Spoiled and Relaxed

This post is for my mom. For Christmas one of my gifts was a portable DVD player. I asked for one because when Ryan goes to bed early I get kicked out of watching TV upstairs, and I refuse to go downstairs because it's always too cold. Ryan got me a foot massager with heat and a back massager with heat for Christmas.. All fun things. After Christmas everything was kind of scattered. My DVD player was anywhere I wanted it to be, My foot massager was downstairs and my back massager was upstairs. UNTIL...One day I came home and Ryan figured it out for me. He put everything in our home office. My massager on my computer chair, my foot massager under my desk, and my DVD player next to my computer! It was brilliant! Now, every single day I come home, I head straight upstairs and turn on the heat and the massagers get my feet and back done, check my email, and watch The Golden Girls all at the same time! When I am done, I come down and start dinner and I am relaxed for the night.. Even after dinner sometimes, I treat myself a little more. I think this is how everyone should unwind from the day!! I promised my mom pictures of how I spend my nights now.. Enjoy momma

My Portable DVD player
My nightly routine...
I suggest everyone get a heated foot massager!
My heated back massager

Happy New Year

I could not wait for this new year to come around! I had so many things to celebrate for this new year. Good health, going back to work, having energy to go out with my friends, just getting back to being me.. It has been a long time. New Years Eve started off great. We went to my family's house for dinner, then Ryan and I headed to a Little Irish pub that my friend Kent invited us to, to hear an 80's cover band. I couldn't pass that up, it was great. We danced, we sang, we celebrated our friendships, the best part of it all, Ryan and I were treated to free diet cokes all night long, we were in 7th heaven. This past year I reconnected with my friends Mandy and Kent from high school. I first met up with Mandy last May in her hometown Chicago, then later she came down and we went to dinner with our friend Kent. We have all made it a point to make sure we never lose touch again. We met Kent's new girlfriend, and also invited my friend from middle school, Emily and her boyfriend Joe. It was good times for sure. I only hope that this new year will be full of joy, good times with family, and friends. Cheers to a new year!

Emily, me, and Mandy

Me and hubby
Jen and Kent

Cheers

Santa came early this year

It is true, Santa decided to come early this year to The Sward house. Dec 15th to be exact. I reported to my Endocronologist who is also been serving as my cancer doctor. I went for a follow up visit from my last thyroid surgery and she happened to have my new pathology reports in. The way she read it off was like a Juror reading the verdict in a court room. She went through the list of tests they ran and all I heard was benign, benign, benign. What a way to turn my frown upside down. It was better than hearing the last report.. Cancer, Cancer, Cancer. It was officially announced that day that I was a cancer free girl. The only thing I have left to do now is radiation treatment, which to me, will be a piece of cake compared to the last few months of pure stress and worry, and 2 battles with surgery. Our prayers had been answered. It has not been an easy journey at all but with the support of our family and friends we were able to get through it. We had our friends from church offer prayers, blessings and meals. It was a huge blessing to us all. We are so thrilled that this journey is almost towards an end now, so we can move forward with our lives. Thanks to everyone who helped us through these hard times, it made things so much easier for us. I can officially say I am a cancer survivor, and that I have been there, done that, and got the T-shirt. My future plans are to attend Thyroid Cancer Awareness seminars, and confrences to help promote education about Thyroid Cancer. Here are a few recent pictures of my journey and if you notice the bear, his name is Mr. Beans. Mr Beans has been with me through my whole journey. Ryan brought home Mr Beans the day I had an ultrasound on my neck. Since Ryan could not be with me for all my upcoming Doctors appointments and biopsies he wanted to make sure I had someone to comfort me. Mr Beans was with me when I was scared and alone, he was a pillow to many of my tears. He comforted me every time I was sad. We all love Mr Beans!

The day of my 2nd surgery.. The day I won my battle

6:30 am my brother, me and Ryan, and of course Mr Beans

Just getting back in from surgery

My staplesThe healing

The Jacket My mom got me for Christmas.. I earned it!!

