Pants and hat finished. Jacket fronts and 1 arm done. Must get back to work on this one. Baby due 11/5. --------
Nice thick socks loosely inspired by these 25% complete ---------
Regia jacquard #5178 ural socks of generic design. 60% complete ---------
Shawl in Lamb's Pride Worsted. Pattern here.
--------- Cardigan
for Dad from Maske for maske - ungdom og voksne by Mette Handberg.
1st arm almost completed body: 4 inches -----------
And okay, I'll admit it, I've got a ribbed cardigan on the needles for my step-daughter, Theresa, made out of her sweatshirt gray
Lamb's Pride Worsted with one arm done and the body to the underarms.
P.I.P.S.s ::
(projects in planning stages) Finish writing
up the pattern for the Cotton Sport cabled sweater and post
it.
---------------
Hva er dette for noe?
This is a weblog. It's mine. It tends to be about knitting
with occasional ramblings about my experience living in Norway.
(Sometimes it's the other way 'round.) Want to know more? Read the
faq's! :O)
I won't be coherent much longer today. My brain turned to goo last night about 8:05pm, just after getting home from line-dance class (I had a lot of
trouble following along, but felt okay) and now I have a fever and my throat seems to be closing up.
Amy, don't worry, I'm almost finished with my Knitty contribution.
And the Elephant/Pavaroti thing is even funnier with a gooey brain.
Speaking of goo, I checked out the Googlism thingy that Robin mentioned
and find
theresa is theresa is theresa is t theresa is th theresa is the theresa is the b
theresa is the be theresa is the
to be by far the strangest...
but theresa is surrounded by pink flowers is nice. But now theresa is hanging by a thread so theresa is going to just stop.
Warning: This part is a tiny bit ... well, it makes a good Halloween story. ;o)
The
next few weeks
are a bit blurry... I had the drainage tubes removed from
the mastectomy later that same week. That's as clear as a bell
and in the interest of historic accuracy I should give a little
detail here. (No, no it has nothing to do with my nurse-like
tendency to tell horror stories.) I was alone in the exam
room for this particular event. Just me and the nurse --
bless her heart, she must have known how much removing that type
of drain hurts. I was, however, blissfully innocent. The tubes
exited directly under my right arm, just about where a bra
strap sits under normal circumstances.
She grabbed the first one and pulled, quickly
and firmly, and I was immediately covered in a cold sweat.
I don't think I've ever, even with all the things that came
later, experienced anything that comes close to the intense,
yet (thank God) momentary, pain that
resulted from that tube, which I realized afterwards
was extending along the entire length
of the 8 or so inch incision, being ripped out. It's
indescribable. It makes me cringe even now. But it also
makes me laugh, for some reason, thinking about it. I know
the nurse apologized. I can almost see myself, sitting there,
shocked beyond belief, looking at her accusingly... I must
have felt like she should have warned me, but there would have
been no way to be prepared so I'm glad she just did it and
got it over with. Then she took out the other, shorter, drain.
It must not have been such a long one.
The other thing I remember from the recovery is the burning sensation
in my upper arm. For the first few days the
back of my arm was numb between my elbow and my shoulder. The area directly
under my arm, and extending a little ways onto my back, are still that way and
heaven help anyone who wants to touch me there... But the burning
feeling was the nerves that had been traumatized by the removal of the lymph nodes under my
arm "waking up" and as unpleasant as it was, I'm very glad the feeling returned in my arm.
First I want to say how much I appreciate the support you guys have shown in response to me talking
about this in such detail. Kathy, Maureen,
Robin, Mama Tee, Marney,
Ellen, Melissa,
Jamie, Barb, Kerrie,
and Robin (who linked back here from her site) and
those of you who have emailed me.
It feels a little strange writing about "all this". At the time it was happening, I talked a great deal about it... but never with
any kind of structure, since it was happening to them too. (Cancer certainly doesn't limit itself to affecting only the person
who has it.) I haven't told very many people who are new in my life about these events because, well, it seems
needlessly burdensome. However, I believe you when you say you appreciate me telling about my experience and some
remote part of me understands that it might even be beneficial. :O) I'm coming to realize that if I tell this as I have been, it
might be loooong... I mean, it's taken me 4 days to tell 4 days worth of events. I don't know, perhaps it'll pick up, but
at least you've been warned.
