CF Awareness Month- In Memorium

This has to be the hardest topic of them all. I have lost some cysters over the years and it so heartbreaking to lose someone to your same disease and at such a young age. I realized recently that at 33 I have outlived most of my closest cysters. At 33!! I am going to speak for all 33 year olds and say we are way too young to be outliving our friends!

When I started blogging I met a friend through my blog comments. She was about my age, worked in a school, and was married and had lung function just a little higher than mine. She found my blog because she wanted to start a family. We hit it off and became Facebook friends and stayed in touch via e-mail.

What happened over the next few years is something I will never understand and I will never live without feeling some guilt as to how life treated us so differently. I had a baby, she was having trouble conceiving. After a few years of trying she decided to try for surrogacy for multiple reasons. I was ecstatic for her because she would finally fulfill her dreams of motherhood.

Then by some weird twist of fate we both started to decline. We both started losing lung function and having problems getting a grip on CF. We slipped down together, and found comfort in clinging to hope with one another. We found comfort in having a friend that could understand how this horrendous disease can pull the carpet out from under you and you can fall at such a dizzying speed that nothing seems to ever make sense.

And then we watched our numbers fall to the 40s, 30s, 20s, both desperately trying anything to get our numbers back, both of us working our asses off to do anything and everything our doctors asked and then more. We made a bet at who would get back to 50% again and we teased one another about who would win. We talked about the upcoming medications in the pipeline and how close Orkambi was. We told one another to hang on until Orkambi become available. And then we both were going to the hospital again, but my room wasn't ready and I kept getting delayed, for days. Finally the phone rang to say a room was ready and she was the first person I told. But she didn't respond.

She would never respond again.

I still don't know why I was given a baby and she was not. She deserved one just as much as I did.

I still don't know why either of us had to decline so rapidly.

I still don't why I was given a second chance and she did not. She deserved it just as much as I did.

I still don't know why I was able to try Orkambi and she was gone before ever getting a chance.

I still cry when I think about her and how things ended up.

I still call on her for strength when my CF gets too hard because I know wherever she is, she understands.

The Complexity of Birthdays

I turned 33 earlier this month. I don't often mention my birthday on my blog, but I thought I may share how I feel about my birthday in case others may have the same confusing birthday feelings.


Birthday are complex for me, wrought with so many emotions and many of them unpleasant.



There is a the childlike excitement that springs up around my birthday. And even though as an adult the actual birthday isn't usually all that exciting and I haven't had an actual birthday party for myself in years, I still get that gity excitement that it is MY day!





Another part of me is relieved to see another birthday and to realize I am not dead yet. Pessimistic? Yes, but it is true. A part of myself is still so tied to that 14 year old who searched "Cystic Fibrosis" online and realized that although I never knew the consequences of my disease, I was in fact more than half way through my life according to statistics. That 14 year old me never thought I would be alive to see my 33rd birthday and yet, here I am.





And just as morbid I can't help, but still feel the stress and fear of the life expectancy hanging over my head as each year passes. And considering where my health is, it is not an easy thing to ignore. Maybe if I had great lung function, or even average lung function for a CFer I could ignore it more easily. I know this disease has been rapidly destroying my lungs and I know that without better medications and treatments (that aren't even available yet) I do not have a sprawling life ahead of me. The life expectancy of someone with CF is around 37, but for people born in my birth year the life expectancy is still only around 28 (according to Vertex). And to make matters worse I have officially outlived all of my closest CF friends. The friends that I could relate to the most as our diseases presented themselves similarly have all passed away. It is a lonely feeling and not one that makes birthdays seem overly exciting.





I guess being 33 with CF is a bit like being in your early 80s (mid 70s for a man). You know you are old and you are lucky to be that old. You know you could live to see 90 or potentially 100 and you live each day as if you still have a good amount of them left. And yet in the back of your mind you also know you are old and there is just no getting around that!




And mixed in with all those emotions I also feel a little sense of hope on my birthday that maybe, just maybe I will be one of those people that lives to "100" (in CF years, of course!).

Just 20 More

"Don't go anywhere because I love you too much..."
My husband whispered into my ear as he was climbing into bed. I had been asleep for a few hours at this point and was woken by his words just enough to process, mumble a quick response, "where would I go because I love you too?" and start to drift back to sleep. However, just before I slipped back into slumber a feeling of dread and sadness filled my heart. Before I could figure out why those words made my heart break, my thoughts were lost to sleep.

