We Are Olive

We Are Olive

Olives are so plump and when you pop them

in your mouth whole they feel so good.

Salty and strong but still good.

These olives are painted in acrylic

on 7x5 canvas panel

$80

To purchase contact me

Blur

I'm not exactly sure what happened, but I think that I lived in Houston, Texas for 30 days, wrecked my body, and am now home on my couch in Tariffville, Connecticut courtesy of a corporate jet and Lincoln Town Car. The month of April has literally been one hazy blur. We arrived home on Wednesday night to our calendar on the fridge that was still turned to March. Craig and I could not for the life of us remember what we did during the days leading up to leaving for Houston, how we got there, nothing. Everything happened so quickly.

I'm disappointed that I did not write more from Houston, but I was so incredibly busy or far too tired to get to it. I know that sounds crazy, but I couldn't get myself to do it. I do have many, many story nuggets that I plan to get to writing now that I can breathe a little bit. But for now I'll do a broad-brush review to get up to speed.

Most importantly, I became an aunt for the second time two days ago. My sister-in-law delivered a beautiful, healthy baby girl: Anna Gisele. She now joins my sweet, sweet nephew, Jake, who somehow is suddenly going to be two years old in August. I am so happy for Eric and Rachel and their newest addition: the news of their good health and sheer happiness eliminates all of the difficult times in my life. I cannot wait to meet her. Before we left for Houston, Craig and I got in some Jake time and his smile and baby language are the best medicine. Together with Anna there are going to be many heart melting moments to come this summer for sure.

After the initial whirlwind of activity in Houston settled, things got pretty tough for me. This was right at the time when my parents arrived. They were with us for the last nine days of the trip. It was really nice to have them there to mix things up and bring a taste of home. I felt badly at first that I was not up to being a gracious hostess and it took me some time to realize that that was not why they were there. Even after nearly two years of being a cancer patient, I still do not do well with accepting help and support. It is a tremendous struggle for me.

Once I accepted that my parents weren't there to sight see in Houston, but rather to just be there for me, I realized that it was okay for me to nap or not want to go out and explore. I am so fortunate to have parents and a husband that care about me so much that they'll sacrifice everything to do what I want to do. Sometimes that made me lash out because I want them to do what they want to do. It's a difficult balance of being extremely grateful and also not wanting to be a burden to anyone. I constantly try to think about what it would be like to be in my caregivers’ shoes and I'd want to be there right with them as well – even if they were just a blob on the couch as I was much of the time.

My mom gave me fantastic back rubs and introduced me to Bananagrams – I don't know what took me so long to discover that amazing game! We played many rounds of that and hung out in my parents' apartment watching silly TV once I finally let my guard down some. My parents rented a car, so my Dad became my chauffeur around Houston, which was helpful to run errands and to get places more easily as my energy had been completely zapped. This allowed us to check out the Houston Museum of Natural Science – including its awe-inspiring butterfly garden, the Houston Museum of Fine Arts' Sculpture Garden, the Japanese Garden in Hermann Park and a scrumptious downtown Farmers' Market. The city really does have so much to offer, much of it right up my alley.

We did get in a trip to Galveston, TX, on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico as well. It is only a short hour-long drive from Houston – Papa behind the wheel. I loved that place. I could have rolled around in the waves like a pig in shit all day long. The ocean water was the perfect temperature and the waves were strong and rolling. The four of us enjoyed some Gulf seafood and took a Duck Boat tour around the island and right into the bayside water as we learned about the history and goings on of this very unique island.

Despite the incredible wind, Craig and I plopped on the flour-fine sand of the beach while my parents did some further exploring. I spent most of the time in the water by myself diving in and out of the crashing waves. The salt water helped to clear my blocked nose and ears and the pressure of the wave undulations felt so good on my back – Mother Nature’s massage therapy.

