Dear faithful family and friends,
Warning: Shameless self promotion to follow...
Well, in addition to fighting off cancer and recovering from five surgeries (shamelessness starting now), I also managed to write a book and create a website to promote my book (self promotion starting now).
Here's where I'd love your help...no it wasn't enough that you were there for me throughout this ordeal by sending prayers, cards, letters, gifts, meals, and more, ha! (shamelessness starting again) I would also love it if you could give this non technical gal a boost by going to my new website and 'Share It' with your friends and family as well as 'Like' me on Facebook and 'Follow Me' on Twitter!
Because my book will not launch until June 1, 2013, the information posted to the website, Facebook and Twitter will be fairly few and far between for now, but it will be all a flurry as it gets closer to my book release next summer.
I would greatly appreciate your support, as I have all along this journey, and I'm thrilled to have you along for the ride as I enter this exciting new chapter that cancer has opened up to me!
http://www.lisambakos.com
God bless and thank you!
XO
Lisa
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Sunday, September 16, 2012
Priceless
Mastectomy - $152,764.55
Anesthesiologist - $90,473.88
Chemotherapy - $54,635.99
Being Cancer Free - Priceless
Anesthesiologist - $90,473.88
Chemotherapy - $54,635.99
Being Cancer Free - Priceless
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Enjoying Every Minute
Last May, still in the thick of chemo, I had to make the appointment for my son's senior portrait. That appointment was today, here in the blink of an eye. It made me ever more aware of how time flies and before we know it, next May and his graduation from high school will be here.
I plan to be there in the front row, healthier in body, longer in hair, and happier in spirit.
I actually got tears in my eyes as I watched the photographer snap photo after photo. Here's a picture of my baby getting his portrait done. I'm grateful to God I'm still here to embarrass him. (note - blonde gal is photographer...in case you were wondering)
I plan to be there in the front row, healthier in body, longer in hair, and happier in spirit.
I actually got tears in my eyes as I watched the photographer snap photo after photo. Here's a picture of my baby getting his portrait done. I'm grateful to God I'm still here to embarrass him. (note - blonde gal is photographer...in case you were wondering)
Monday, September 10, 2012
What the Bible says about prayer
~ by Dr. Charles Stanley
"Nearly everyone reaches a moment, when the only thing he or she can think to do is pray. Tragedy, uncertainty, unrest, fear, insecurity and trouble can bring even the most self-assured individuals to their knees.
Right now Americans are nervous about the upcoming presidential election, shell-shocked from a number of deadly mass shootings, concerned about the jobs and real estate markets and the hurricane season that has just begun. The days ahead are sure to be filled with many prayers for protection, prosperity, patience and peace.
Prayer is not a transfer of information, but rather an act of humility.
But why is it that the urge to pray only seems to come when the going gets tough? When life is going well and everything seems to be right on track, we think ourselves to be fully capable of handling it all. Many people only recognize their need for God when things begin to fall apart.
We turn to prayer because it is the most personal way to experience God, to encounter Him and to grow in knowledge of Him. According to the book of Ephesians, God’s desire is for us to pray “on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests” (Ephesians 6:18).
Still, people are most motivated to pray when they need something from God. But what does the Bible say is the reason God wants us to pray?
Jesus provides clear instructions when it comes to prayer. In what is perhaps His most well known public address, the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus shares with His followers what has become known as “The Lord’s Prayer.” His example models prayers of praise, submission to the will of God, reliance upon Him for daily sustenance and requests for forgiveness and deliverance. Jesus’ prayer focuses more on honoring God than listing needs to be met.
Interestingly, shortly after this instruction on how to pray, Jesus reminds his followers that "the Father knows what you need before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8). This raises a fairly obvious question: if God already knows what we need, why bother asking?
The answer: Prayer is not a transfer of information, but rather an act of humility.
Prayer requires us to admit that perhaps we don’t quite know it all. In our culture, there is great pressure to have the answers, to convince everyone that we have it all together and to be completely self-sufficient.