A few days later my husband and I found ourselves sitting on the front stoop with glasses of wine. The night air carried the perfect feeling of spring, the neighborhood was quiet with slumber, and we were discussing the events of the day gone by. There was a quiet lull in conversation and I tipped my head back to see thousands of stars dancing above us. Even after all these years the stars seem to surprise me with their glaring presence in the city. Just as I was about to comment on the beauty of the night sky my husband uttered those same words he did the other night,

"Please don't go anywhere. I love you so much."
My heart filled with that same sinking dread it had the other night as I responded. "where would I go? My life is here with you and Kaylee." But even as I was said the words I knew what he meant. I knew it all too well.
"But you are going to die and I don't want you to leave me."

And there is was, the reason for my dread and his desire to ask me to stay despite knowing that it was a promise I was sure to break.

"I am doing everything in my power to stay here as long as possible"
"Just give me 20 more years."

And the thought of twenty more years stretched ahead of me felt overwhelming and impossible. Look how much my lungs have been destroyed by this disease in the past 30 years, how would I ever survive another 20? 52 years old, still so young to the average person, and yet I couldn't imagine how this broken body could make it to such an age. But when you love someone so much that hurting them hurts you even more, you sometimes are willing to tell small lies.

"I think I can do twenty." The problem when you love someone so much and that love is reciprocated they know when you lie. He knew. I turned to him, thinking of my mother in her in 50s and how youthful she still was,
"You will only be 50, still so young."
"But I won't age well," he said with a smirk, "so everyone will think I am 70, at least!" It is a running joke we have, that we will age so very horribly. And I guess when I put it in writing it isn't funny at all and yet it always leaves us with tears in our eyes from laughter.

And somehow all that sadness that enveloped us under that night sky seemed to be washed away in laughter and talking about how horribly wrinkly and old my poor husband will be at the age of 50. Through all our years together sadness and fear often weaves itself into the lives were are creating together and yet it has made our bond stronger knowing our days may be limited and that the future is always uncertain.

A Green Tomorrow

To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.

- Audrey Hepburn

I started my first vegetable garden 5 years ago, in pots that were much too small, outside my apartment's front door in a much too shady and busy walkway. Throughout the day I would move the pots holding my precious tomatoes and peppers to wherever the sun was filtering through the branches of an overgrown pine tree. It was the worst conceivable place to grow a garden, but that little potted garden that gave me a total of three tomatoes and two stunted bell peppers ignited a passion in my soul that I have never been able to shake.

Today, the first sight you will lay your eyes on when you go in my backyard is a large display of raised beds that is home to everything from asparagus to watermelon. My mornings and evening are spent tending to my garden and my kitchen is home to the rewards these plants offer in return for my care and attention. It seems at times my daughter was raised in the vegetable garden and the age of two can rattle off facts about garlic scapes, and the importance of ladybugs, and that melons have both female and male flowers.

I always found it funny that so much of my life is avoiding thoughts of the future, a future that statistics and doctors assure me won't be long. Yet, I spend my time on a hobby, a passion, an obsession that is all about forward thinking and constant planning for the future. The seeds I so careful sow in the ground in spring comes with so much hope of thick green vines heavy with melons that will fill my stomach and soul mid summer. I cover my strawberries today to protect them from tomorrows ravishing birds. Asparagus is planted with the hope that in three years time I will have spears to grace my dinner table.

If you ask me about the future of my garden you will grow bored and restless long before I stop chattering on about expansion, and artichokes, and aphids. If you ask my about my future, the future of my health and my life you will be greeted with a harrowing silence. You will see an empty vastness in my eyes so foreign in a woman still in the prime of her adulthood.

The garden is a way to plan for the future and put my hopes and dreams into a tomorrow that feels so uncertain. Somehow it feels safer to make plans for my plants than for myself. If I never get the harvest of cherries it is much less heartbreaking than never seeing my daughter get ready for prom.

So for now I carefully tuck seeds into the soil so that in two months from now the ground will be stuffed with plump carrots. And as for what lies in the future? The carrots are all I can be certain of.

Never Growing Old

My husband and I went away for several days without the little one. There is something so renewing so refreshing about skipping town with the man you chose to marry all those years ago. The man who made a younger version of yourself nervous and giggly, but now makes you feel safe and content.. The man who in the past would make your face light up when you would talk about his warm eyes, strong arms, and addictive smile, but now fills your heart with a sense of home and belonging as you talk to your friends about the adventures the two of you, husband and wife, have recently experienced. The man that would make your heart flutter and your palms sweat when you saw his name on your caller ID, but is now the very first person you want to call with news, both good and bad.

After three years of parenting together it was nice to be able to focus on just the two of us for more than an overnight here and there. We spent our days hiking through the forest and our evenings laying in the warm sand listening to the ocean waves crash near our feet. We got tipsy at lunch and ran while bursting into fits of giggles because we almost missed our steam train ride back to the hotel. We had good wine, the freshest seafood, and amazing conversation.

