Jumping up and down

So this weekend I was jumping up and down and cartwheels happy.

I went to a dog adoption fair and the animal shelter to see if I could find a good fit. It's hard to do a search via pet finder because really I just want a carbon copy of Jethro's personality, my favorite dog at the Oakland shelter. He wasn't a beautiful dog to me, I certainly wouldn't have picked him out in a line up but what a great personality! So I didn't find a match this time but that's OK because I want to wait until the maintenance starts anyway.

After that I played biked to Adam's Morgan to play dodgeball for 2 hours and then it was so beautiful just biked around for an hour or so. I didn't start coughing until an hour after that. So I think my test now is to exercise for a long amount of time and then see. Also now I can see that my lung capacity isn't what I should be. If only I had known... I remember last year in the summer I was feeling that my endurance was horrible and thought it was strange because I had been hard core working out 3 times a week at Crossfit. I thought it was just my sprinter lungs holding me back.

Gosh, I just don't want this to happen to anyone else when it's so preventable. I keep thinking back to when I had chest pains in California and went to the doctor - could that have been when it was starting? If they had given my a catscan 4 years ago, could this have all been prevented? Oprah had this woman on her show that is the author of "Crazy, Sexy Cancer". Oprah asked her do you ever ask why me? and she answered "why not me?". that's not how i feel, i feel like yes, dammit, why me? I have not picked up a cigarette, dubbie (i don't even know how to spell it), or any smoked substance in my life. maybe if i had this somewhere else in my body but yes, why me? but since it's happened and I can't change it. I can help change it for someone else I'm sure.

I keep thinking how would I have considered getting a cat scan? When I worked for Avendra my boss said she went to a dermatologist about skin cancer and I should get it checked out. I figured it was kind of a long shot, I mean, have you seen me, I've got TONS of protection with my brown skin. BUT despite that, I did go and get my skin checked. For me, that's how it would have to come. I keep thinking I should write Oprah and ask her to publicize people with puffler's in the lungs and tell them to request cat scans, but that wouldn't have helped me because I never watched Oprah. Commercials about puffler's and medicine and insurance, were just blah blah blah to me as far as my own health was concerned. Florie told me about Lance Armstrong having this and seriously it was like it was the first time I heard it. So basically my friends would have had to tell me, I wouldn't have listened to my family (they still send me forwards about watching out for the man who gives you needles in grocery bags, so that you trip and fall on them when you buy oranges for less than 50 cents - and other ridiculous things). And it couldn't have been sent with a forward either because I automatically delete those. Lan told me I should have a fire ladder, and I do (never used it, still dusty in the box, but I have it, and it's in a place where I could use it if I needed to). I always get tested for HIV... I guess that's part of the problem, there is no simple blood test for this. But seriously, a cat scan is not like a pet scan, but you can still see if there is anything suspicious. So I guess what I'm saying is, especially for young adults (since apparently 70,000 Americans between 15-40 are diagnosed with cancer each year. ), tell your friends to request a cat scan. If the doctor doesn't suggest one, then lie and tell him/her that your mom, dad, friend, sister, aunt, cousin, dog, cat has puffler's and since it runs in the family, you just want to be sure. Gosh, if I had known to ask for a cat scan for the pain in my chest this could have been caught in stage 3 or 2 and I'd have had one surgery with a scar on my side instead of the scarab on chest. I'll keep thinking about other ways I would have acted earlier, it would be great if just one person gets surgery and is Cured (seriously that's what the doctor said stage 2 is curable!) rather than have to go through this crap that I'm going through.

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So my other thing is I have to get over my anger with smokers. It's going to be a work in progress but I decided I have one friend, Carisa, who used to smoke and I met her when she still smoked. She is going to be my sample smoker because she is a very kind person and I know she would not intentionally harm anyone. She is a little different because even when she smoked she was conscious of non- smokers, moving away from them, or fanning the air. So she is going to be my sample smoker so that I can work on getting rid of my anger towards strangers who smoke.