

The energy and love in that room was indescribable. When everyone 'Ommmmmmed' (is there an actual word for that?) together I saw double rainbows and unicorns, y'all.

Here I am with some of the cast of All My Children. In the middle, with the pink headband, is Stephanie Gatschet, who played Madison North (you may also remember her as Tammy on Guiding Light). She organized the event to honor her Mom, a lung cancer survivor.



You can see more pictures from the event here.

My team raised the most money, with over $5,000 and I was the second place individual fundraiser with $2,500. They are still tallying the final amount raised by the event, but we've estimated close to $20,000!

Thanks to everyone who supported my efforts and/or donated. It was such a great day with rad people to benefit and wonderful cause!

I can't believe I'm even saying this, but I kinda dig yoga now and think I may keep doing it. Wait, what? Who am I?

Namaste

Tomorrow, tomorrow...

...I'll Yoga, tomorrow!

Tomorrow is the big day! I stretched; I shaved; I am in bed at 8:30 on a Saturday night. This is serious.

My team raised $5,166, coming in as the top team. I personally raised $2,258 of that, coming in second for individuals. A girl who lost her dad to lung cancer raised $1,000 more than me- so I'm happy she came in first. I can't really compete with that

Thank you so much to everyone who has cheered me on and supported this cause. I'm looking forward to seeing how many sun salutations I can do tomorrow!

I did it

I DID 13 FULL SUN SALUTATIONS TODAY! (Modified for my abilities a bit)

Friday I managed my first one and have been adding more ever since.

Congratulations are appreciated, but money says it so much better! ;p If you want to throw any at my fundraiser for lung cancer, in celebration, you may do so here. (Lung cancer kills more people than the breast, prostate, kidney, colon, liver, and melanoma COMBINED & your donations are tax deductible)

The event is on the 25th and I am trying to raise the last $400 of my final goal of $2,108 by the 22nd.

I'm elated by my progress and floored by the support I've received from everyone. THANK YOU to those who have donated. This experience has been a challenge and a blessing. I'm grateful for the opportunity to help others while also helping myself.

A whole lotta updates!

Clinical Trial

Back in July I had a boat load of tests to see how my body was doing with the Aspergillosis. The results were promising so I decided to take a chance and participate in a clinical trial that started on September 30th.

The trial will be over on March 16th, so today, tomorrow, and Tuesday I'm having tests done to check my progress. I had bloodwork, an ultrasound, xrays, and a Flouroscopy today- piece of cake! Things looks really good, from what I could tell/was told. They can't tell me anything, definitively, yet

Tomorrow I'll have an MRI and CT scan- during which I'll take a nice little nap.

From the looks of it, I will not be subjected to a Barium enema or swallow, a Colonoscopy, a stress test, a Broncoscopy, or any probes this go round! (This week keeps getting better and better!)


Foot

Tuesday will be the fun stuff: Electromyography & nerve conduction study, during which I will sing show tunes to myself and try not to sob. Awkward

I've been turning my crutch around and using it as a cane part of the time. On flat, short distances I can walk hands free, but if there is any change in the surface, I need help. I've been mastering downhill with the cane-side, but uphill is still extremely difficult for me.

I made grand predictions on how well I would do with my foot recovery. Things haven't gone as well as I'd hoped. And it started out so promising, too!

I'm at the 3.5 month mark. I said I'd be ditching the cane and walking on my own by now. My doctors said I'd be ditching the crutch for the cane. Turns out, every once in a million years, I'm not right. Damn

I wanted to be walking by my birthday in two weeks. That is obviously not happening, so I'll settle for moving to the cane by then.


Yogathon

I'm working on the physical part. It's a lot of work and if it weren't for a fundraiser or incorporated into my physical therapy, I would probably not be doing it. Luckily, I love a challenge!

So far, I have raised $1,678 and I have two weeks to hit my final goal of $2,108. That's $430 more to go! My team has raised $3,316 so far! If we all hit our goals, we should hit $4,000!

I am overcome with gratitude to everyone that has cheered me on and donated to the cause. I am so very blessed to be surrounded by such supportive people. Thank you for being a part of this journey.

If you'd like to help me reach my goal, you may donate here. Every little bit counts!


*In other, totally unrelated, but equally awesome news: my niece is rad.

Free to Breathe Update

A month ago I blogged about a fundraising Yogathon I am doing next month in LA to fight lung cancer, the leading killer of all the cancers.

I'm learning yoga for this and working really hard! I'm getting my ass handed to me

I checked in a few weeks ago to report I could do most of the poses (pink checks) and now I can do a couple more (blue checks)! Some of the poses are slightly modified for my abilities and I am still working on the transitions between them (the hardest part), but I think I'm off to a great start. I still have a month left to work out the kinks. A boy are there kinks in every muscle of my body!


Also, I am so excited to say that with the help of friends and family, I have exceeded my personal goal of $1,108 and currently have raised $1,208! My team: Kids of AMC (All My Children), along with Danielle (played Emma Lavery) and Tate (played AJ Chandler), is only $32 short of our $2,000 goal!

Aren't they adorable?

