Here Comes the Sun gala

Last night I had the pleasure of attending the gala organized by a friend I made when I got diagnosed. Jen is quite the inspiration to me and many others. She had been batteling leukaemia for 6 long years and she is now officially cancer free after her stem cell transplant. 

At this event benefiting the LLSC organized my her and her family, an impressive 21000$ was raised! 

I have to admit I got emotional when they called to the front all the nurses that were there for her along with her doctor. I was just so overwhelmed. To think that my two years seem like forever and she has been fighting from 14 to 20 and it's finally over! And with all that she founds the strength and motivation to raise money for the cause. Amazing! 

Other than the obvious wonderful feeling I got from being surrounded with people well aware of the cause and what many of us are going through, I had a wonderful time. It was nice to dress up for a change and be proudly bald! The event was wonderfully organized and if this becomes and annual thing I will most definitely be attending every year! 

Mediterranean quinoa bowl

This is amazingly easy to make, filling and yummy!

 

So here is what you will need.

For 3 normal people, or 2 people like my boyfriend and I 😜

For the sauce: 

3 red peppers

1/4 cup olive oil

Juice of half a lemon 

1 tbsp sunflower seeds (or wtv seed or nut you'd like) 

Salt to taste

For bowl:

*the quantities are just to help, the proportions are what ever you would prefer!*

2 cups Cooked Quinoa (I cooked mine in organic chicken broth) 

1 Large Cucumber 

1/2 cup Chopped Parsley

1/4 cup Finely Diced Red Onion

1/2 cup Kalmata Olives

1/2 cup Fetta

1 cup Chickpeas 

1 half Avocado 

Lemon juice

Olive oil

Vinegar 

Dry parsley

Salt & pepper 

To make the sauce:

1. Set the oven on High broil and put in the peppers, turn them every 4 minutes until all the sides are pretty black (don't worry) 

2. Let them cool down completely, cut out the core, pull the skin off (it should peel off very easily) and throw that away

3. Blend together the peppers, olive oil, lemon juice, seeds and salt.

To put together the bowl: 

Assemble as you wish but here are a few things I did

1. Cut up the fetta in small cubes, sprinkled dry parsley and small drizzle of olive oil on them

2. Squirt lemon juice on the chickpeas

3. Mixed fresh parsley, onions and cucumbers with a bit of olive oil, vinegar and salt.

Then combine everything in the bowl and add the sauce from heaven :) 

Half way through the hardest part

The next few days marks one midway point in in my treatment. Not THE midway point, unfortunately. 

For those of you who are unfamiliar: there are 4 phases to my treatment (leukemia is a stubborn and very annoying cancer) 

Phase one was the month and a half I spent at the hotpital. 

Phase 2 was 3 weeks of very uncomfortable spiral taps. 

Phase 3 is the 6 month part called the "intensification phase" and let me tell you; intensification is an understatement. This is the phase I'm half way done. 

Phase 4 is the longest (18 months) but I've been told it gets easier during this phase. But let's not get to excited, I still will have to undergo chemo therapy every week but in smaller doses. Also my hair should start growing back, which should help with the mental image of my self always looking sick. 

Hopefully I will be able to go back to work part time. Feel like I'm moving forward in my life instead of glueing my face to Netflix. 

This post may not be light harded and food oriented, but it's an update. I guess it's good to point out these small milestones that help me remember I'm moving forward. 

P.s. This is a painting of me that my dear sister in law gave me for Christmas/my birthday. Little reminder that I will go back to that brightness one day! 

Planning around the chemo

Every three weeks I get a heavy dose of chemo. So, I have to try to plan my life around that. Knowing that 2 out of 3 weeks on my life will be unpleasant (to say the least) for the next 20 months... I have to try to get used to it. 

My actual birthday is December 25th, I usually celebrate on the 26th or 27th. But unfortunately I have chemo on the 21st, so I celebrated my birthday on the 19th. My brother and his wife thankfully hosted this small event. And my good friend made the deserts. I was too distracted to take pictures, but I couldn't resist taking a picture of my oreo cake! 

The unfortunate thing is that on Christmas, when my family will be in from Ohio and my parents house will be full of wonderful people, I won't be able to enjoy myself as I usually do. There will be an infinit amout of my favorit foods and I most likely won't have much of an appetite. 

The past few week have been pretty rough because I was neutropenic, so I may a tad pessimistic about the whole thing. Time will tell! 

Big Bald Step

Today I'm taking a big step! I'm daring the outside world with nothing on my head! Here are my eyes holding back tears. My patchy head and my very swollen cheeks caused by all the medication I'm on. And where am I going? To a Christmas party. A fashion industry Christmas party.

Let's do this. 
Let's try to forget that I never thought I'd look like this. And enjoy the night as much as I can!