According to Scripture, God is all knowing and completely wise which means He understands everything about a situation and sees the best path through it (Psalm 147:5). While our days are filled with expectations and demands, God is waiting for the moment when we say, ”I don’t know, but I know who does.”
Ultimately, Jesus demonstrates through His own life that prayer provides an avenue to the Father. Throughout the New Testament, we're told that Jesus "often withdrew to lonely places and prayed" (Luke 5:16). He was actively carving out time alone to meet with the Father in prayer.
In Luke 10:27, Jesus issues the command to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” But how can we love someone with whom we never speak? It is only through prayer that one can move from knowing about God to knowing God.
Perhaps you’ve never experienced a moment when, out of desperation, you bowed your head to pray. That’s ok. There is a first time for everything. But you don't need to wait until a crisis looms to begin a relationship with God through prayer.
If you have never really prayed, I urge you to give it a try. After all, the Bible tells us that your prayers will be met with God's delight (Proverbs 15:8, Psalm 149:4). The act of prayer leads to the peace, patience and perseverance we all so desperately need. With that in mind, what have you got to lose?"
Dr. Charles Stanley is the pastor of First Baptist Church Atlanta, founder of In Touch Ministries and best-selling author of many books. His latest is "The Ultimate Conversation: Talking with God through Prayer."
"Nearly everyone reaches a moment, when the only thing he or she can think to do is pray. Tragedy, uncertainty, unrest, fear, insecurity and trouble can bring even the most self-assured individuals to their knees.
Right now Americans are nervous about the upcoming presidential election, shell-shocked from a number of deadly mass shootings, concerned about the jobs and real estate markets and the hurricane season that has just begun. The days ahead are sure to be filled with many prayers for protection, prosperity, patience and peace.
Prayer is not a transfer of information, but rather an act of humility.
But why is it that the urge to pray only seems to come when the going gets tough? When life is going well and everything seems to be right on track, we think ourselves to be fully capable of handling it all. Many people only recognize their need for God when things begin to fall apart.
We turn to prayer because it is the most personal way to experience God, to encounter Him and to grow in knowledge of Him. According to the book of Ephesians, God’s desire is for us to pray “on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests” (Ephesians 6:18).
Still, people are most motivated to pray when they need something from God. But what does the Bible say is the reason God wants us to pray?
Jesus provides clear instructions when it comes to prayer. In what is perhaps His most well known public address, the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus shares with His followers what has become known as “The Lord’s Prayer.” His example models prayers of praise, submission to the will of God, reliance upon Him for daily sustenance and requests for forgiveness and deliverance. Jesus’ prayer focuses more on honoring God than listing needs to be met.
Interestingly, shortly after this instruction on how to pray, Jesus reminds his followers that "the Father knows what you need before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8). This raises a fairly obvious question: if God already knows what we need, why bother asking?
The answer: Prayer is not a transfer of information, but rather an act of humility.
Prayer requires us to admit that perhaps we don’t quite know it all. In our culture, there is great pressure to have the answers, to convince everyone that we have it all together and to be completely self-sufficient.
According to Scripture, God is all knowing and completely wise which means He understands everything about a situation and sees the best path through it (Psalm 147:5). While our days are filled with expectations and demands, God is waiting for the moment when we say, ”I don’t know, but I know who does.”
Ultimately, Jesus demonstrates through His own life that prayer provides an avenue to the Father. Throughout the New Testament, we're told that Jesus "often withdrew to lonely places and prayed" (Luke 5:16). He was actively carving out time alone to meet with the Father in prayer.
In Luke 10:27, Jesus issues the command to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” But how can we love someone with whom we never speak? It is only through prayer that one can move from knowing about God to knowing God.
Perhaps you’ve never experienced a moment when, out of desperation, you bowed your head to pray. That’s ok. There is a first time for everything. But you don't need to wait until a crisis looms to begin a relationship with God through prayer.