The last evening after several days of rekindling the zest for our love that was ignited so many years before, we sat down to a romantic Italian dinner. As we were discussing what our evening plans entailed an elderly man was seated at a table across from us. He had trouble lowering his tired old body into the seat and his hands were shaky as he reached for the menu. He pulled out a magnifying glass to look at the menu and carefully sipped his wine while waiting to eat. My husband kept glancing at the man and would whisper, "that makes me so sad." Although, the man dining alone filled my heart with a sad loneliness as well I was surprised at how fixated my husband was on this gentlemen. As we finished out own meal the elderly man had finished his and left. My husband, now safe to speak freely, looked at me and so quietly so heartbreakingly in a voice barely above a whisper said, "That will be me someday." I instantly had clarity as to why my husband was so transfixed by this older man dining alone. I quickly felt my heart shatter with sadness for the man I love so very much because we both knew that realistically CF will take me long before either of us sees old age. I was reminded again how heartbreaking this disease is and that even though we live each day as if life were normal there is always the looming knowledge, the heavy sadness that this disease is killing me and leaves me little chance of ever growing old with my husband. It reminded me how angry I was at this disease for what it does to me, how it destroys my body and my life, but most of all that it takes all those who I love the most in the world and drags them down with it.

We had a moment of understanding and acknowledgment of how this disease can break our hearts and then in true fashion to my husband he followed it quickly with, "at least I won't have to argue with anyone about what kind of wine to order." And just like that we pushed the fear behind us and moved in with life because we know our days are numbered and our moments precious so we can't dwell in the what ifs and sadness.

What It Means To Be Different

The other day I was sitting with a good friend of mine chatting while sipping coffee (hers was decaf- she is trying for baby number 2). We have been friends for years and we used to be so similar, we were always in the same stages of life. We went to college together and spent countless hours studying side by side, got married less than a year apart and shared and planned every little wedding detail together, had our babies 3 months apart and took yoga together, went to the same midwife, and eventually breastfed, burped, and soothed our babies in each other's homes. But somewhere along the line my life stalled out and hers continued forward, I got left behind. I are no longer on the same page. I am not sure I belong in the same book anymore.

You see, when we get together she chats about what most 30-something year olds chat about, things I should easily relate to. She talked about how excited she was that they are trying for baby number two. How she wants a large family- 3 or 4 total. She want a house full of kids!
I kept thinking how I will never be healthy enough to have another baby. My husband and I don't have the luxury to discuss how many kids we want because CF took that choice from us.

She was chatting about how she found the perfect school to send her son to. One that does amazing enrichment programs and has a great student teacher ratio.
I kept wondering if I would live long enough to see Kaylee go to kindergarten. With my lung function so low and the fear of sickness lurking around every corner. I wonder how much longer i will be around to raise my precious little girl. Please, oh please, let me see her go to kindergarten. I want to at least live long enough for her to have memories of me.

She was talking about how her and hubby want to take a little vacation in the mountains, you know to get away from it all.
I was thinking about how my husband absolutely loves going to the mountains, but how I could barely breath in the high altitude when my lung function was in the 50s. I can't fathom the struggle with 30%. My husband's favorite vacation spot is a place we can't go anymore. Maybe after I die he can go with his new wife...

She was talking about how she was a crazy teenager and that as hard as raising a toddler is that raising a teenager will be 1000x harder.
I kept silently praying that I can know what Kaylee will look like as a teenager. I want to know if her hair stays curly, if her eyes shine just as bright. Will she be smart and studious, athletic, artist? What will her friends be like? What class will she hate? Which will she love? Oh. I don't care if she makes me drop her off at the end of the street because she is humiliated to be seen in the car with her mom, I just so desperately want to know if that dimple in her left cheek will still be there when turns 16.

I agree and nod and say all the things I am supposed to say. But I don't understand her world- your world. It is not the same that I live in. I do not speak of my horrid reality, it is one you do not wish to know. Nobody wishes to see the world I live in and so I live in it by myself. I think these thoughts, but they will never escape from my lips. Your world has you too preoccupied with the wonderful possibilities your youth gives you, of the vast and open life that lays ahead. My world is rapidly collapsing on me and I won't be so wretched as to invite you in. Nobody deserves to be here.

For now, I will pretend. Pretend to understand the excitement of being young and free. I will pretend to understand what it feels like to know your life has just started rather than wondering how rapidly it will end. I will pretend my life is like yours when in reality I know nothing of the life you live and in reality you know nothing of mine.

Down The Rabbit Hole I Go

I have found myself in a place that makes no sense at all. It all seems to get "curiouser and curiouser" in the worst kind of way.

