Always remember that the future comes one day at a time - Dean Acheson

Hello,

         I'm Jill. I love music, laughing, cats, family and the colour yellow, among many other things.

         I've decided to do this little blog as a type of diary, journal...something like that. In my tween-age years I used to write in my diary every single night. I usually filled one to two pages! Every night! That's like...a lot of words! Goodness knows what I thought was so interesting about my days.
        I imagine if I tried to write a diary everyday now, at 23 years old, it would be something like..."Dear diary, so I got out of bed today...went to work. it was ok. I had sausages for dinner. I can't remember what happened in between."

        So you'll be happy to read that I am not going to write everyday when I have nothing to say on this blog!

        Anyway, so just over one year ago, I got married to my best friend and it was awesome. 2012 was a crazy year for us and our families. There were good things and bad things, there were awesome things and horrible things. It was an emotional roller-coaster of a year for all of us. But we started 2013 with high hopes. "This is going to be a good year" we all said. 

       It started off well. 

       My husband, Jacob, was almost finished his first year of being a Probationer Paramedic, and he was stationed less than one minute away from our house. Very handy. However in Jacob's second year as an Ambo, we would most likely be sent out country. So we started looking around at all the country stations in NSW. We made lists, gathered statistics (Statistics is another thing I love by the way), looked at houses, prepared our families that we may be moving 6+ hours away, and started imagining our new country life!

       Our imaginary country life was forming up to be pretty sweet. We had a dog, a cat, chickens, a cute old house, we would have a little Bed and Breakfast for our families. I'd do more art and craft. Some DIY around the little cottage. 

       Yes, something like that, throwing a few chickens in the mix. (yes, I was very optimistic)

       This is when I thought I should make a blog. I'll have so much time to do stuff! 

       However, six days before we had to hand Jacob's preferences into the placement people at Jacob's work, I went to the doctors about some little lump on my neck, and this is where our plans got flipped, squished and thrown right out the window.

        After being sent for a blood test and an ultrasound on my neck lump I got the phone call I'd never really expected. I was standing in the kitchen holding my bowl of 2 minute noodles when I answered the phone. The doctor told me "It looks as if you have a tumour". 

        It is quite startling hearing those words about yourself in real life, and not just in the movies. I didn't know whether to say "It's not a tumour!" in my best Arnold Schwarzenegger voice, or simply smash my bowl of noodles on the floor. Instead I went to my husband and had a little cry on the bed.

       Now it is about three weeks later and I have had many tests: core biopsies, CT scans, bone marrow biopsies and numerous blood tests. The doctors are fairly certain I have Hodgkins Lymphoma, but we are still awaiting more tests I am yet to have, such as surgery in two days to take out a lump and study it (not that excited about that). Anyway we are hoping to find out the exact diagnoses next Thursday (fingers crossed).

        So now our plans have significantly changed. I'll be most likely needing treatment such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy, as well as organising IVF stuff to preserve some of my eggs (ew) just incase the chemotherapy leaves me infertile. This means that we won't be moving out country for the mean time. We won't have chickens and dogs and cats and our own little cottage, but that's ok because things change.

         I figured that I might as well start this blog anyway. I was always waiting for something a little different and interesting to happen to me so I would have something to write about, but never really expected it would be this.

        While I will be writing about my health on here, the main purpose for this blog is for me to try new things, get off the couch and start painting, start sewing, start cooking and crafting. 

        So here I go.... x