If you have never really prayed, I urge you to give it a try. After all, the Bible tells us that your prayers will be met with God's delight (Proverbs 15:8, Psalm 149:4). The act of prayer leads to the peace, patience and perseverance we all so desperately need. With that in mind, what have you got to lose?"
Dr. Charles Stanley is the pastor of First Baptist Church Atlanta, founder of In Touch Ministries and best-selling author of many books. His latest is "The Ultimate Conversation: Talking with God through Prayer."
Sunday, September 9, 2012
I Hope You're Happy
It's just about three weeks from my latest surgery and I'm starting to feel good again. Physically and emotionally, thank the Lord.
Today, I had a nice time out to lunch with my Aunt Sue. For those of you who may not know, my Aunt Sue (along with my wonderful mother and sisters) has been an integral part of my battle and journey with cancer, every step of the way from first fears, to diagnosis, to multiple surgeries, and finally to recovery. She has nutured, pampered, cooked, cleaned, laundered, organized and been a constant source of support.
She told me today that when she looks back over this past year of trials and tribulations, she feels sadness for me for what I went through. Understandable. She is like a mother to me and I can imagine feeling that way if this had been my daughter going through the same thing.
She then asked me what I thought about when I look back at the past year of my life. And you know, when I really stop to think about it, I feel happiness. Happiness for many reasons, but to name the biggest ones...happiness that my family and I are better people for what we have gone through, that our faith in God is stronger than ever, that I'm blessed with so many loving family members and friends, and happiness that I'm alive and able to sit down to lunch with my wonderfully loving and caring Aunt Sue on such a beautiful and sunny afternoon.
I hope that after reading this, you're happy too. :)
"The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering." ~ Ben Okri
XO and God bless,
Lisa
Today, I had a nice time out to lunch with my Aunt Sue. For those of you who may not know, my Aunt Sue (along with my wonderful mother and sisters) has been an integral part of my battle and journey with cancer, every step of the way from first fears, to diagnosis, to multiple surgeries, and finally to recovery. She has nutured, pampered, cooked, cleaned, laundered, organized and been a constant source of support.
She told me today that when she looks back over this past year of trials and tribulations, she feels sadness for me for what I went through. Understandable. She is like a mother to me and I can imagine feeling that way if this had been my daughter going through the same thing.
She then asked me what I thought about when I look back at the past year of my life. And you know, when I really stop to think about it, I feel happiness. Happiness for many reasons, but to name the biggest ones...happiness that my family and I are better people for what we have gone through, that our faith in God is stronger than ever, that I'm blessed with so many loving family members and friends, and happiness that I'm alive and able to sit down to lunch with my wonderfully loving and caring Aunt Sue on such a beautiful and sunny afternoon.
I hope that after reading this, you're happy too. :)
"The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering." ~ Ben Okri
XO and God bless,
Lisa
Friday, September 7, 2012
You may have peace in me
"I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33 NLT)
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Feel Free to Feel Free
After my brief Tamoxifen melt down last weekend, I felt oddly relieved. Then after thinking about it for a few days, I figured out why: it felt good to FEEL.
After I got over the initial feeling of shock I experienced from receiving a diagnosis of cancer, I felt largely emotionally numb for the better part of this past year. I had to stay numb in order to get through the horrible things I went through, both physically and emotionally. And I got really good at being numb.
Last Saturday, during my anger fest, it was the first time in a very long time I had let my emotions run free...and admittedly, it felt great.
I'm finally free to actually FEEL free, regardless of whether it's happiness, fear, depression, elation, sadness, anger, anxiety, or joy and it feels good. It makes me feel alive again!
I am grateful to be alive and have the ability to experience my God given range of emotions and feelings, without the numbness of worry or the mind blurring drugs of chemo!
“We think too much and feel too little.”
― Charles Chaplin
After I got over the initial feeling of shock I experienced from receiving a diagnosis of cancer, I felt largely emotionally numb for the better part of this past year. I had to stay numb in order to get through the horrible things I went through, both physically and emotionally. And I got really good at being numb.