Oh, and one more thing: I feel like it's getting a bit too somber around here, so let's just look at Snoopy for a moment, shall we?
life ... is a state of mind
The evening of the second day after being home, Dr. Gray called me with the results of the tests
done on the lymph nodes they removed from under my arm. There was no evidence of the cancer having spread. He told me to
"sing the Doxology and go to bed". Whew.
The tumor itself - 1.8 cm in diameter, the lymph nodes - negative, no evidence of metastasis = Stage I. Survival rate for
Stage I = 90% at 5 years. Whew! If the tumor had been over 2 cm, it would have been classified as Stage II. Survival rate for
Stage II = 65% at 5 years. How's that for an advertisement for early detection?
Quote for the day: Grief has limits, whereas apprehension has none. For we grieve only for what we
know has happened, but we fear all that possibly may happen. ~Pliny the Younger
I had a nightmare last night that this was happening all over again,
but with the other breast. Bleh. But I'm determined not to let anxiety get the upper hand here.
So the day comes to check into the hospital for a modified radical mastectomy. That
means they remove the entire breast and the lymph nodes under
the arm for testing. Dr. Gray prayed with me before the
surgery and there were friends working in the pre-operative
holding area, both of which made me feel in good hands. They
gave me Versed IV in pre-op, so I don't remember being wheeled
in to the operating room. (Since then I have made it very
clear that I do not want Versed until I am actually in the
operating room. It's a sedative and I'm all for that, but it
is also "associated with a high incidence of partial or
complete impairment of recall for the next several hours"
which means I may very well have been awake and talking but
have absolutely no memory of doing so. I never claimed to not
be obsessed with being in control. :o) )
Carolyn, a very close friend of mine who worked on the unit of the hospital where
I would (by my request) be, was working on getting me assigned to the largest room and the most compassionate nurse available that evening. I
woke up in post-op attempting to sit up and feeling incredibly nauseous. The nurse taking (excellent) care of me there
had to tell me rather firmly to stop trying to get out of bed. I talked to her much much later about it and
got to tell her that I couldn't help feeling that she was mad at me. Post-operative emotions are strange things indeed.
Sometime later I was in my room, still feeling sick and being hugged (Who hugs a post op mastectomy patient?!? )
by some well-meaning coworkers who were anxiously waiting. I was getting painful-in-themselves pain and nausea shots as
often as possible and (sorry, but it's a fact) vomiting most of the night. I had the television tuned in to the "relaxing music
and scenery" hospital channel all night (forever after to be profoundly associative) and pitched a minor fit when Mom tried to turn it off.
As long as the television was on, I would stay intact.
The next morning I felt somewhat better. I wanted to go
home and was trying to downplay how nauseous I had been all night. Denise (also a friend, a social worker, and the Cancer Care
coordinator for the hospital) came to see me and talk to me about what excercises I should be doing
at home and the Reach to Recovery program. Dr. Gray
came in, looked me over, decided to let me leave that day. He
came back with some papers and handed them to me from my right
side. I reached over with my left arm to take the
papers (no way I was moving my right arm, it hurt too much) and he gave me a look and
told me I'd have to use that right arm, that's the point of all those exercises. Sneaky, but effective. I went home later that day,
wrapped in a very large ACE bandage and attached to two drainage tubes to wait to hear the results of the testing done on the 16 lymph nodes
they removed from under my arm.
Thank you all for your encouragement to tell this story. (I'm so sorry for giving some of you a fright yesterday!)
October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and
I'm telling the story of my experience with breast cancer that happened a little over 6
years ago. I was 25 years old. The risk of having breast cancer at or before that age is 1 in 19,608. But the cancer is
much more likely to be aggressive in younger women, likely because of hormonal levels.
Early detection through breast self exam is the key
to surviving. Click on the pink ribbon to go to the previous entry.
A few things I remember between the day I found out and the day I had surgery:
My cousin, Stephanie, came immediately to stay at my house. She helped me do emergency cleaning since my parents would be
coming to stay after the surgery. She took me shopping. We looked at dresses and everytime I said "I won't be able to wear
this after Tuesday" she said "Oh, shut up" and made me laugh. I am forever in her debt for what she did for me
during those days. I hope she reads this.
I called Dr. Gray's office to tell them the place where the biopsy was taken was hurting. I don't remember what the
nurse said exactly but I remember thinking after the phone call that what she was thinking was "it won't matter after Tuesday, it'll
be gone" and it made me feel very very strange.
