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Lauren and Fig vs. Cancer
“Life’s not fair.” “I hate my life.” “F my life.” We hear these things everyday. Hell, chances are you’ve said one, if not all of those quotes yourself at one time or another. I know I have. Luckily though for most people chances are that they get over whatever made them say it, or they realize that things weren’t actually that bad. Over the past month something happened that made me say “Life’s not fair”, and for the longest time I didn’t know if anything could make me change my opinion. (But more on that later)
When you get the news that you’re expecting a baby, you’re supposed to be the happiest you’ve ever been in your life. Your life is going to change greatly, for the better! A miniature version of you is about to come into the world! This was one of the greatest surprises I’ve ever received in my life. After several days of joking around with me insisting that we were having a boy and her insisting that we were having a girl, we decided that since our baby was the size of a fig at the time that we would nickname him (her?) ‘Fig’ to make him(her) easier to talk about. (Hence the Fig name in the title!)
But sometimes the unfairness of life shows itself at the worst times possible. Unfortunately for my beautiful girlfriend Lauren, it chose the form of cancer to display its ugly head. A few weeks ago Lauren was diagnosed with Stage 1b1 cervical cancer. We were devastated, but determined to fight. We visited several doctors around South Florida to get their opinions, before we settled on a highly recommended doctor at the University of Miami hospital, working out of the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center. Lauren has undergone two high-risk procedures so fair to battle this nasty disease, including one that kept her in the hospital to recover. Luckily both her and Fig came out of both procedures in good health and great spirits! Sadly, they were unable to get all of it. The cancer is still there.
After the last procedure we were down to two options. After talking it over with family, friends, and doctors, Lauren has decided that she’s come this far in the fight, and there’s no way she’s backing down now! Starting Monday, February 9th Lauren will be receiving chemotherapy treatments every 21 days for 4 cycles. If all goes well, this will allow her to get to 32 weeks with the pregnancy and they will be able to deliver Fig relatively safely.
Earlier in this story I mentioned that at one point in time I didn’t know if anything could make me change my opinion about life not being fair. While that statement remains true for everyone in his or her own way, I discovered that there is so much love and caring in this world that it makes it a little easier. A few days ago I posted a similar story to this on Facebook and we have been overwhelmed with the outpouring of love, prayers, positive vibes, and positive comments coming from people all over. We’ve both cried tears of happiness, which has been a needed change from the tears of sorrow that were flowing. Several people reached out to me and suggested that I do this fundraiser because times are going to be extremely tough for us soon financially, and I realized that that is very true.
Not only are we going to have a lot of hospital bills, doctor bills, and treatment bills, we also will have the additional costs of traveling, as the University of Miami hospital is over an hour away from us (and that’s before the South Florida Traffic is factored in). We have already gone down there (and back) 5 times in the past 4 weeks, with one hotel stay. To make it all just a little bit harder, we are both running low on vacation time so a majority of our missed work will be unpaid.
Please don’t feel obligated to donate. I know some people are worse off than we are. All we really ask is that if you have a few spare moments to say a quick prayer or send some positive vibes our way.
Many thanks to everyone for everything they have said and done for us!
Love,
Michael, Lauren, & Fig
Lauren and I at the hospital before one of her procedures.
Fig at 16 weeks
“Life’s not fair.” “I hate my life.” “F my life.” We hear these things everyday. Hell, chances are you’ve said one, if not all of those quotes yourself at one time or another. I know I have. Luckily though for most people chances are that they get over whatever made them say it, or they realize that things weren’t actually that bad. Over the past month something happened that made me say “Life’s not fair”, and for the longest time I didn’t know if anything could make me change my opinion. (But more on that later)
When you get the news that you’re expecting a baby, you’re supposed to be the happiest you’ve ever been in your life. Your life is going to change greatly, for the better! A miniature version of you is about to come into the world! This was one of the greatest surprises I’ve ever received in my life. After several days of joking around with me insisting that we were having a boy and her insisting that we were having a girl, we decided that since our baby was the size of a fig at the time that we would nickname him (her?) ‘Fig’ to make him(her) easier to talk about. (Hence the Fig name in the title!)
But sometimes the unfairness of life shows itself at the worst times possible. Unfortunately for my beautiful girlfriend Lauren, it chose the form of cancer to display its ugly head. A few weeks ago Lauren was diagnosed with Stage 1b1 cervical cancer. We were devastated, but determined to fight. We visited several doctors around South Florida to get their opinions, before we settled on a highly recommended doctor at the University of Miami hospital, working out of the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center. Lauren has undergone two high-risk procedures so fair to battle this nasty disease, including one that kept her in the hospital to recover. Luckily both her and Fig came out of both procedures in good health and great spirits! Sadly, they were unable to get all of it. The cancer is still there.
After the last procedure we were down to two options. After talking it over with family, friends, and doctors, Lauren has decided that she’s come this far in the fight, and there’s no way she’s backing down now! Starting Monday, February 9th Lauren will be receiving chemotherapy treatments every 21 days for 4 cycles. If all goes well, this will allow her to get to 32 weeks with the pregnancy and they will be able to deliver Fig relatively safely.
Earlier in this story I mentioned that at one point in time I didn’t know if anything could make me change my opinion about life not being fair. While that statement remains true for everyone in his or her own way, I discovered that there is so much love and caring in this world that it makes it a little easier. A few days ago I posted a similar story to this on Facebook and we have been overwhelmed with the outpouring of love, prayers, positive vibes, and positive comments coming from people all over. We’ve both cried tears of happiness, which has been a needed change from the tears of sorrow that were flowing. Several people reached out to me and suggested that I do this fundraiser because times are going to be extremely tough for us soon financially, and I realized that that is very true.
Not only are we going to have a lot of hospital bills, doctor bills, and treatment bills, we also will have the additional costs of traveling, as the University of Miami hospital is over an hour away from us (and that’s before the South Florida Traffic is factored in). We have already gone down there (and back) 5 times in the past 4 weeks, with one hotel stay. To make it all just a little bit harder, we are both running low on vacation time so a majority of our missed work will be unpaid.
Please don’t feel obligated to donate. I know some people are worse off than we are. All we really ask is that if you have a few spare moments to say a quick prayer or send some positive vibes our way.
Many thanks to everyone for everything they have said and done for us!
Love,
Michael, Lauren, & Fig
Lauren and I at the hospital before one of her procedures.Fig at 16 weeks