Giving Thanks to ALL of You😍🙏

Well it's that time of year again! November is one of my favorite months. The weather is changing, the leaves are beautiful and bright and most of us get to spend time with our family and friends on Thursday around the Thanksgiving table.🍁 

This year, more that ever, I am thankful that I will be with our family at our house. The past few years we've traveled up north to spend time with Bob's family, but this year we are hosting! There will be 12 of us and I think we have all the tables and chairs figured out. Everyone is helping or I would not be able to do this. I'm going to thank them in advance for cooking, baking or going to the grocery store so that we can have a fabulous meal and plenty of deserts💜 It's my first time hosting Thanksgiving since my diagnosis in 2016 and I am extremely thankful for Bob and everyone for doing most of the work! My brain cannot handle multiple tasks, stress, or too much going on at the same time. But I know it will be fun and the day will be filled with laughter!

The past few weeks since the fire have been very hard on me. The smoke has made its way down from Paradise to the East Bay. You can smell it in the air and I can feel it in my eyes and in my throat. We have family in Chico and many friends. I can't imagine how bad it is up there. All schools have been closed, cancelled and an NFL game was moved out a few weeks so that the players wouldn't have to breathe in the smoke. I've been wearing a mask and so have many people in the Bay Area. It's so sad.

Our son Jonny lost everything in the fire near Paradise - its call the Camp Fire if you want to look it up.  He woke up to flames and only had time to get dressed and jump in his car😲 Like many others, he drove through the flames to make it to safety. We are all devastated, and the sad part is, his story is just one of MANY! I don't know the exact count so I won't even guess, but thousands have been affected and it will take a long time to rebuild and have their lives get back to normal. Honestly I don't know if they will ever recover, but I will continue to pray for them, and for rain. As of today the fire has burned around 150,000 acres and the death toll has risen to 77. What's even worse is 1300 people are still missing. 

All of this is weighing on me, causing sadness, concern, fear, anxiety and many

Rusty Kitty

other emotions. I know my doctor told me to 'do what makes me happy', but right now its hard to focus on that when so many people we know have lost their homes. I guess the silver lining is that Bob and I now have a plan and know exactly what to take if we only have a few minutes to evacuate. It won't be a surprise to any of you that #1 on my list is Rusty - my sweet kitty. Please have the conversation with your family too so that you know what to do should an emergency evacuation be necessary!

It's National Caregiver Month too but with everything going on I haven't done a good job of honoring Bob, Kristen and my other caregivers. I am so thankful to have their support, and the support of my friends and extended family. I am feeling the love so please know that even if I don't say thank you I REALLY appreciate your calls, texts, emails, cards and letters. Having lunch dates keeps me going and I get really excited when I hear from my friends, both near and far. Especially my Intel buddies!!

I hope you all have a fabulous Thanksgiving holiday, no matter how you celebrate. I have another MRI at UCSF on Wednesday but the rest of this week is all about cooking, cleaning and getting organized. Regardless of your faith I hope you take the time at your holiday table to give thanks and to let your family and friends know how much you love them. One fun tradition is to go around the table and ask everyone to say one thing they are thankful for! Give it a try and let me know how it goes 😍

I'm sending all of you a virtual hug and wishing you a wonderful holiday. Thank you for your continued support and for all your love and prayers.  You keep me going and give me hope! Happy Thanksgiving and God bless you always🙏😻🙏

Scary fire storm 🔥

There’s so much going on right now that it’s hard to know where to start. Yesterday the town of Paradise near Chico, where Bob and I lived and went to college, burned to the ground. I watched the news and read all the tweets while I sat in the safety of our home. They are calling it the Camp Fire and it is still burning.

I’m sitting outside writing this and the sky is grey, not from fog but from the smoke. Chico is at least a three hour drive from here but the wind pushed all the smoke to the Bay Area. San Francisco and Marin are also very smoking and hazy. The fire is not contained but they do think they can keep it out of Chico. Many people already evacuated. I really can’t even imagine their fear.

Last night I was on twitter and watching the news and was horrified by the stories. I couldn’t stop crying as I read about all the family members who were searching for their loved ones. Please pray for them and for all of the Chico / Paradise area. The fire is still not contained and I’m sure there will be more homes and lives lost. Over 70,000 acres have burned so far😓

Times like this make me realize I am not prepared to leave quickly (if I ever need to). I don’t have a bag packed with extra clothes and essentials. I don’t have copies of all my important documents. I do know where my cat carrier is and my passport. I think we should have a plan and when Bob gets home I will talk to him about it!

I encourage all of you to do the same thing if you haven’t already. I don’t do well with stress so I know that in the moment I would probably be disoriented and scared. Being prepared is the best way to avoid that.

We had another tragedy occur on Wednesday night in Thousand Oaks. A gunman entered a popular country bar and killed 12 people. Most of them college aged who were out for some line dancing and a good time. When will this stop? It’s so hard to continually read about these events. Several of the people at the bar were also in Las Vegas last year when 58 people were killed at a country concert. I really cannot imagine the trama they are dealing with. Let alone the sadness all the families are feeling.

All of this makes me cry. Last night I was a mess. Crying about the fire, crying about the kids and others who were killed. Crying because so many people are missing and presumed dead up in Paradise. Crying because I can’t imagine what it would feel like to lose one of my kids.

So today I’m sitting outside in the sun and drinking espresso and getting out my feelings. In a few hours I will be with my daughter doing some fun wedding planning. And tomorrow I will say goodbye to my ex husband at his funeral.

The moral of this story is to cherish every day. To stay in touch with your family and have a plan for evacuating quickly. To remove all hate from your heart and surround yourself with peace and joy.

Sending love & blessings to all of you. Thank you for your support during this journey of mine🙏🏼💜🙏🏼