Last Saturday, during my anger fest, it was the first time in a very long time I had let my emotions run free...and admittedly, it felt great.
I'm finally free to actually FEEL free, regardless of whether it's happiness, fear, depression, elation, sadness, anger, anxiety, or joy and it feels good. It makes me feel alive again!
I am grateful to be alive and have the ability to experience my God given range of emotions and feelings, without the numbness of worry or the mind blurring drugs of chemo!
“We think too much and feel too little.”
― Charles Chaplin
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Tamoxifen Rage - it is a real thing!
I recently found myself searching the Internet pairing the two words 'Tamoxifen' and 'rage' together...why you ask? It will all make sense in a minute. Please read what I found as a result of the search below, written by a fellow warrior in the fight against breast cancer, Ann Silberman - (http://www.butdoctorihatepink.com)
Breast Cancer? But Doctor....I hate pink!: Tamoxifen - by Ann Silberman.
"Imagine, if you dare, a woman with PMS. But, this is no ordinary woman, and this is no ordinary PMS.
This is the mother of all PMS, and by that I mean you combine the PMS your mother had (you know, the kind that caused her to wake you from a sound sleep by hitting you with a hanger because you'd left your socks on the floor) with the PMS of a woman who is naturally upset at the state of her hair.
Which apparently refuses to grow in.
This combination doesn't make for your regular, garden variety PMS. This PMS is volcanic in its power. It is the Tsunami of PMS. If this PMS was electrical power, it could take the entire city of Sacramento off the national grid.
Let's pretend you take such a PMS and mix it with an annoyance, such as, say, a car running out of gas.
Add the fun fact that this car has a broken gas gauge so one can't tell when it's near empty. And that somebody's husband - who normally very kindly fills up the car each weekend to prevent the aforementioned running out of gas - forgot. Just this once. Let's envision that this car ran out of gas, causing the driver, who just might have had a right breast amputation and is in the middle of reconstruction and isn't allowed to (nor can) lift more than a couple of pounds, to have to turn a powerless SUV around a sharp corner to park it.
You mix this mother of PMS, add car problems, no hair, and a strained chest muscle with a tissue expander wrapped around it, and what do you get?
A Tamoxifen explosion.
Chemical lava flowed all over that long-suffering husband.
Now, maybe I know the person who had the above experience, and I'm sure if I did she'd want me to apologize for all the bad words the people around her might have heard as she stood in public on her cell phone and screamed about how a husband who really loved her wouldn't f'ing forget to fill the tank up, and how it was completely assholish to purposely leave his cancerous wife stranded miles from home.
Let me just say I think it's highly unfair that I (oh, okay, I admit it, it was me) went through eight years of perimenopause, with its intense one-day a month PMS symptoms, only to have it started up again chemically due to cancer. I was happy to have my ovaries killed by chemo. I was ready for my well-deserved old-lady rest, and I think I can speak for my husband in saying that he was ready too.
If I had to guess, I'd say he'd happily trade a little laxity in the skin to not have to be called names when he doesn't do me the courtesy of filling my gas tank.
My doctor warned me about the side effects of tamoxifen, an estrogen-blocking drug: cervical cancer, blood clots, hot flashes, headaches, weight gain - and mood swings.
What he didn't say was that these mood-swings would be on the level of a 7.2 earthquake.
Unfortunately, unlike real PMS, there will be no Aunt Flo to come and calm me down. This is a chronic, unyielding, continual condition.
I have to take tamoxifen for five years.
I could have PMS-type mood swings daily for five years!
That would be a real natural disaster for all involved.
But, it'd make a cool movie. It could star Ernest Borgnine and Roddy McDowall as men who have to navigate an upside down world - while Shelley Winters tries to kill them."
Ann Silberman is - "Blogging my life with breast cancer, from suspicion to diagnosis to treatment. Now livin' the Stage IV Lifestyle! Terminal Cancer can be funny. Just not for very long."
