Surgery Update

A quick update -- Jen had her surgery this morning, and it went well. She is very tired and trying to get some rest. She is calling this surgery the Final Four as she's hoping it's the 4th and last surgery.

Thanks for all of your love and support. I'm sure Jen will post more details as she starts to recover.

- DL

Some Laughter as I Head Towards Surgery

My friend Paul is known for writing great Top 10 Lists. What a nice present to receive this hysterical list in my inbox as I head towards surgery.  I have to laugh now because after tomorrow, laughing will hurt a lot!

Top 10 Reasons Jen is Fed Up with Cancer!

 10.  She's tired of explaining to everyone that Sarcoma is a form of cancer, not a type of sarcasm unique to New Jersey natives.

9.  She drops a small fortune on a great looking wig and the paparazzi repeatedly mistake her for Beyonce.

8.  She’s been to chemo so many times she can bake a potato in less than 3 minutes or thaw a frozen turkey in 9 and a half.

7.  Her assistant started a rumor that she's having a midday romp with some guy named Sloan Kettering.

6.  In the last four years, she's gone under the knife twice as many times as the entire cast of Housewives of Orange County, Season 4.

5.  She's been hospitalized so many times, orderlies all over the tri-state area have tagged pictures of her knockers on their MySpace pages.

4.  She's infuriated Hollywood agents by blowing off meetings with SpongeBob, Dora and Linda Ellerbee to go to "treatment" with "Sloan".

3.  She drops a small fortune on a great looking wig and -- on windy days -- senatorial hopefuls mistake her for Governor Blagojevich.

2.  In spite of battling cancer, her gay and single friends still make her organize Cycle for Survival as a way to meet guys in tight bike shorts.

And the Number One Reason Jen is Fed Up with Cancer is:

1.  Her weekly chemo treatments conflict with the exact time she is supposed to be watching 90210!

You know your surgery is close when...

...the "sell by" date on milk and yogurt is after your surgery date

...people at work start to set up meetings and the majority of them are when you will already be out of the office

...you have your last chemo treatment prior to surgery so that you can "rest up"

...you start to eat all of the foods you don't typically eat because you know in a matter of days you wont' be eating anything

The Countdown to Surgery Begins

I am so sorry that I haven't written in a while.  I have been travelling a lot for work and for pleasure. First, I spent a week in Los Angeles for business. I had a ton of meetings and finished the week at the Kid's Choice Awards. It was an amazing event and I was thrilled that the show received the highest ratings and most kid votes (91MM!)  in the show's history.  In addition to attending the awards show, highlights of the week for me were going to a live cast reading of SpongeBob SquarePants and sitting at a restaurant near Turtle from Entourage.  You gotta love LA! 

 While I was there, I worked at the local Equinox (down the street from my hotel).  I was so excite

d to see one of the General Managers who I had met earlier in the year.  He wants to bring Cycle for Survival to the West Coast which is very exciting.

Then, I spent a wonderful week in Arizona with Dave's family. It was absolutely beautiful and so much fun to just relax and hang out with my nieces. We had a great time!  I realized 

when I slowed down, that it had been a long time since I was able to focus on me and the upcoming surgery.  Unfortunately I found that when I had some down time, I started to think a lot more about the surgery and got a bit sad.   For me, the hardest part is never the surgery (although it is extremely painful).  The hardest part is not knowing what is to come after.  My guess is that the doctors will tell me to go back to a period of "watchful waiting" where I get CT scans every 3 months and we hope the tumors do

n't return. For me, this has always been the hardest part.

But, I refuse to spend a lot of energy thinking about what's to come and I will chose to focus on "now".  I just found out that two of my friends who I met through cancer treatments at MSKCC will be having surgery the same week as me (1 the same day and the other the day after).  So, I guess it will be a social surgery!  Since it is so hard to walk after surgery (they cut my stomach down the middle and then sew me back up), I told my friends that my goal will be to get to their side of the hallway by the end of the week :)

I will write again soon!