Ok, everyone. I told you I would do it. Now I have. If you're on Facebook, you can see videos of me being doused with very, very cold ice water EIGHT TIMES! I want to publicly recognize the following people, who have donated at least $50 to my LLS Light the Night fundraising campaign:
Richard and Joy Mann
Sarah Moon
Mel and Lori Roper
Russ and Nancy Merrill
Larry and Becky Ottesen
Jan Hayes
Bill Floyd
Tim and Rebecca Riggs
THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!
I can't really say it was a pleasure to have eight tubs of ice water dumped on me, but it was worth it, and I'm willing to do it many times over. Cancer sucks - BAD - and anything I can do to help the LLS support more leukemia and lymphoma patients like myself, and fund the research that is saving lives every day, is absolutely worth the discomfort I felt for a few minutes.
To watch the videos (which are too large to post here on my blog), go HERE and HERE.
Here's hoping I can buy a lot more ice for this cause over the next three weeks until the Light the Night Walk. Please help if you can. Every dollar counts. You can make a contribution to my personal fundraising efforts HERE, or to my team, "Philpott's Fighters," HERE.
Let's keep those bagged ice companies in business!
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Thursday, September 4, 2014
Light the Night with Music Update
Well, with two weeks to go before my benefit recital for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's Light the Night Walk, we've raised just under 10% of the $3,000 we hope to raise for the LLS. We still need lots of help to reach our goal. The LLS is so important to me and to the thousands upon thousands of patients who are diagnosed with blood cancers every year. They provide ground-breaking research for life-saving medications, marrow transplant advances, and tremendous financial support to patients like me. My family would not have been able to afford all of my medicines (at one point last year I took over 45 pills a day) without the financial assistance of the LLS. Now I just want to do what I can to give back. I have made a donation as a show of my own commitment. Please join me.
To make a donation, please go HERE. Please be as generous as you can.
If you plan to attend the recital (hopefully everyone in the Salt Lake area will), please note in the "Your Message" box how many seats you would like reserved for you. The earliest donations get the best seats. =0) The flier with all of the detailed info about time and location is in my post from August 17th.
This is so important to me. If you're grateful that I'm still around, please make a financial contribution to show it. Here's a little incentive...
Everyone on Facebook has seen by now the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. Well, something I will do for the LLS is dump a bucket of ice water on myself for every $50 (or larger) donation made to my or my team's page. Sarah Moon and my parents have already made that 2 buckets of ice water. I'll post the videos on Facebook and here. I hope to get frostbite from all of the ice water I'll be dumping on myself! I HATE BEING COLD! If this doesn't prove my determination to see this through, I'm not sure what will. Please help.
To make a donation, please go HERE. Please be as generous as you can.
If you plan to attend the recital (hopefully everyone in the Salt Lake area will), please note in the "Your Message" box how many seats you would like reserved for you. The earliest donations get the best seats. =0) The flier with all of the detailed info about time and location is in my post from August 17th.
This is so important to me. If you're grateful that I'm still around, please make a financial contribution to show it. Here's a little incentive...
Everyone on Facebook has seen by now the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. Well, something I will do for the LLS is dump a bucket of ice water on myself for every $50 (or larger) donation made to my or my team's page. Sarah Moon and my parents have already made that 2 buckets of ice water. I'll post the videos on Facebook and here. I hope to get frostbite from all of the ice water I'll be dumping on myself! I HATE BEING COLD! If this doesn't prove my determination to see this through, I'm not sure what will. Please help.
Eye Surgery. Ugh!
Darned Prednisone! I thought all you did was suppress my immune system and make me fat!
Once upon a time - about a year ago - my body began to balloon from 170 pounds to nearly 250 pounds over the course of a couple months. This was all thanks to a steroid I had to take called Prednisone. Fast forward to yesterday. I sat down with an ophthalmologist to see why over the past few months I've noticed blurred vision in my eyes, and particularly in my left. Well, as it turns out, my prolonged exposure (about 6 months) to high doses of Prednisone along with my acute illness (leukemia, if anyone is still unclear) have given me cataracts well before the age when they typically develop for those who get them. My vision isn't so bad (yet) that I need cataract surgery immediately, but I will need it eventually.
Cataracts are basically clouded lenses inside the eye, causing (in my case) blurred vision. I have a follow up appointment with my ophthalmologist on December 3rd to see how things are looking. He says my cataracts could advance slowly or quickly...it's hard to know because of the cause of the cataracts. With cataract surgery, the lenses inside my eyes will be broken up and suctioned out, then replaced with synthetic lenses. Super fun. They'll do one eye, then wait a couple weeks before doing the other. After the surgeries, I'll probably at least need reading glasses. My vision insurance won't cover the surgeries. Hopefully my medical insurance will, because they're not cheap. Bummer.
In other news, I'm still working for Be The Match and loving it. It feels so good to be doing something day-in and day-out that can make a difference for other blood cancer patients. I've run 8 drives, adding over 250 new people to the Be The Match Registry, and generating over $4,000 in fundraising. And I'm still learning how to do what I'm doing. It'll only get better from here.
Lastly, I'm in the final stretch run of tapering my Cyclosporine (immunosuppressant drug). After I'm off of it completely next month some time, we'll be able to make plans to re-immunize me. That's a big deal. Here's hoping my taper continues to go well without any GVHD. Fingers and toes are crossed.
Once upon a time - about a year ago - my body began to balloon from 170 pounds to nearly 250 pounds over the course of a couple months. This was all thanks to a steroid I had to take called Prednisone. Fast forward to yesterday. I sat down with an ophthalmologist to see why over the past few months I've noticed blurred vision in my eyes, and particularly in my left. Well, as it turns out, my prolonged exposure (about 6 months) to high doses of Prednisone along with my acute illness (leukemia, if anyone is still unclear) have given me cataracts well before the age when they typically develop for those who get them. My vision isn't so bad (yet) that I need cataract surgery immediately, but I will need it eventually.
Cataracts are basically clouded lenses inside the eye, causing (in my case) blurred vision. I have a follow up appointment with my ophthalmologist on December 3rd to see how things are looking. He says my cataracts could advance slowly or quickly...it's hard to know because of the cause of the cataracts. With cataract surgery, the lenses inside my eyes will be broken up and suctioned out, then replaced with synthetic lenses. Super fun. They'll do one eye, then wait a couple weeks before doing the other. After the surgeries, I'll probably at least need reading glasses. My vision insurance won't cover the surgeries. Hopefully my medical insurance will, because they're not cheap. Bummer.
In other news, I'm still working for Be The Match and loving it. It feels so good to be doing something day-in and day-out that can make a difference for other blood cancer patients. I've run 8 drives, adding over 250 new people to the Be The Match Registry, and generating over $4,000 in fundraising. And I'm still learning how to do what I'm doing. It'll only get better from here.
Lastly, I'm in the final stretch run of tapering my Cyclosporine (immunosuppressant drug). After I'm off of it completely next month some time, we'll be able to make plans to re-immunize me. That's a big deal. Here's hoping my taper continues to go well without any GVHD. Fingers and toes are crossed.
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