And they lived Happily Ever After...6 year Anniversary

It all started in high school.. I had a huge future planned out for myself. I was on the path to Art School in Seattle as a photographer. My dream was to always live in Seattle, go to little clubs on the weekends to see the hippest punk shows Seattle had to offer, and perfecting my pictures of the Space Needle. I never thought I would get married, it was never in the plans. I was one of those girls who just wanted to be independant and spend my time with friends...Until the summer of June 1999, I met the missionaries. A few discussions later we were talking about The Temple, eternal life, eternal marriage, and eternal family. A year after I was baptized I did get to be little miss independant I moved to Salt Lake City to get the whole Mormon experience. I loved it, but I was prompted to move back to KY as soon as possible. I decided to follow the prompting and moved back home within a week of deciding. Coming back home was great, I made new friends in the singles ward, got a group of girls together and became roomates. Then I decided in my heart that I wanted to serve a mission. I started mission prep, got my paper work, had enough money for financing, my mom took me shopping for clothes and shoes. I was READY! I thought, This is it!!

Until... June of 2002, I set up an appointment with my bishop to discuss my mission. As I sat there in excitement, he sits there and said.. I'm sorry, but I think you should stay here and take marriage prep classes and parenting classes. I was thinking WHAT!? Are you serious? I politely said, I have dated quite a few people in the ward and I know none of them are for me. He told me to start the marriage prep classes then we would discuss the mission afterwards. I agreed.

The next few days came and my roomate and I were riding around town, and just talking in conversation, when she asked me how my interview with Bishop went about the mission. We pulled up to a stop light, and I started to explain what he told me about marriage prep. As soon as I said that, I blurted out... I think I am going to meet my future husband in October. She said WHAT? I had no idea where that came from it just came flying out. - October is the month I would have been leaving for my mission. - October was also the month Ryan came home from his mission... If I had left for my mission, I would have missed out on all these blessings that were in store for me.

Ryan and I met at the temple before his mission and before I moved to Salt lake. I drove the sisters to the temple and he drove the elders. We were both standing around in the parking lot waiting. We realized we were in the same ward, we talked about him going to Nebraska, and I talked about Salt Lake.. When Ryan came to the singles ward in December he sat behind me in church, it was the first time I had seen him since he came home in Oct. I was sitting with my friend and turned around and saw him and wrote him a note on the back of a tithing slip asking if he remembered me. I had Jill pass the note back to him. After sacrament He stood up and said of course I remember you Jennifer. A few weeks later we went on our first date, the chemistry was akward because we had nothing in common, we were night and day from one another. We had a hard time communicating, but that night I knew we were going to be married. I had never had that feeling before in my life. I was just sitting there while he was talking, the feeling hit out of no where, the spirit told me. I immediatly got nervous and that made things even harder for me. I went home and told my mom that the guy I just went on a date with was going to be my husband one day 11months later on December 20th, 2003 we were sealed for time and all eternity in the Louisville, KY temple. Today we are celebrating our 6 years of marriage. I tease and say, 6 down eternity to go! Ryan is my best friend and supports me in everything I do. We have truly been blessed with the gift of marriage. I am so grateful that he was a part of Gods plan for me. We are blessed! Here are a few pics we collected over the years...


The Dating Days

The Engagement
Our wedding day

The First Year of Marriage

Early Detection is KEY!

