Recent newspaper ARTICLE Was in error

There was an article written in my local newspaper (and it’s sister papers) about my financial struggles because of dealing with cancer without health insurance, and brief coverage of my diagnoses. So much of the article was wrong.  Starting out with the fact I was diagnosed with Stage 4 Advanced Breast Cancer, NOT Bone cancer. The reporter (being a female will now be referred to as SHE) also was in error in her attempt at explaining my initial misdiagnoses two years prior to my actual date. Basically everything she said was backwards, misconstrued, and some just false.   I was not given less then a year to live. I was given 2 to 3 years to die. It was not my surgeon from the first biopsy (that was misdiagnosed in 2002) that wanted $9000. up front to do the surgery, it was the hospital that would not schedule the surgery without it. The surgeon was more than willing to work with me on his cost.  After making a payment of $4500. to the hospital the surgery went ahead as scheduled.  There was not a lapse in time. I did not wait 10 months to do something about my health.  The generous surgeon did in fact leave part of a lump in my breast.  The initial lump was large the second one found a few days before surgery was small.  He removed the smaller lump and only removed half of the larger lump as he did not think it appeared to be cancerous.  Did so, so that my breast would not be seriously scarred and imperfect.  Nice thought.  Even though the test results returned benign for cancer on both lumps, it was the portion he left in my breast that came to be the breast cancer that had spread through out my entire body from Oct 2002 to Feb 2006.  Some of her errors were minuet in the grand scheme of things. But it was important to me that the real basics of my story be true.  I did not want someone reading that, that already knew my circumstances and think it strange that the stories were different.  My word is all I have and the truth is the only thing I want to people to relate to me.  Even in their half-hearted attempt to write a correction a few days later…. was still in error.  I gave up. 

Whether the article was right or wrong We did receive an abundance of cards, prayers and financial aide.  Recently my daughter Skyelar and I have been so very blessed by the kindness of strangers.  Due to the incredible generosity from the community of North Port, as well as Port Charlotte, Englewood, Arcadia, Venice and Punta Gorda, we have received a total of $4704.00, which includes a $631.00 dollar contribution from my daughter’s school – Heron Creek Middle. They came together to help one of their own, my daughter; therefore it is this act of giving that is most meaningful to me. After Skyelars language arts teacher read the article in the paper she reached out to fellow teachers and faculty to share our plight. She started a collection from the students as well.  The day came to meet Mrs Jamie Hall, for her to gift the funds collected to Skyelar and I. Photographer from the newspaper (also a friend) was there to capture the moment as Mrs. Hall handed me a handwoven basket with $631.00 inside.  That right there was the most touching of all gifts received. 

Now back to the error parts.Please do not think I am ungrateful by no means. That is far from the truth. Just want to make sure you understand what this site is about, for when those photos ran in the newspaper there was a mistake as well.  It was stated “ Andrews-Pifer has a website to help others who may be struggling with cancer, and the financial costs associated with the illness...” which then included this website address.  This site is a blog site where I share my personal experiences while battling terminal cancer.  It covers blogs from the very beginning of when I was first diagnosed Feb, 14, 2006. 

I believe she misunderstood, as I had also mentioned my plans on starting a Non-profit called ARMY OF ANGELS FOUNDATION  which will help single women with cancer in their everyday needs.  Such as childcare while they go to the doctor, or while they are not feeling well after chemo.  Making dinner, mowing lawns.  Just volunteers to be their support system if they have non.  From my own personal experience of being a single mother with cancer, I know how important it is to have someone there when you just cant do it yourself.  I have had to find on my own;  ways to get medical assistance without health insurance and other measures for financial assistance.  I can also offer that information to these women. Amercian Cancer Society, and other charities do not offer the help you would think they should.  That is the back bone of  my non-profit, much more will go into it.  So if you did read that in the newspaper, I hope you feel I have explained everything in clarity.

 With all said however, the recent turn of events have revealed Gods will.  His Angels are among us (even those that make mistakes).  Above and beyond the financial help I have recently received, it is the outpouring of love, concern and prayer that has made me feel like the richest of women. 

I AM IN DESPERATE NEED OF HELP

I am swallowing my pride as I humbly ask for financial help.  I never in a million years thought my life would come to this, but then again I never thought I would be inflicted with terminal cancer either.   I have lost everything due to the expense of fighting this disease over the past 3 years. I have sold everything I could sell for money to keep a roof over my daughters head. I have nothing left.  I don’t know what else to do but to ask others for help at this time.  It is embarrassing for me, but I need to provide shelter for my daughter.