Unfortunately for Steve, he was the costar of a scene from my life on Tamoxifen today, and it wasn't pretty. Picture Ernest Borgnine, Roddy McDowall, Shelley Winters AND Glenn Close from Fatal Attraction, all together in the bathroom scene - THAT'S why I did the Internet search.
How am I to take this drug for at least five more years? By the end, my blog will be titled "Not Much Faith, No More Family, No More Friends".
Cancer, you suck.
Breast Cancer? But Doctor....I hate pink!: Tamoxifen - by Ann Silberman.
"Imagine, if you dare, a woman with PMS. But, this is no ordinary woman, and this is no ordinary PMS.
This is the mother of all PMS, and by that I mean you combine the PMS your mother had (you know, the kind that caused her to wake you from a sound sleep by hitting you with a hanger because you'd left your socks on the floor) with the PMS of a woman who is naturally upset at the state of her hair.
Which apparently refuses to grow in.
This combination doesn't make for your regular, garden variety PMS. This PMS is volcanic in its power. It is the Tsunami of PMS. If this PMS was electrical power, it could take the entire city of Sacramento off the national grid.
Let's pretend you take such a PMS and mix it with an annoyance, such as, say, a car running out of gas.
Add the fun fact that this car has a broken gas gauge so one can't tell when it's near empty. And that somebody's husband - who normally very kindly fills up the car each weekend to prevent the aforementioned running out of gas - forgot. Just this once. Let's envision that this car ran out of gas, causing the driver, who just might have had a right breast amputation and is in the middle of reconstruction and isn't allowed to (nor can) lift more than a couple of pounds, to have to turn a powerless SUV around a sharp corner to park it.
You mix this mother of PMS, add car problems, no hair, and a strained chest muscle with a tissue expander wrapped around it, and what do you get?
A Tamoxifen explosion.
Chemical lava flowed all over that long-suffering husband.
Now, maybe I know the person who had the above experience, and I'm sure if I did she'd want me to apologize for all the bad words the people around her might have heard as she stood in public on her cell phone and screamed about how a husband who really loved her wouldn't f'ing forget to fill the tank up, and how it was completely assholish to purposely leave his cancerous wife stranded miles from home.
Let me just say I think it's highly unfair that I (oh, okay, I admit it, it was me) went through eight years of perimenopause, with its intense one-day a month PMS symptoms, only to have it started up again chemically due to cancer. I was happy to have my ovaries killed by chemo. I was ready for my well-deserved old-lady rest, and I think I can speak for my husband in saying that he was ready too.
If I had to guess, I'd say he'd happily trade a little laxity in the skin to not have to be called names when he doesn't do me the courtesy of filling my gas tank.
My doctor warned me about the side effects of tamoxifen, an estrogen-blocking drug: cervical cancer, blood clots, hot flashes, headaches, weight gain - and mood swings.
What he didn't say was that these mood-swings would be on the level of a 7.2 earthquake.
Unfortunately, unlike real PMS, there will be no Aunt Flo to come and calm me down. This is a chronic, unyielding, continual condition.
I have to take tamoxifen for five years.
I could have PMS-type mood swings daily for five years!
That would be a real natural disaster for all involved.
But, it'd make a cool movie. It could star Ernest Borgnine and Roddy McDowall as men who have to navigate an upside down world - while Shelley Winters tries to kill them."
Ann Silberman is - "Blogging my life with breast cancer, from suspicion to diagnosis to treatment. Now livin' the Stage IV Lifestyle! Terminal Cancer can be funny. Just not for very long."
Unfortunately for Steve, he was the costar of a scene from my life on Tamoxifen today, and it wasn't pretty. Picture Ernest Borgnine, Roddy McDowall, Shelley Winters AND Glenn Close from Fatal Attraction, all together in the bathroom scene - THAT'S why I did the Internet search.
How am I to take this drug for at least five more years? By the end, my blog will be titled "Not Much Faith, No More Family, No More Friends".
Cancer, you suck.
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