I'm BAAACK!!

I've been a BIT busy this summer ... But I'm back n o w.

I'm still planning my photo shoot... it sounds ridiculous b/c I could have taken the pix 17 times already but there was always something: money, time, training, nutrition, and of course mum.

Mum is going to have to come first in all of this right now so my training and shoot will have to take a back seat for the time being. Although I am frustrated by this, I wouldn't consider doing it ANY other way.

For those of you who do not know, my mother is terminal with lung and liver cancer. She was first diagnosed in 1998 with lung cancer and immediately operated on. The docs felt confident that they were able to get just about every cancer cell with the exception of the microscopic cells they were unable to detect. My mother recovered and was still able to use 40 % of her lung capacity. She was to be on O2 for the rest of her life. However, this did not deter her or even slow her down one bit! The woman went out. She drove. She cooked. She cleaned. She gardened out in the yard. And even the death of my father in early '99 could not slow her down. Not until 7 years later...

She was informed in late February '05 that the cancer had come back and was not only in her lungs but had metastasized to her liver. She was given 3 months to live. Again, this did not stop her.

She went in for both radiation and chemotherapy. She was in her mid 70s at this point and had a fierce desire to live! The doctors could not believe the sheer will of this woman! Not only was the tumor in the lungs destroyed by the radiation but the chemo helped keep her up and going for another 16 months. However, by the summer of '06, she began to show signs of the cancer really affecting her. She was still very active in May but when I visited again in September I could see that she had began a rapid decline. Her breathing has been affected by the size of the tumor on her liver and her appetite has severely decreased. She has very little energy and tends to nap most of the day.

I have to say that watching my other parent die right before my eyes is so hard and so incredibly painful. I cannot be with her everyday or even as much as I would like and I resent that my older sister is not doing enough to help her b/c of her own egotistical issues. All I can do is keep on doing what I'm doing and ask for prayers of peace for mum.

Thanks to all of you for your support, love and well-wishes. Keep her in your prayers and I will continue to keep you posted on my trials here in the gym! Thank g-d for my training, however erratic it may be at this point... it REALLY has kept me SANE (well, sort of... grinning).