Last Monday, I went to clinic. When it was time to see my doctor (I usually see one of the two) both doctors came in to talk to me. I knew right then that things couldn't be good. You don't get two specialists sitting in your room if things are going well. My numbers dropped again. I am now dancing in the 20s. The 20s are a wonderful number when it refers to your age, not so much when it is your lung function. The problem is nothing makes sense and nobody knows why. Let me show you what I mean:

After getting super sick and losing a ton of lung function from the flu I had several rounds of IVs where my lung function went up slightly, but I could never get them out of the 30s which is far lower than my (old?) baseline of 50.  So after feeling like IVs and increased CPT wasn't getting me anywhere I decided go get more proactive and here are the results:

Hospital stay = 4% drop in PFTs
Increase CPT to 4x/day everyday for a few months (and going) = 1% drop in PFTs
Go on steroids = 4% drop in PFTs

And so the harder I try the further I fall. The doctors said multiple times that with everything I am doing we should see some improvement and at the very least I should be holding steady. I have no new bugs and the ones I do have are not resistant to anything, I am 100% compliant and do CPT 4x/day everyday. I don't have fungus. I am treating my Psuedo with Cayston and currently on oral abx as well.

 We decided to try one last ditch effort. I am going on an appetite stimulant. I keep losing weight with lung function and even though the dietitian was very happy with my food log I was quick to admit that I eat well only when I am well. When I get sick or fevers (at least once a month and often for a week or more at a time) I just can't find the energy to eat enough. We know there is a correlation between weight and lung function. We hope if I can regain my weight my body will be stronger and more able to heal or fight off germs.

We added a few other changes as well, but the main focus is weight gain and exercise (to build muscle and lung strength). It is interesting that in yoga last night the set was dedicated to building courage and facing the impossible. It felt appropriate given the feat I have ahead.

Hope Vs Denial

This past year has been brutal and I seem to get knocked down over and over just as I am getting up from my last blow. It seems every time I start to get better I know for sure that this time, yes this time, I am finally getting back to my old self. I am positive that my health is turning around and this crazy year of sickness will be behind me, a distant and horrible memory. And then. And then I find myself sick, in pain, and feeling hopeless all over again

Since getting the flu last February I was hopeful I would bounce back. Why wouldn't I have been, I always bounce back. A quick dose of orals or a few weeks of IVs always brings me back to my old energetic self. And yet, this time I didn't bounce back. It has been over a year and I have yet to get my lung function and weight back, and I get sick so frequently I wonder where my wonder woman immune system ran off to. I have never had a CF flare up knock me off my feet before. I have never known this side of the disease before. I have heard of people with CF getting hit so hard they can't recover, but that just wasn't me, that wasn't my CF. I always bounce back, right? Right?

This realization that sometimes CF doesn't allow you to bounce back and sometimes it does get the best of you makes me wonder where do you draw the line between being hopeful and being in denial? At what point do you admit your body is tired and weak and that CF is starting to get the best of your life? When is it time to make plans for the future that may or may not include you? When do you ignore your fears and stay strong telling yourself that one day you will be healthy again? How many times can you take the disappointment of believing things will turn around and they don't?

I seem to be stuck bouncing around between denial and hope. I have days I feel hopeless and lost and as if this disease has already taken the best of me. I have days that I think we just need to find the silver bullet, that the answer is out there we just haven't found the right combination to get my health back.

I don't want to live in denial, but I just cant accept this as my fate, yet. I know CF is progressive and I know where this journey will take me, eventually. But oh I am so not ready to believe I am there yet. So maybe this is denial at its finest, but I will keep fighting and trying and hoping that tomorrow may bring a little bit of good news and that tomorrows will keep coming.

A CF Mommy Gets Her Wings

Hearts shattered all over the CF world at the news of Nicole's death. She was only 27 years old and excitedly pregnant with her first child, a son. More than halfway through her pregnancy she experience a severe lung bleed that landed her in the hospital. The bleeding was stopped, only to return again. Sadly, CF reared its ugly head and took Nicole's life as well as the life of her unborn son. This disease is horrendous and needs to become a thing of the past. No more lives should be destroyed from this disease and nobody should endure the pain that Nicole's family has had to endure. A fellow cyster set up a fundraising page to raise money in honor of Nicole. The money will go towards the CF Trust. The UK has been working on promising gene therapy that has been halted due to a lack of funds. If the enough money isn't raised by the end of October the gene therapy research and trials will end. As a way to honor Nicole we are asking for donations to aid in making CF stand for Cure Found. The CF Trust is based in the UK, but discoveries made anywhere in the world effect CFers ALL over the world. US citizens can of course donate, but keep in mind the exchange rate when making a donation. Check out the memorial site here!