Easter was spent mostly on the couch or the bed in our apartment. The Easter Bunny did find us there in the form of a bag of candy left outside our door and a beautiful bouquet of flowers that came from my Gramma and uncle back home. Plus, the adorable cards that arrived for the holiday and otherwise. After much internal (and external) debate, we all did make it out for Easter dinner in Rice Village – a Houston neighborhood that I came to love, which is adjacent to Rice University. We ate at a fabulous restaurant called Benjy's. The food was so good that I actually ate half of it and thoroughly enjoyed seconds for lunch the next day.

I love to travel and I love to see new places but there is a difference between being on a chosen vacation and being in a place far from home because you have to be there for treatment. We made the most of every moment that we could, but we missed the comforts of home badly, especially at night when I was remiss of distractions. I missed my Sammy dog tremendously. I did a lot of crying and a lot of yelling. I had many breakdowns and I know that this is because I didn't have my normal coping mechanisms with me at my disposal.

It's at times like this past month that I realize the things that really matter to me in my life. I missed my family and friends. I missed my alone time. It bothered me tremendously to not have nature and woods around me. It bothered me that I couldn't write and that I couldn't go to yoga class. I missed walking and hiking and the Farmington River. I missed having the basic necessities to cook our own healthy meals. I missed recycling. I missed tasty water out of the faucet. I missed quiet. I missed my pillow and bed.

After coming back from San Antonio, exactly as predicted by my doctor and nurse, all of the crappiness set in during week three. I got incredible backaches and tenderness and the fatigue became extreme. I had only a few hours of energy in me each day before I had to take a nap. The record heat and humidity in Houston did not help. Heat in the 90s, humidity 95% some days. I love, love, love the sun and warm weather, but the humidity made my already reduced breathing more labored, and I found myself often in the sanctuary of our air conditioned apartment, which is very unlike me. But the extreme temperature was too much for my body to handle. This worked out okay though because both my parents and Craig run hot and I was actually on the same body thermometer as them for once.

Appetite has continued to be low and I’ve dropped weight. I’m working hard at getting food down, but it’s certainly a chore. I have constant dry mouth. With barely any saliva, it feels like I’m walking around with cotton balls stuffed in my mouth, which takes away the appeal of food. Certain areas of my tongue are also very sensitive to harsh tastes and make it difficult to eat. However, I’ve still avoided any full-blown mouth sores. My lips are another story, though. They are swollen and cracked and in the mornings, especially, I have Herpesesque growths on them that hurt like a mo’ fo’.

On top of the chemo side effects, I caught a cold something nasty, or it's allergies, no one knows. But in any case, it still hasn't quit. It came on with a sore throat in San Antonio, which left but settled into a very rumbly cough, plugged ears and drippy nose. My parents and Craig had to put up with a lot of coughing fits around them. I saw a nurse practitioner in the "fast track" team at MD Anderson, who after ruling out a virus with a sinus wash, kept me on the antibiotic and told me to treat it symptomatically. The symptoms are still persisting, but have gotten better with rest and my home environment.

The good news is that I made it through the entire month down there without ever needing blood products and I required only one shot of Neupogen. I got this really because I asked for it as I did not want to be off of my pills for any more than needed. The schedule has worked that I've had to take a break from the pills for 3-4 days every other week. I've been able to tolerate the other side effects enough to avoid longer breaks. However, the drugs knack for knocking my blood cell count down is really nothing that I have control over, so the Neup shot helped my white blood cells soar back up (in one day) to far surpass the required ANC level of 1.0.

On Tuesday I met with Dr. Younes and Amy again to go over my first month. They were both impressed with how well I did and said that I was able to keep more drugs down than expected. They are still really exploring how much is tolerable and suggested. There are only 23 people that have been on this combo drug study and only eight of them have Hodgkin Lymphoma. I’ve kept diligent track of the symptoms I’ve experienced in hopes that it’ll help them better asses this drug tolerance and efficacy.

The meeting with the doc was very lighthearted. Both my mom and Craig came with me and we had a lot of laughs with the medical team and they gave me the thumbs up to continue treatment back home and get my blood cell levels checked locally with Dr. Dailey at Hartford Hospital. I felt much more at ease meeting with them and hearing that I’m tolerating the drugs well. I tend to be very hard on myself and outside assurance that I’m doing okay is very helpful to me.