Thought I would just blog a minute about what has been going on lately in hopes that it will get people motivated. Every month I give myself "Self Exams". In July I was doing my exam and ran my fingers over my throat area. I felt something very small and hard. I was curious about it and knew that it wasn't there last month on my own self exam. I thought it was my mind playing tricks on me or maybe it was really there all along but I just now felt it as a part of my bone. But I decided to keep an eye on it just in case. A few weeks later I was getting off a ride at the fair, I rubbed my neck and I felt it again. It felt bigger and I just knew it wasn't my mind. I started telling my family about it, but it didn't seem like that big of a deal to me. Until it got a little bigger. I started having everyone touch my neck Ryan felt it and his eyes got BIG. He said you need to go to the Doctor. The next day I talked to my boss and then booked my appointment that day. I went to an Internal Doctor, he said he felt something as well. But he had no worries he thought it was a goiter. He wanted to be on the safe side and send me for an ultrasound. That day as soon as they put the ultrasound on me, my mom and I immediately saw the thing in my throat. It looked like a little egg sitting there. By this time the lump was so big I felt like I was choking to death or something was always stuck in my throat. I was constantly lethargic, being in the sun made me really weak, I had a constant cough and my lymph nodes on the back of my neck swelled so much I had to keep a heating pad on them to ease the pain. After the ultrasound came back, the Doc referred me to an Endocrinologist for a Fine needle biopsy. When I was there it was just for a consultation about how the biopsy would go. When she saw the report of the ultrasound she did an immediate biopsy. The size was bigger than they wanted it to be. She called in people from all different departments. Radiology, pathology etc. Pathology was there to see if there were any "CELLS" if there weren't any cells more than likely it was a cyst. But he shouted out "we have cells'. They did 2 biopsies and I waited a few days for the results.

The results came back undetermined but they kept talking about follicular cells, which are cells that can grow into cancer. At that point they decided to send me to a surgeon to take out my right Thyroid. I was kind of glad it was coming out because I don't think I could have lasted much longer being so lethargic and choking all the time. The day of my surgery the Surgeon said while I was still on the operating table they will do more pathology tests on it to see if it is cancerous. He said I only had a 10% chance of it being cancer. If it was cancer they would take out my left side of my thyroid too and give me a radiation treatment and I would be done. I came out of surgery and they said they didn't find cancer but they were still concerned about the small follicular cells. They told me my official and final pathology report would be back the next week.

Wed 9-9-09 I called the office to check on my pathology report, because I knew if anything were wrong I would have to have another surgery. The nurse was confusing me, the doctor was out for vacation but she didn't want me to have to wait on the results so another Doc explained my report to her. She kept saying that all the tissue reports came back really really good for someone who has papillary carsonoma. She said that was common in people with thyroid cancer. I said great I am glad I don't have cancer. She said no dear You Do Have Cancer! I was shocked, stunned, confused, worried. I just about fell out of my chair, I was shaking. I was confused because she said the tissue was normal, which it was but the growth on my thyroid was cancer.

When I went back to the Endocrinologist they said I caught it REALLY REALLY early. If I had never done my own self exams it could have grown and spread to my lungs or my lymph nodes. I caught it while it was still the size of a PEA. My family was so excited to hear that news. And all the Doctors were shocked that I found it on my own. I was so proud of myself. I am still in recovery at home for another 2 weeks. I do know now that I won't have to go through Chemo. I still may need my other side taken out- because unfortunately it can grow back. I still may need a radiation treatment. But any advise that I can give to anyone is that Early Detection is KEY! I hope everyone will do their own exams and know there body well enough to know when something is not right.

Catching up

About a month ago Ryan was sitting in his summer school class wondering when he would get a letter from The School of Nursing since he sent in his application back in March. The next day he called admissions and they said they would be sending out the letters in about 3 weeks and that the letters would come certified so they would know that everyone got there letters. We checked the mail box daily hoping to see a notice that a package tried to be delivered. One rainy night I was checking the mail and there was a small envelope from The Nursing School. My heart sank into my chest. I thought "This is no good" the letter was not certified like they said. I came inside and handed the letter to Ryan and shook my head like oh no, I am so sorry, we were both worried. Until he read the first line and started jumping up and down screaming "YES"!!!!! I was about to faint not knowing what the letter said. It was so exciting it made our year! So now Ryan will be starting his Clinical rotations in Aug in hospitals. He will be graduating in 2 1/2 years! We can't wait! I am so proud of him. He has worked really hard and sacrificed so many things to make his dreams come true. Way to go Ryan!

Milestones and Blessings

This month marks my 10th year anniversary of being baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I was only 17 years old when I met the missionaries. I was working my boring high school part time job at Burger King one day when an elder I was serving kept asking me questions about the church. I told him I had actually seen the commercials and he asked me if he could get my info and talk to more about it. I was like sure why not, besides he was holding up my line. LOL! So a few days later Sister Buckley started blowing up my phone wanting to come over, so after the 4Th time she called me I decided to have the sisters over. The Elder at Burger King was actually driving the transfer van back to Louisville. So he wasn't even in my area.