I saw the plastic surgeon and discussed options for reconstruction. This was a very good idea. I knew him
and felt comfortable with him right away. I knew I didn't want any silicon and I found out about several types of
surgeries in which your own muscle and tissue is used to reconstruct a breast. There is even an option to have it done
at the same time as the mastectomy but they didn't recommend it and, knowing what I know now, I wouldn't recommend either. I think there's something
to living a while without a breast that makes it easier to appreciate the results of reconstructive surgery.
So I get back from vacation and pick up my mammogram/ultrasound results from the Radiologist. Pull the findings report out of a large
manila envelope, which is something I wouldn't recommend. Somehow I can see myself reading "strongly suspicious of malignancy" but cannot remember how
this made me feel. I can only imagine. I don't think I believed it. Denial and shock are part of the grief process for a very good reason.
Next I find myself at the Women's Medical Center, watching Dr. Gray stick an alarmingly large needle in me. The next day I'm at work, they call and
say come to their office. When? Now. I think this may have been on a Friday or perhaps a Thursday. I go. Listen as he tells me
a modified radical mastectomy is the best course of treatment. They will take lymph nodes and test them to see if the
cancer has spread anywhere else in my body. I remember talking to him about my age, I've never heard of a 25 year old with breast
cancer. He says it's uncommon, but that he has seen young women, even a 17 year old, with breast cancer.
I'm sure we talked a
bit about what would happen afterwards. Seeing an oncologist, perhaps. I know a wonderful oncologist, Dr. Messino, who treated my great Aunt
Molly for lung cancer. Dr. Gray recommends him highly (as does everyone who knows him). I also know a plastic surgeon, Humphreys, who removed
the benign cyst I mentioned before from my face and the scar is totally
invisible... I'll see him before I even have the mastectomy (which apparently is being scheduled for the following Tuesday). I walk
out of the building and realize it's been almost 2 hours. Dr. Gray and several of his staff who are treating me with great compassion, have stayed way
after office hours to talk to me as long as I want. I see the world, but it's a strange color. I'm kind of hovering beside myself, watching
as I vacillate between being a nurse, calm and clinical, and being a very small child, hoping someone will come take care of this for me.
This month is breast cancer awareness month. I want to share some of my story. This may take me a while because I'm likely
to do it slowly.
In 1996, around April somewhere, I was lying on the bed, mushing on my right breast. I don't know why. I wasn't doing a breast self exam, though I knew how important they were are. My family
doctor told me to do monthly exams when I was 17 years old. Thank you, Dr. Pennington, wherever you are.
It felt like a very round, hard pea just behind and to the right of my nipple. Okay, I'm a nurse. I've felt those dummy latex breasts with the
lumps in them. I know that perfectly round symmetrical lumps are more likely to be cysts rather than malignancies. And, besides, I've had two
completely innocent cyst things removed (one on my right arm near the elbow and one from my face) and this feels just exactly like those. Sigh with relief. But I call
the FNP, Susan, at my gynecologist's office anyway. Go in. She feels around. Tells me to take Vitamin E for a month and come back. Probably a cyst. Don't worry.
A month later and it's still there. No noticeable change. Hmmm. "Okay, let's schedule a mammogram. They're going to give you a hard time because you're only 25, but
tell them to call me if they don't like it." So off I trot, not worried, to have
my breast mushed some more. By the way -- Mammograms don't hurt. And, even if they do, mastectomies hurt more. They tell me
to wait in the waiting area... cold, gown on backwards, what am I waiting for? Come back here, we want to do a ultrasound too. Still, not that terribly worried.
Mustn't have been, because I went away to the Outer Banks that week. About halfway through the week, I must have called Susan to find
out the results. She says it showed something "concerning" and would like me to make an appointment with a surgeon to have a biopsy.
Okay, this is worrying. But I'm on vacation. Several phone calls later and I've got an appointment with a doctor who comes
highly recommended by some people who work in the O.R. of my hospital. I try to put it out of my mind. (Not too difficult when I'm fast asleep on Benadryl
because of hives resulting from a mixture of some antibiotics I'm on and the sun.)
Just finished reading The Shipping News. Much better as a book than a movie. Sentences affected by E. Annie Proulx's writing style.
Quoyle couldn't get used to the sight of Benny Fudge knitting. Wolf down his sandwich and haul out the stocking, ply the needles
for half an hour as rapidly as the aunt. No sooner done with the blue stuff than he was tearing into white wool, some kind of a coat, it
looked like.
...Billy nodded, still on the subject of knitters and busy hands.
"Jack knits a little still, not like he used to of course. He was a good knitter. But he never had the grip on it Benny does.
