And I’m back, for real and regularly.
Yes it was an amazing year, and one that I’m wanting to share, especially given my failure to do so in “real time” (hehe) as has been my custom.
Last you heard from me that Karen was very pregnant and due on October 12.
Our little girl, Adia, arrived on October 6 after we learned she was breech two days previous. We had an abrupt welcome to parenthood as she got a Staph infection in the hospital and subsequently spent five days in the NICU with 20 per cent of her skin blistering off. She recovered, but her parents are still a little scarred, I think.
And, due to her breech position, her hips were dislocated, which meant she wore a harness for four months, literally all the time (bathing and diapers were a challenge!) and a night-time brace for three more months.
These were relatively minor obstacles in hindsight, but they didn’t seem that way at the time.
Today Adia is a happy, very healthy, extremely out-going, fun little girl. She turned one on Saturday and we had a great birthday party with some of her friends–just the close ones. We couldn’t include the millions of friends she makes every time we go to the grocery store.
Amazing how your definition of birthday party changes in just a year. A little over a year ago, I’d likely be talking about an all-night party with a very late sleep-in. Even in my survivorship state, birthday parties were a good excuse to get out and pretend I was still in university. Now it means being up at 6 a.m. for the day and in bed by 10 that night.
Adia has certainly been the major highlight of the past year, but not the only one. I learned just how well I can function on next to no sleep, and I found a whole other gear between increasing demands at work and an exponential increase in demands at home as the pace picked up.
My health continues to be solid since I recommitted to the gym and continue to work to find balance. I got back to the soccer pitch this summer and learned that I’m neither as quick, nor as durable, as I once was. How much of that is related to cancer? I don’t know. There’s room for improvement on my conditioning that’s for sure.
RealTime Cancer is making great progress, but for the past year or two it doesn’t seem as “great” as I’d like. Perhaps much of this is related to my lack of patience, but I feel we have been due to take a huge leap forward, and that just hasn’t happened yet. It will, I know this, but I can truthfully say that for the first time in my professional life, my professional life hasn’t been as fulfilling as desired.
It is as simple as my daily activity is spent doing too much of what I don’t like, and not enough of what I love. My belief is also that the things I love are the things at which I excel, and the things I don’t like are things I’m not very good at. My inexperience at building an organization is certainly a major reason behind this, and (fortunately) I do learn, and I am slowly working toward getting my professional life back to where I have envisioned it for so long.
My life is a miracle–even just the fact I’m here to write this is amazing–but the birth of Adia really brings that to another level. It is something I sit with and wonder about often.
Having said that, would you believe me if I told you that Karen is pregnant again? Yes, the craziness continues. I often joke with Karen that I’m going back to schools with a much different message this year, something along the lines of “if I can do it, anyone can, so wrap it up!”
Kidding about the different message, but yes, I continue to sit in wonder and amazement as life spirals incredibly out of control.
And on that note I’m going to shut this down, but I will be back again soon.
Always…
Live life. Love life.
Geoff