To make the travels back home to Connecticut even sweeter, we scored a ride with the nonprofit organization Corporate Angels Network. The charity sets up cancer patients and their caregivers with rides on corporate jets that have open seats on a given trip. We lucked out in that one was going from Houston to Jersey City. They even set us up with a Lincoln Town Car driver from Teteboro Airport right to our door in Tariffville. These were both donated services. The travel effort and financial burden it relieved were instrumental. The experience of traveling in sweet, comfortable rides with incredibly generous corporate execs wasn’t so bad either. They were kind and fun and so, so accommodating. We felt like royalty.

When we arrived home, we were met with balloon clusters and vases of bright flowers in every room of our house. There was a big, adorable “Welcome Home Craig and Karin” banner spread across our dining room table and our refrigerator was filled with all of the essentials. Our neighbors and their kids had been busy. Their incredible thoughtfulness brought huge smiles to our faces. Our smiles continued when our friend Melissa delivered Sammy back to us and we had a good cuddling/petting/tail wagging session. Then all three of us crashed into a sound sleep in our respective couch positions.

I haven’t been doing much besides sleeping since. I slept for 12 hours the night we got back, was up for a few, then back to bed until Craig got home from work. Thursday night was particularly rough. I woke up in the middle of the night with an intense headache. The pain was so bad that I stumbled out of bed and vomited my brains out. I hate, hate vomiting. This is only the third time I’ve thrown up in two years of treatment. I was barely even conscious and can’t believe that I made it to the toilet. Craig woke up to the noise and found me hugging the thing with my face down on the bowl.

I got back into bed with a cold compress on my head just in time for the 4 a.m. live coverage of The Royal Wedding, so at least that was a plus. The nausea and headaches persisted into the next day. As difficult as it was for me to do, I e-mailed my trial nurse to tell her what was happening and ask for a break over the weekend. I can tell without even checking that my counts are low as my energy level is so shot. She wrote back: “Absolutely.”

Basically, the ball is in my camp with this clinical trial and I need to listen to my body and speak up when things get to be too much. I know my body intimately and my medical team wants the best for me. We all want to give the drugs the greatest chance to work, but also don’t want to kill myself in the process. I’m hoping that on Monday I’ll be able to get back on the treatment regimen. Right now though, my body is telling me–in no shy terms–that it needs a break from the toxins and the travel and requires a ton of sleep. I am listening.

Some Houston Pix:

Houston 2

Sunflower Show

Sunflower Show

No other flower reflects and is touched by the sun as

the regal sunflower.

The stand tall and strong against the winds which blow.

They wait for their time in the sun

to display their

Sunflower Show

5x7 acrylic on canvas panel

To purchase contact me

Back in the studio.....

Laundry is done. Chaos has disappeared. Replaced by order.
The rhythmic and consistent sounds of the waves fill the space that just a day or so ago vibrated with giggles and laughter . I am back in the studio.

Reiki wall pieces are calling out to be created.
I am thrilled that these have been selling as soon as they arrive at The Chalk Farm Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico! I'm setting my prices low because nothing feels as good as a piece of one's artwork selling and being placed in someone's home. I love making these pieces!
Each piece has a hidden Reiki symbol under a tempered glass mosaic. My intention is that these pieces bring healing energy into the space where they are hung.

The first piece is created on a palm frond with a bone that I found on the beach and old rusted pieces, highlighted with rhinestones.




The next piece is done on an old Chinese board. I used a skull that I had found, embellished with rare red coral and rhinestones.


I include a write up with each piece that explains the power of the piece.

"Having studied the several thousand year old energy healing system known as Reiki and having become a Reiki Master teacher, I have experienced the power of the Reiki symbols. By creating artwork that contains these symbols, respectively hidden but energetically present, my intention is that their inherent power become available through these art pieces.