Benny's like that transport driver, you know, drove a container truck between St. John's and Montreal? ... This driver used to barrel right
across Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, had his arms sticking through the steering wheel, knitting away like a machine. Had a proper gansey
knit by the time he got to Montreal, sell it for good money as a Newf fisherman's authentic handicraft."
"Might as well," said Benny Fudge. "Happen to know what he got for one?"
"No, but I can tell you about the time buddy was ripping along down the Trans-Canada knitting about as fast as the truck was going when this Mountie spies him.
Starts to chase after him, doing a hundred and forty km per. Finally gets alongside, signs the transport feller to stop, but he's so deep in
his knitting he never notices."
One of Billy's jokes. Quoyle smiled faintly.
"Mountie flashes his light, finally has to shout out the window, 'Pull over! Pull over!' So the great transport knitter looks at the Mountie, shakes his head
a bit and says, 'Why no sir, 'tis a cardigan.'"
Benny Fudge didn't crack a smile. But Billy screeched like rusty metal.
Oh, how I love this 1824 Wool! I got 13 skeins in the mail Wednesday afternoon in a
yarn exchange with the ever lovely Wendy. I'm planning to use the Burma Rings
pattern from Interweave Knits Winter 00/01 but without the rings. I love the picot edging on the sleeves (which doesn't show up in the picture). Just a plain
pullover with no design decisions to be made by me.
Which is even better because I feel like I'm about to crumble into a thousand pieces. I found out last night that my aunt has bone
cancer. Simply unfathomable. She just spent entire days before my wedding cleaning up behind me while I made food for the post-wedding party... as bright and full of
laughter as ever. I talked to her last night and she's scared. I'm scared for her. She sees her doctor today and will find out what's in store.
And tomorrow is the day that would have been the birthday of someone I love and miss every single day. It's usually the hardest
the few days before and I feel certain I can hold out because surely this weight will lift. It must.
By the way, I'm feeling weird about writing this because I don't usually get this personal here, but it's my space and I say it's okay.
I'm getting there with the Rauma baby jacket... the body to the underarms and one front piece is finished, and I'm
working on the other front. Here is
a close up of the stitch pattern that comprises most of the body of the jacket and is also
in the little hat. I love the structure! Almost like a little tartan...
Ellen, one of those very cool Chicks with Sticks, was having trouble with getting an extra stitch
every row... and Shetha commented on that pesky first stitch that sometimes is so loose that it
appears to be two. I had this problem when I was learning to knit, so I thought I'd try to be helpful this morning, did a bit of illustration and came up with this.
It's quite easy to increase one stitch per row when the first stitch tries to disguise itself as two. Don't be taken in! Make sure the working
yarn is coming from the front and under the needle before working that pesky first stitch.
I found a good thing this morning at Echoecho.com... a
window resizer that lets you see how your page aligns at different resolutions. Which set me to wondering...
With what resolution are you viewing this? (Mine, by the way, is 1280 x 1024.)
Vivian Høxbro will be at Knitting Hands today and tomorrow, and in Black Mountain, N.C.
on Nov 11-14. Check out her tour schedule for more...
If you see her, you can tell her Det var hyggeligt at mødes which would mean "Nice to meet you."
...and an out of print children's book
The Faraway Drawer about a little girl who finds sweaters knitted by her Grandmother whose Scandanavian patternwork take her imagination to all sorts of places...
doesn't that sound delightful?
Oh, and somehow I just came across this
List of Do's and Don'ts for Young, Inexperienced Cats Who Have a Household to Run:
If one of them is sewing, or working with paper and pens, and the other is idle,
sit with the busy one. This is called hampering. Following are the main tips for
hampering:
For ladies knitting, curl quietly
into lap and pretend to doze. Then reach out and slap
knitting needles sharply. This causes what she calls a
"dropped stitch." She will try to distract you with a ball
of yarn, which is ridiculous. Ignore it.
KK, a Norwegian women's magazine, featured
these patterns in a
recent issue.
In other news, I've finished the hearts on the bottom of the baby sweater, and I just want to say I hate working
color stranding flat! But it's over now and I'm about an inch onto the body. We've learned it will be a nephew and arrive the 5th of November. I think
I can manage...
Meet Flat Stanley. Flat has travelled
to Norway from Marney's niece's classroom and is looking to continue exploring Europe.
Any of you European knitbloggers care to help Mr. Stanley out?
Aortal link ::