I receive $674.00 in monthly disability.  That is it for my income.  My rent is $650.00.  As I mentioned above I have been juggling and selling what I could to get by every month. we have adjusted to living with the very basics.  A house and electricity.  But now I am losing that as well.  My electricity was turned off 10 days ago.  I paid what I owed, but they had closed the account.  So I now need to open a new account with installation charges and new deposits.  Totaling $300.00.  I don’t have that.  The insanity of all this is I used my disability to pay the original past due bill, hoping I would get the electricity turned back on. And I would worry about the rent later. Which is not how it played out.

Skyelar and I have been staying at my son and daughter’s house that they share.  It’s cramped and I am sleeping on the sofa.  I am sure we are a huge intrusion on their daily lives.  I know they will say otherwise, but we are all head strong people, so you can imagine how that goes.  Besides that my youngest daughter misses her bedroom, as we both just miss being in our home. I know I miss the hell out of my bed.

I have been driving her to school every day and picking her up.  For we are not near her school district while staying here.  We have pets in our hot home, which we go twice daily to take care of. I feel so bad leaving them there. So all that is costing me in gas, which has taken even more of my rent money. As it stands I need $400.00 to make rent which is three weeks late.  They are ready to file eviction papers.

It’s a never ending vicious circle that I can’t find my way out of alone.  My children can’t help for they have their own living expenses.  Which is what brought me to write this blog.  I need a total of $700.00 to stop the eviction and get electric back on.  I just want to go home. I want to be amongst my things. Not living out of a suitcase.  I would feel so much better healthwise not dealing with all this stress and just being able to sleep iin my own bed.  The biggest concern however is for my daughter to not have to worry about where she is going to sleep.  Worrying about losing our home. Worrying about her pets.

If there is anything you can do, however small a contribution it may be.  It can add up.  It would have such a profound effect on my life. You would be providing such relief to help us keep our home.  My gratitude would be endless.  I will do what ever I can when I am able to repay you. Thank you for reading this and for even considering to help me.  You have no idea the positive impact you will make on the lives of two people.

P.O Box is below.  If sending a check please make it out to my daughter LaTrisha Pifer, for I do not have a checking account to cash it through.  No money no need for a checking account right.  lol.

Wishing you Peace and All Good things

Angela Andrews Pifer
PO BOX 381315
Murdock, FL. 33938

I have so much to catch up on

With out having the internet at my house I have not kept up on everything relating to treatments and my life in general.  There has been many ups and downs.  I have finished medications that did nothing at all to help hold the cancer back.  I need to review everything in my last blog and then will write to cover everything.

I am about to lose my house and be evicted.  I have not been able to pay rent or my electric bill.  I am three weeks behind.  Electric has been turned off for a while.  I am currently staying  with my son and daughter who share a house.  I hate putting my youngest daughter through this.  Just tonight she commented on how much she missed her own bedroom.  That she feels she has nothing.  It broke my heart.   I am sleeping on the sofa and she shares a bed with her sister.  Its crowded and I pray they can tolerate our intrusion a bit longer.  Atleast we have a roof over our head at the moment.  I have no idea what I am going to do. I need to figure out what to do with my household furnishings, etc.  I need to start packing, but with out electric and this heat wave  I can’t tolerate it with my health and all.  It’s just never ending.

I will write in detail tomorrow or the next day.

How Do I deal… Really…How?

I realize it has been a while with no updates.  As this blog is a wee old as well. I continue to write at home periodically. First Chance to post this blog, with out internet at home.  Since this was written cancer matters have continued to get worse. My current tumor marker numbers are now at 121.  I am currently pondering whether radical chemo is worth the time and hell.  It is my last alternative, with no promises it will even help. Sadly this may be the beginning of the end.

June 6th 2009

In my last blog I began by saying there had been so much going through my mind.  I ended by mentioning how I felt resilient to my current news.  The fact that the cancer is once again progressive (spreading).  That being true, there is still another side to those aforementioned thoughts and feelings.

It’s a wishy-washy ping pong effect playing out within my mind constantly.  Not sure anyone else can understand it unless they too have had to live and deal with a terminal disease.  Emphasis on “Live”.  Almost crazy I tell ya.  The battle is still a battle as long as I am fighting it.  The current negative details of it spreading and occurring in new places just did not surprise me.  I always knew it would inevitably turn for the worse.  So I was mentally prepared for that.  Physically beefing up my battle plan and moving forward with that.  A power house mentality.