I am now trying to get to $1,500, personally, and our team is competing for most money raised. We're up against Downward Dogs: Stephanie Gatschet (Madison North on AMC, Tammy on GL), Melissa Claire Egan (Annie on AMC, Chelsea on YR), Alexandra Chando (Maddie on ATWT), Emme Rylan (Abby on YR, Lizzie on GL), and Paul Gosselin (OLTL).

We really want to beat Downward Dogs, so please help us out and donate!

Dear Yoga

Dear Yoga,

I apologize for my many years of mockery in regards to you. I am now eating my words. I take back those times I spoke of you being lame and boring, and that time I said you were just glorified group stretching. You are effing HARD and you are kicking my ass. And, I deserve it for all my naysaying.

My physical therapists kept telling me to court you and that it would be a beautiful relationship that would strengthen me. I told them that you just weren't my type. They kept persisting, saying you would be so good for me. Finally, I found some incentive in a fundraising event featuring you. I knew signing up for a Yogathon to raise money for a great cause was the only way I would actually get acquainted with you. So far, it's working.

As it turns out, your tough love was just what the doctor ordered (pun intended) and I've stretched (again, pun fully intended) outside of my comfort zone. I'm growing and changing through knowing you.

Already, I am checking off several poses that I wasn't able to do just a few short weeks ago.


(I can do E with shoes on, working on doing it without)

I'm confident you will help me reach my goals*, since you've already helped me reach my toes.

We're creating quite the beautiful love/hate relationship, here, Yoga: I love to hate you, and you love to hate on my body.

See you on Monday,
Bren

P.S. Let's be honest, I'm only using you for your money. (If anyone wants to donate to my efforts, you may do so here. Thanks!)

*I'm already past halfway on both my physical and fundraising goals! :)

Crutches, clots, and canes...oh my!

It was pretty exciting times at the podiatrist this morning, folks!

I'm at the 2 month post foot reconstruction mark now, and as you may recall, I made some predictions about where I thought I'd be at this point. My medical team surmised that I would just now be beginning to bear weight, which I have been doing since about 3 weeks post-op. I said that this would be the week I would trade my crutch for my cane and was sure I'd do it. Thus, today when I crutched my way into my 8 week appointment, I was all set to cane my way back out. No dice.

Instead it went a little something like this:

Dr: "Everything looks really good. Your tendons are healing; your bones are fully fused; your ligaments look great; and your muscles are getting stronger."
Me: "So should we break out the champagne and canes?"
Dr: "Well, there is a bump under your toe incision that we want to take a look at."
Me: "Is that bad?"
Dr: "We think it may be a small blood clot..."
Me: "I'll take that champagne, now."

Turns out, it wasn't a clot, but one of the knots from the internal sutures that didn't dissolve, collected calcium and blood, and was just overstaying its welcome. We sent it packing.





After the unwanted guest was dug out and sent on its way, the conversation went like this:

Me: "Okay, so about that cane."
Dr: "Can you do a plie or tendu yet?"
Me: "Wait, what?
Dr: "Do you know the exercises?"
Me: "Yes, but I can't do them. Nobody told me I should take up ballet."
Dr: "Well, you're already taking yoga, why not add in some ballet? ;)"
So now my doc is rivaling me in smart-assery!

Long story short, she wants me to go easy on the toe through the weekend so I don't split the new stitches and then, hopefully next week I can start slowly introducing the cane during my physical therapy.

Aside from this blip, I still think I'm on track to be walking on my own by my birthday (March 19th).

Tomorrow I'm getting bloodwork and I have a Nephrology appointment to see how my kidneys are doing. I hope they're on their best behavior!

Free to Breathe

I'm am excited to report that I will be participating in a fundraiser on March 25th. This will be the first fundraiser I have done that involves being physical since Jump Rope for Heart in elementary school. They gave us some rad t-shirts, y'all

The event is a Yogathon to benefit Free To Breathe, funding lung cancer support and research.

We will be doing 108 sun salutations. (Any Yogis out there?)

This is ONE full sun salutation:

To be repeated One Hundred and Eight times. Oof!

108 is a sacred number in Yoga, associated with luck and wellness. Coincidentally, the event falls EXACTLY 108 weeks after that fated ski trip in February 2010 that kick started this whole journey.

I have yet to do a single sun salutation in my life, before now. In fact, the only yoga I have done is what my physical therapists recommend.

However:
-Most people who have Aspergillosis die within 6 months (80%) or 12 months (15%), so the fact that I will (God-willing *knock on wood*) have seen 108 weeks of sun risings shouldn't go unnoticed.
-My illness attacks the lungs, so I know what it means to not be able to breathe, and lung failure is usually how Aspergillius kills people.
-I've known way too many people who have died of cancer, and lung cancer kills more people than any other cancer.
-I have a newly reconstructed foot that a)could use yoga to get stronger, and b)can actually DO yoga!

So far, I can do the first three poses and I'm going to really push myself to be able to do all of them.

If you would like to contribute my fundraising efforts, you may do so here.

I will be sure to post updates on my progress!



"I have the right to breathe; everything else is a bonus." -Anonymous