Reiki is a Japanese technique for stress reduction and relaxation which also promotes healing. It is based on the idea that "life force energy" flows through us. If one's "life force energy" is low then we are more likely to get sick or feel stress, and if it is high, we are more capable of being happy and healthy.

The word "Reiki" is made of two Japanese words - Rei which means "God's Wisdom or the Higher Power" and Ki which is "life force energy".
Thus Reiki is actually "spiritually guided life force energy". Reiki Healing Energy provides a means to balance the human energy fields and energy centers to create conditions needed for the bodies healing system to function.

There are several different Reiki symbols that focus and empower different energies.
The symbols that I use are:

Cho Ku Ray: "The Power Symbol". It's meaning is "I have the key".
The primary use of this Symbol is to increase Reiki power. This symbol is nicknamed "the light switch" as it connects us to the flowing of energy, like a light switch being turned on. It opens us as channels for Reiki energy. It cleans out negative energies. It is used for Spiritual protection and to aid manifestation. It is used to empower.

Sei Hei Ki: The Mental/Emotional Symbol. Meaning: "Key to the Universe".
It is used primary for mental/emotional healing and calming the mind. It is known as the harmony symbol and is used to heal mental and emotional energies that no longer work for us, and to heal emotional and mental distress. It offers psychic protection. Cleansing. It is used to balance the right and left brain and as an aid for removing addictions. It is used for healing past trauma and clearing emotional blockages. Removes negative energies and bad vibrations. Restores emotional balance and harmony.

Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen: The Distance Symbol. Meaning: "The God ( The Buddha, the Christ,..) in Me Greets the God in You to Promote Enlightenment and Peace". This is used to send Reiki over distance and time (past,present, future), to anyone and anything. "Correct Thought (/Correct Mindfulness) is the essence of being". True consciousness is attained when our little universe (our mind) unites with the great universe. Grounds and balances energy. Helps to unblock the energy chakra centres allowing the energy to flow. Helps to remove karma and trauma. Makes contact with the essence of every substance and situation.

Dai Ko Myo: The Master Symbol. This is the most powerful symbol in the Reiki group.
This symbol is used to heal the soul. The "Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion" lists a definition for this symbol as "Treasure house of the great beaming light" and states that it is a Zen expression for one's own true nature or Buddha-nature, of which one becomes cognizant in the experience of enlightenment. The meaning literally translates to "Great Being of the Universe, shine on me." It helps to provide enlightenment and peace. This symbol brings profound life changes.
It is used to Light the Awakened Heart

A Tulip or Two

A Tulip or Two

Red on red with green accents. So much fun to paint.

5x7  acrylic on canvas panel

$80

To purchase contact me angelasacrylics@yahoo.com

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It's A Dog's Day

It's A Dog's Day

If you are a dog owner surly you are aware that

It's A Dog's Day as is everyday.

They own everything in their world and

yes that  means even you!

5x7 acrylic on canvas panel

$80

To purchase contact me

Whispers of memories.......

The first morning after everyone has gone is always the strangest.
I wander around and through the rooms and find only memories scattered and left behind. Memories..... and piles of laundry. :)
I think that tears are nature's release valve for a love and gratitude that just is so immense that it can't be contained within one small human heart.

Ava and the honu.....

Squashed

Squashed

Squashed? No not like a bug on a windshield but like a

delicious yellow squash which is just perfect to look at or

to put into a casserole. Squashed? You know like a Squash.

7x5 acrylic on canvas panel

$80

To purchase contact me

Voices of Spring

Voices of Spring

A spring chick chirps as it follows closely near it's mother.

The voices of spring are so fresh and invited.

Early morning sounds which fill the earth with the evidence that

life is new and spring is truly here.

