As I slowly recovered from the sight of Brian's report card, Megan's showed up in the mail. She completed another year with nothing less than an A, and in fact, mostly A+'s. Since these are all in honors classes, they will be weighted more heavily than a regular, non-honors class would be. So when they calculate class rank in two years, this year will give her a boost. and, hopefully, she can keep it up, although she has some really tough classes next year, including honors chemistry and a second math class in addition to the required geometry.
Anyway, that was one small consolation, although not an unexpected one. And if only she could put that kind of effort into cleaning her room, or washing her face and hair, or even caring for these warts that she has on her foot, another source of angst for me. About two years ago, they were only one wart. She had a pedicure, and the wart was filed. It blossomed. I took her to the podiatrist, where we had had such luck the last time, and he started the same treatments. It seemed like they were working really well, you couldn't see anything, but he said that he could still see a small bit of it, and freezing would take care of it. So he blasted it with the liquid nitrogen, and it responded by multiplying like chipmunks. Now it is a pile of warts, and I will not go back to him. He said the next step was laser surgery to remove it.
But we have appointments at the dermatologist next month so I'll show it to him. He's very good, too. Really, they are not a problem, but they are unsightly. I have told her to try what he recommended, 'wart stick' followed by duct tape, but she doesn't like to use the wart stick because it makes them stand out more initially. So that's a saga for another day. She also has a mole on her shoulder that is looking scarier, and Brian has his large 'congenital nevus' that needs to be rechecked. I'm sure it hasn't changed, but I try to stay on top of it anyway.
The Christ Church Pilgrims left on Friday for their pilgrimage to Northumbria, England. They left without Megan, and two others from their group, but one of the two is a disabled boy so that is a different story. I have been feeling slightly guilty about not having sent her. I regularly follow a few caringbridge sites, and I am still following the page of the swimmer with the brain tumor.
This girl was an Olympic hopeful a few years ago, at the age of 15, when she was stricken with brain cancer. An initial surgery was supposed to be all it would take to halt this non-aggressive cancer, but three months later, it was back, and it was aggressive. A second surgery rendered her unable to use one side of her body effectively, and dramatically stunted her speech. Over the past few years, she has been fighting, with her parents (mostly her mother) by her side the whole way.
Through it all, she has never stopped swimming. Her father got a new job in Seattle, so they moved across the country and had to find all new doctors, friends, and schools. She continued to swim. The tumor was back and she was told there was no hope, but they found a clinical trial for her. That held the tumor at bay for quite some time, and then there was a change again. Still, she swam. Just over the past few months, she was selected to represent the US in Beijing at the paralympic trials.
Then she got sick again. One of the tumor sites (I guess) bled into her brain as a result of the radiation it received. Also at the same time, they discovered cancer cells in her brain stem. She had more surgery to clean up the bleed, and just underwent more radiation on the brain stem; it was her only hope of halting this dizziness, which had put her Olympic dreams on hold again.
Anyway, in reading this blog for the past few years, I have followed her many travels to exotic places, and read of the things she has done with her family. It all makes me feel very small and insignificant in my little world where I didn't want to allow my daughter to travel to Northern England to tour monasteries and revisit the roots of the Episcopal church. I am not so much saying that I wish I had let her go, as I think that we need to do more of these things. The Fresh Air Fund and the exchange student are a step in this direction, but we are still keeping ourselves in this little world, and part of the problem is swimming. It is so all-consuming that there is no time to live. For any of us...and for what?
Well, those are my thoughts for the day. In other news, C called us yesterday morning! All he said to me was "yes" or "no" but then he got on the phone with Brian and talked a little more. I was surprised to hear that he is only going into 5th grade, which is two years behind where he should be, which is probably not unusual, but is unfortunate nonetheless. We have still been emailing back and forth with E, but now she is off to a week-long adventure at an outdoor concert series. I hope she never asks me to allow her to do anything like this! I'll have to defer to the agency rep. I wouldn't want to allow her to do anything where she might potentially not survive! Finally, we are off to the Blue Claws game this afternoon. Our church bought a bunch of tickets, and then they were unable to sell many of them. I bought five to bring a friend for Megan, thinking Brian's group would be there anyway. But we were the only family in the group that bought tickets, and Megan couldn't find anyone to go. So it's just us, and our one extra ticket. They were only $6, so I consider it a donation to the church.
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