I haven’t shared too much personally about myself so I thought it would be fun and good reading to recap the last three years. They’ve not been particularly easy years, but I think it will make for some interesting reading. Now maybe I can start working on my 100 things list… Enjoy!

1. I started infertility hormones.
2. I stopped infertility hormones.
3. We decided to adopt an infant son.
4. We decided to adopt a toddler girl too.
5. My daughter Emma was 3 and I hated leaving her home to travel.
6. My mom, from Florida, stayed with Emma.
7. We traveled to Kazakhstan.
8. We got detained in Moscow because we didn’t fill out a form.
9. I tried to bribe the guard. I cried. Nothing worked.
10. They made us convert all our US Dollars into Rubles.
11. We checked out of the hotel we stayed in for the night and waited for our ride.
12. I got food poisoning. I ralphed for HOURS in the lobby bathroom of the Marriot Grand in Moscow.
13. It was a nice hotel bathroom in which to spew.
14. Lucky for me, there was a snow storm and our plane was very delayed.
15. By midnight when we borded, I was done ralphing and was just mildly nauseated and weak.
16. I remember watching the sunrise and crying that today I would meet my children.
17. We landed at 6:30am.
18. At 7:30 when we got to the apartment I tried to call home.
19. I heard the following: I’m sorry; we are unable to connect your call due to an earthquake in the region.
20. It’s hard to find news stations in Almaty. It’s harder still to find news stations that speak English.
21. We found out the earthquake was a 6.7 and freaked out.
22. We were meeting our two new children in 2 hours not knowing if our eldest child was alive.
23. I cried. A lot.
24. Dinara was walking outside the orphanage with her groupa wearing a little mink coat.
25. It was strange to see an orphan in a mink coat.
26. She recognized us from our pictures, held our hand, but was very nervous.
27. They took her away to get her dressed and when she came back she wasn’t too happy.
28. When John took pictures, the flash scared the crap out of her.
29. She cried for 30 mins.
30. And for everyday thereafter for 9 days of visitation.
31. The couple who was with us couldn’t believe we were going to adopt a child who cried at the sight of us for days on end.
32. We knew she’d stop crying by the time she was asking to borrow the car keys.
33. Noah was a happy go lucky baby.
34. He was 7 months old. Dinara was 2 ½
35. We called them “fire and ice”.
36. Guess which one Dinara was?
37. Emma and mom survived the earthquake.
38. When we went to court in Kaz, when they declared the kids ours, we cried.
39. It snowed that day.
40. It was one of the best days of our lives.
41. We then went to Moscow to process the kids through the US Embassy.
42. We found out that John’s father had passed away.
43. We couldn’t leave in the middle of the process.
44. We couldn’t go to the funeral.
45. We flew home on March 19.
46. It was hard adjusting to 3 kids.
47. I was on leave from my job.
48. I decided to quit.
49. Not working was very hard concept/adjustment for me.
50. My identity was always wrapped up in my job and career.
51. It took a long time to enjoy being a stay at home mom.
52. It took a long time to enjoy being a stay at home mom with 3 kids.
53. It took about 6 months for Dinara to learn English.
54. Know how hard it is to reason with a 3 year old? Imagine it now with a 3 year old who doesn’t speak the language.
55. We decided to build an investment property.
56. I bought the land the weekend of Sept 11th.
57. It was also when I realized I now liked being a stay at home mom.
58. That same weekend I decided to have weight loss surgery.
59. September 11th brought a lot into focus for me.
60. I had weight loss surgery in June 2002.
61. They cut me open from belly button to sternum.
62. It made me so tired adjusting to it.
63. 1% of people who do it die.
64. I wrote good bye letters to my kids.
65. But I knew if I didn’t do it, I wouldn’t offer my kids the best quality of life they could have with a mom who was too fat to do anything.
66. I also knew I’d die sooner..
67. In Nov 2002 the house was completed.
68. I had a lot of fun decorating the house.
69. It’s a weekly vacation rental in SW Florida.
70. We got our first renters in December.
71. I was very proud of that accomplishment.
72. In January I started having abdominal pain.
73. I thought it was kidney stones.
74. Turned out I had a grapefruit sized tumor on my Ovary.
75. My CA125 (ovarian cancer marker) was very elevated.
76. I had a total abdominal hysterectomy with a gynecological oncologist on Valentines day.
77. I was so afraid after all I did to lose weight to live longer, I would die of cancer.
78. And what was even sadder, was that I was terrified of what Chemo would do to my quality of life.
79. It wasn’t cancer. Thank God.
80. Turns out I had Stage IV Endo. All that fucking infertility they blamed on being FAT was bullshit. I had Endometriosis.
81. On day 14 my incision ripped open getting up from the couch.
82. It was gross.
83. Doctor forgot to put in a drain in the OR. Also forgot to give me hormones.
84. The adjustment was hell. Damn doctor.
85. Anyway…. I finally healed.
86. My 14 year old dog died suddenly in June. We were happy we still had her daughter.
87. I lost 140 lbs with the weight loss surgery.
88. I realized I would need plastic surgery to look normal.
89. I went to Brazil to do it and my mom went with me.
90. I shouldn’t have gone to Brazil. I had complications.
91. They removed 13 lbs of extra skin from me.
92. But they don’t use the same level of pain control in Brazil.
93. I really suffered.
94. They wanted to readmit me to the hospital in the USA, but I resisted. I had surgery without anesthesia instead.
95. I thought if they put me under again, I’d die. I was convinced and still I am I was that close to death.
96. Day before I came home from Brazil my daughter and other mini schnauzer were attacked by a stray bull Mastiff while walking the dog. Bailey was a hero.
97. Bailey didn’t make it. She died 6 days later.
98. It hurts to sob uncontrollably after a tummy tuck.
99. It took me 8 months to heal.
100. It was only a few months ago I could start sleeping on my stomach again.
101. But my boobs are perky and my tummy is flat.
102. When 2003 ended, I was glad.
103. 2004 was going to be my “easy year”.
104. We found out my grandfather had liver cancer.
105. 12 days later he was dead.

Related posts:

  1. accept the extraordinary mundane
    2.    I think the key to happiness is to learn to...
  2. Emma’s Surgery
    3.    This will be a fast post as I have more to...
  3. Metastatic Liver Cancer
    4.    I woke up to an email from my mom this...