It’s the emotional issues that are so daunting.  They play havoc with my brain, my heart and tear ducts.  A life laid out according to the customary expectations of us all.  I gave up on my fairytale long ago, but growing old with grandchildren in my life is something I never let go of.  Watching my youngest graduate from High School should be a given.  Planning my older daughters wedding when she finds her fairytale.  Standing proud beside my son as he follows his dreams and becomes more successful.  Aren’t those the dreams all parents have when they hold their newborn babes in their arms.  We dream of what will become of them and how wonderful it will be to watch and love them along the way.  I took it for granted I would be there for all their milestones, because…well… that is just the way it is supposed to be.  That’s part of being a mother.

Being me; the mother I am today however breaks my heart a little.  Maybe a lot.  I think it is so unfair for my children to have to deal with all this. (I am not saying it’s unfair I have cancer. Only unfair for my children) Even more haunting that they might not have me there in some of the most important moments of their lives.  I feel I have let them down.  I know they would be the first to scream out that I am not letting them down by no means.  Still it is my heart and I am allowed to feel as I do.  I know when they marry, their day will be marred by my absence.  Just as any other monumental day through out their lives.  Never my intentions to not be there, but if I lose my battle that’s just the way it will be.  It’s those moments that have yet to be born that haunt me.

How do I prepare to die?  How do I prepare my family for my death? Can anyone answer this? We all know death is inevitable.  We are only human and that is the circle of life. It’s not like I awake each day with thoughts of dying.  Far from it…I have been fighting too damn hard to live.  At 44 years old, I think I am still too young to even be thinking about making my funeral arrangements.  Yet I need to take care of that now while I am well enough to do so, as to not burden my children at my passing.  That is just one of the things on my mental “To Do” list.  Since I have very little left, a Will seems ridiculous, but need to make one all the same. Those are two things most people in general do.  It saddens me that I have nothing left of real value to leave my children.  So it’s the little things that I have to remind them that are the most precious.  I pray the love I gave them in the past is going to be enough to last. This Christmas past as I packed all my decorations away I sat down and wrote a letter to my children.  It was one of the most lonely and tearful nights as I placed that letter atop a box of special Christmas memories.  Since my health had already took a turn for the worse I was not sure if that might be my last Christmas Holiday.  I wanted to remind them how special that season always was for me and hope they kept that magic alive through all the years to come.  How I wanted them to divide my holiday collections and so forth.  Most importantly I did not want them to be saddened when the holidays came.  I want them to love and cherish that special time of the year the way I always did and share all our memories with their own children.  See I should not have had to write such a letter.  I mean really how many people do that when packing away their own Christmas decorations. Beyond that, my mind is constantly turning and making notes for them.

Just as I feel that each day I am blessed with, I am cursed all the same.  I feel like I am not getting enough time with my loved ones on a daily basis.  That I am stagnant and not making memories.    Sucks (for lack of a better word) that the desire for living those moments that will create fond memories is effected by monetary means.  Mind you cancer itself is very costly, especially without insurance.  It had already broke me, then the current economical recession sunk me even further.  So I sit here with no means of making my own personal dreams come true.

I am not being shallow.  Any time with my family is a wonderful blessing, whether we are just watching a movie together or hanging out.

Let’s put the money issues aside… all those things I once did that I can’t do anymore because of my physical limitations.  Big ass Bummer.  Then throw in all the things I always wanted to do and assumed I would have the opportunity to do.  Well now I can’t achieve them either because of my physical limitations.  Talk about frustrating as all get up.  That angers me and saddens me.  If I sky dive my back will break.  White water rafting, same scenario is possible. I was a runner, now I can’t run at all. Mountain biking through mountain trails…have fun I can’t do that now.  Can’t put on ice skates again unless I want to sit on the bench and look stupid.  Never learned how to snow ski and now I never will.  Those are just a few…a very few frustrating thoughts that dance around in my head.  Taunting me like a bully.  I can’t lie, it gets to me.  Those who have known me well know that I can’t stand to be told I CAN’T do something. So it adds aggravation to an already tormented state of being.

I do my best to come up with new ideas to replace the old ones, but my best is not always good enough in that arena.  How can I forget about those thrilling plans I had and not be disturbed by the fact I am suppose to replace them with mediocre attempts at something far less thrilling.

Then come those lonely, lonely moments that sneak up and scare me.  I have brought it up before and I am sure I will again.  That thing called LOVE.  Sure wish I had it.  True Love with a wonderful man by my side to hold me when I am scared.  To show me I am never alone.  To just do those small things for me when I feel so damn tired.  I know that last sentence will shock those who know me.  However cancer has broke me in more ways than financially.  You heard it here first.  I can and would allow a man to do things for me. I don’t have to be so hard headed anymore. Something I long for now…that man that would want to do things for me. I am so very tired deep in my bones from this struggle and going through all this alone, all the time.  When I see a couple totally enveloped in their love it cuts through me like a very dull knife.  It is yet another reminder of something I know I may never have again.