4x6 acrylic on canvas panel

To purchase contact me

Matters of the Heart

Since I started the SGN-35 in December I’ve been having strange feelings in and around my heart and up and down my arm. I could feel my heart laboring. It did not pound fast like a heart feels after a sprint or a long flight of stairs. It was the distinct feeling that it was working extra hard and it happened only when I was at rest. It was most intense at the end of the day when I’d lay down on the couch to watch the news and unwind. I could feel and almost hear the blood coursing from the upper left side of my heart and down my left arm. At times I thought I was having a heart attack, at other times, a panic attack, but I always made it through it and came to expect it.

After starting these even newer experimental treatments here at MD Anderson, the feeling was happening more often than not. When it came on, it stayed for a much longer period of time, especially in the evening and all the way through the night and into my morning routine. I hated it because it made me so worried that my heart was just going to give out. I had no problem walking for miles, or exerting myself in any other way but when I laid down I’d feel that my heart was so tired and working much harder than it should be.

I’ve been pursuing and persisting on this since its initial December onset. I’ve gotten a lot of “hmphs” and “hmmmms” from oncologists, nurses, and APRNs. I’ve gotten a lot of: “That’s strange,” and with a quick assessment that all of my vitals and functions were fine it was brushed off as maybe anxiety manifesting in strange ways or one of the answers that irks me: “Chemo and cancer can do really weird things.”

The day that I started the LBH589 and RAD001 treatment I told my clinical trial nurse, Amy, about the feelings so she’d have it as a baseline. Again I got the “Huh, that’s strange,” response and she told me to just keep monitoring it. She said that they wanted to pay extra attention to my heart during this anyway.

The side effects of RAD001/Everolimus (the names are used interchangeably) are more well known than the LBH589/Panobinostat as it is FDA approved and has been proven successful in solid tumors, though with not as much data in lymphomas as of yet. The LBH589 is still investigational and not yet FDA approved. Its sister drug, SAHA (Varinostat), which is also an HDAC inhibitor can have negative effects on the heart. Because of this, I have been monitored for the first couple of weeks with frequent EKGs, tests of my heart’s electrical system. This is the very quick test with all of the little sticky disks affixed to points around the chest, heart and abdomen with long electrical leads attached to their conductors to measure the heart’s electricity.

I had gotten an e-mail from Amy one week into my treatment regimen saying that they saw something strange on my EKG reading. She said it was no big deal, nothing to be concerned about, but that Dr. Younes wanted me to see a cardiologist while I was down here. I couldn’t get a straight answer from her on what it was that flagged my test, but only that it wasn’t a big deal and not to worry.

The day of the appointment with the cardiology team, Craig and I sat in the doctor’s exam room after I had had a thorough electrocardiogram, which looks at the heart’s structural health through ultrasound technology, and another EKG. The cardiology resident came in, sat down and with a heavy Ukranianesque accent said: “It looks like the leads were reversed last week. Your EKG and echo are normal.”

I blew out a huge gust of air made up of frustration, annoyance and relief. I had had so much anxiety up to the moment it was incredible. Just an hour before while lying on the echocardiogram exam table tears started rolling down my cheek as I thought about how my body would ever handle a heart replacement or what I would do if the cancer grew and killed me while I was awaiting a valve transplant from a cow. How would I choose to stay on treatment if I knew it was going to cause my heart to fail? When she told me the tech had everything backward I didn’t know if I wanted to wring her neck or kiss her.

But as I’ve always found is that in every bad experience comes a little gift. This time it was in the form of verification and knowledge and eventually, a solution. Even though the lines were crossed on my last test, I still knew that my heart wasn’t right and I wasn’t going to waste this opportunity with a cardiologist who works at the nation’s leading cancer center and sees patients with chemotherapy related heart issues all day every day.

He was like a knight in shining armor – with the demeanor of Al Roker. In fact, he looked exactly, exactly like him. He had the same head shape, the same rimmed glasses, and the same huge smile with shining white teeth against his dark black skin. When we first began talking I had to squelch a big case of the giggles as I couldn’t get over the uncanny resemblance. I love Al Roker and I loved this man: Dr. Jean-Bernard Durand.