So the day I met the sisters... I was in total awe of them. They taught me the 1st discussion and when they did I had a knot in my throat and tears in my eyes. They asked me if I would pray about getting baptized. - I had never even been to the church yet. But I knew this was for me. When I prayed I felt the spirit for the first time. I decided to get baptized. As I prayed I had a warm feeling come over me. It was more like a burst of warmth, that gave me the chills. It was very peaceful.

To give you a back ground on my life before, I was in high school, never went to church, did not have friends that went to church so my life was all about parties and being a wild teenager. With my decision, my parents were very supportive. My friends...well let's just say that since I no longer partied I didn't have friends any more. I didn't know anyone at Church but the missionaries. I was too young for singles ward. But I did it. I went to Church by myself. No family, no friends. Just Heavenly Father. It was EXTREMELY hard. But at that time I never gave it a second thought. I was in pure mission mode. I wanted to be a missionary so badly. My first calling after I got baptized was to be a Stake Missionary. I LOVED it. I felt like I got what I wanted and that was to be called to serve. I adored all the Missionaries who touched my life. I was really attached but they are the ones I needed the most. I had no one else! Joining the Church was the best life decision I have ever made. I am not sure if the missionaries knew just how much they meant to be. But Phil 1:3 says it best....I thank my God upon Every remembrance of you.

Sister Cannon and Sister Jones were my missionaries and they treated me so well and made me know that without a doubt I was a Daughter of God. And I deserved all of the blessings he had in store for me. Because of them I was able to take my mom to the Louisville Temple open house. I was able to be in the Temple when it was dedicated by President Monson. My mom was able to go with me to get my patriarchal blessing, and she was amazed at all the blessings that were to come to my life. I was able to move to Salt Lake City Utah with another convert the sisters taught, I met a lot of friends there, and I was able to get a lot of temple work done. I was able to have the want and desire to serve a mission, even went to mission prep , got my paper work. Then in my interview my Bishop told me to stay here and take Marriage Classes. I was like ummm but I am not dating anyone. After the meeting, I had a feeling I would meet my husband in the month of October. Or at least know who he was going to be. Sure enough, the month I would have left on my mission, my husband was just returning from his mission. We had met before I moved to Salt Lake City 2 years prior. I was able to make life long friends in the Singles Ward I mean life long friends as in Eternal friendship. Friends that I have an extreme spiritual connection with, like my friend Grant, we always spiritually uplifted one another. Still even do to this day. I was able to receive my endowments, and be Sealed to my Eternal companion. The blessings are endless. The blessings that I mentioned were very few compared to what I have been given.

I can't believe it has been 10 years! I still love The Gospel, times for me are still hard. It is still hard to go to church sometimes. I have gotten all my friends back from age 17. The best thing about it now, is that I can hang out with them and not be in party mode. They respect me for not drinking. Some people around me won't even drink at all because they think it offends me. That always makes me think that I am setting an example. In Harry Potter terms. They are muggles and I am teaching them all the magic, they just don't know it. I am posting a few of my milestones- these things would have never come to pass if I never made the decision to be baptized or have ever met the missionaries. To all the missionaries who were and are in my life I love you guys and think of you often. Thanks for the memories.

1st row: Sister Jones, me, Sister Cannon, Elder Shakespeare, and Sister Buckley- The missionaries who found me and taught me.


2nd Row: Sister Barnes and Sister Solongo. Elder Johnson- to this day still one of my dearest friends.


Row 3: My first trip to The Temple. This was My 1st roomate Marybeth.
The St Louis Temple.

My engagement and The day of my Sealing


Our 2 year wedding anniversary to Nauvoo. Aubrey and Jennilyn.. My two blessings
I thank God for them.


These are some things I would have missed out on in my life if I didn't have these wonderful people in my life. You never know what angels Heavenly Father will be sending your way in your time of need. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your many blessings see what God has done.