Yes I have my family, but that’s different.  It’s just me and my 13 yr old daughter at home.  My two oldest live on their own.  They work and have their own lives to tend to on a daily basis.  So with the time my daughter spends at her fathers as well… it leaves me much to many hours on my own, with myself.  That is such a dangerous place to be.

It just dawned on me, perhaps my skin has not thickened so much against the outcome of this disease; only the fight.  Maybe, just maybe my soul has finally accepted the truth. Unbeknownst to me it has revealed itself as a scared little girl.  With so many hopes and dreams yet to live. Afraid of the big bad wolf called cancer.

I am Lost.

May 28, 2009- Cancer Results

May 28, 2009

So much has been going through my mind lately, but I will touch upon that in the next blog.  The few days leading up to yesterday were internally stressful.  Couldn’t sleep, even though I felt exhausted.  Digestive system out of order; need I say more.  Just waiting for the results this time was hell.  I just knew nothing miraculous was going to come from those results.  For me it was just going to reveal “how bad” the cancer had spread, and where it all is now.

My older daughter took me to the appointment yesterday and accompanied me into the room.  She wanted to be there to hear the news, I wanted to protect her from the news.  I let her make the decision however, so she sat beside me as the doctor made her entrance.  First thing the Doc said as she motioned for me to join her next to the computer to review my results was “Well, everything we have done has not worked”.  I’m like “Okay” let’s get into this.

So the results confirmed the cancer is technically “progressive cancer” once again.  The tumor marker numbers increased yet again from three weeks ago.  That last round of Xeloda (chemo) did nothing.  My effected left breast (where the cancer started) showed a drastic increase of 5.07 (the uptake of the radioactive crap they inject intravenously) in an area of 9mm.  Last reading was 1.54 showing only in skin thickening from scar tissue. So there is something new going on in there now.  Previous readings were below 1.0 before things started to turn sour 6 months ago.  See the egg sized tumor had disappeared almost two years ago from treatments.  It appears there is locally recurrent disease.

The new bone cancer on my right lower rib that revealed itself 5 months ago has continued to grow.  It’s uptake jumped from 1.75 to 4.17.  Now the scans however are showing that it may have soft tissue involvement as well in the outer lining of my right lung.  Lower lumbar spine L1 shows increased uptake as well. From 5.42 to 6.89.  Mixed lytic and sclerotic lesion in the sacrum (lower tail bone of spine) jumped from 4.45 to 8.03.  Big increase in mass size.  Other activity in the right hip femoral head, but that is where I have had surgery twice to reconstruct my femur (thigh bone) and hip, due to my ambitious lifestyle.  Lol.  So inflammation could be responsible for that activity showing. No biggie. So you got all that right?

Over all I personally have to find the good news in all this. Even though the cancer numbers have jumped, it all is still in the same general areas that started showing 6 months ago.  Nothing new, except the recurring activity in the left breast.  My abdominal and pelvic area are clear. My head and neck are clear. No fluid in my lungs.  Most awesome is the fact that NONE of my Vital Organs are effected either!!!  See that was expected, but by the grace of God did not come to fruition.  So there is still time. At least more than not.  I am a lucky girl!

Over all I feel pretty darn great.  THEY can say I am supposed to be feeling pain and feeling sicker, but that is not the case.  I have stopped taking all pain meds and all muscle relaxants.  I take Celebrex occasionally now for inflammation pain in my hip and leg. But not everyday as I was.  Yeah I have a high tolerance for pain, but honestly I can usually handle it these days and it is not related to the actual progression of the cancer itself.  I feel good so I am not going to let this knock me down.

My oncologist said the next step would be full intravenous cocktail Chemotherapy.  I shot her down right there on the spot.  (No fears …not with a gun- she’s alive)  I told her I wanted to go back to Hormonal Therapy with a new drug.  I did my homework and went to that appointment yesterday with my own game plan.  So that’s it, I am in control now.

I am getting my Lupron shot tomorrow to shut down my Ovaries once again.  I will be starting Aromasin tomorrow as well.  She is going to check my tumor marker numbers monthly.  If they stay the same or drop then that is indicative that it’s working.  If they continue to climb then it’s not working.  At least I will know I gave it a try and go from there.

I don’t know if I have just become more stubborn, or resilient to the real facts of this battle.  All I know is nothing really scares me too much about all this.  Almost like I don’t believe them anymore. Or is it that I have come to terms with it all and just take each day as it comes? I can’t honestly answer that one. I can do my best to take care of myself and what ever the fall out may be is what it shall be.  I am doing well and will continue to live every moment I have with true zest.  Nothing can knock me down!