I told him about my strange heart feelings and he was the first one who didn’t just shrug me off, tell me to monitor it, and basically look at me like I was crazy. I know that even my family thought I was crazy every time I kept bringing this issue up. Instead, he wanted to look further into it and ordered a 48-hour holter monitor for me to wear. Basically it’s an EKG machine light – a to-go version. I had five monitors stuck to me that connected to a recording device through a series of wires. The recorder clipped onto my pants top like a circa 1980s pager. It also came with a pocket size diary in which I was to record the time of day when I was having an “episode” so that they could look back and check what readings were happening at that time. I did everything as normal – Mexican dinner with my husband, happy hour at the outdoor Icehouse institution with Betts and Brenna. I just did it with a few extra parts attached.

Well, once they saw the results of what my heart does all day it was concluded that I do have some issues. It turns out I have an Atrial Flutter, an abnormal rhythm in my heart. Dr. Durand spent much time explaining what this means and how it is an easily correctible problem that is not at all uncommon. It happens to many healthy, fit women who don’t even have cancer and unfortunately, some chemotherapies have been known to exacerbate it if I did have it underlying before all of this. The Adryomycin of my initial ABVD regimen and this current HDAC inhibitor are known to have heart effects and his thought is that this is likely a result of the experimental drugs and that it may go away when this treatment is over. An Atrial Flutter means that my heart is not beating in balanced beats from one chamber to another in a nice syncopated rhythm. One area is beating two times for every one time the next chamber is.

Dr. Durand said that on a 1-10 scale of heart issue seriousness, this is a 1 and is very common and easily corrected. He explained that the results of the holter monitor revealed that my heart rate was above 100 beats per minute (bpm) for 14% of my day. An average person reaches that heart rate only 8% of the day. There were three episodes where my heart rate was up to 150bpm – herein explains the labored beats I was feeling. Dr. Durand said that my heart was doing the work it would be doing to run a marathon and doing it every day. We need to get all back in sync because though it is not an immediate danger now, it will be in the future when my heart tuckers out. It can’t sustain that pace forever. But right now there are no structural issues with my heart. It is strong like bull.

To correct the Atrial Flutter he started me on a twice-daily teeny dose, 6.25mg of Coreg, a Beta blocker that will lower and stabilize my heart rate. In studies, it has also shown to have a protective effect on the heart during chemotherapy treatment. It sounded a little counter intuitive to me as my blood pressure always runs so low: I average 90/60 and have dipped much lower and always have to beg and plead that it’s normal for me … I have the heart of an endurance athlete so they say. However, when my heart rate, which is normally around 65, spikes to 100-plus then this is a problem. For other people that may be what they shoot for, but for me that’s a huge jump. Every time it’s been checked here, it’s been climbing steadily.

So, add beta blocker to the mix of meds I’m on to keep this body in tip-top shape. I started it this past Tuesday and have had no episodes since. A huge layer of anxiety has lifted with this development as well. There is an incredible calm that comes in knowing what a problem is and an even greater calm when the problem can be easily fixed. I now have documented evidence that I am not crazy and that my heart is safe and whole.

Happy Easter to all.....

Sleepy Time Brew with Berries

Sleepy Time Brew with Berries

Another sleepless night.

I already tried Sleepy Time Brew now on to

more remedies. Today I will try

Sleepy Time Brew with Berries

This just might do the trick.

Oh!     I        am       getting

very         sleepy... Zzz

$80

7x5 acrylic on canvas panel

To purchase contact me

Corn on The Cobb

Corn on The Cobb

The crisp crunch of fresh corn on the cobb.

The family get together where it is enjoyed.

Who wouldn't want some?

To purchase contact me

5x7 acrylic on canvas panel

$80

Signs of Spring

Signs of Spring

I am out of town for a week having fun in San Diego with the grand kids. Thought I would post a few from days past. The cacoon unfolds for the summer.

A beautiful butterfly is released to start the new cycle of life.

4x6 acrylic on canvas panel

$50

To purchase contact me

The most beautiful beach......

Art Studio Day in Kawela Bay.....