Well here I am. The day I stressed and worried over for 6 weeks. Is it working? Is it worse? We'll know tomorrow. So no matter how little I sleep tonight, how much I worry, or how much dread I feel, tomorrow will come. I'll have an answer and a plan and life will go on. But to get to tomorrow, I have to get through tonight, and tonight is the killer.   "Results Eve" is by far the most stressful time to get through in this whole cancer journey. You know something is coming. You just don't know what. It starts about the time your day starts winding down. You get through dinner, you ..read more

I had my first treatment January 3rd. I went into it fully thinking I'd fly though this year and it would be a breeze.  Well shot that theory down within 3 days haha.  I began having chest pains Thursday night and by Friday night was in the ER. Every time I took a breath it was like being stabbed by knvives. Luckily, it wasn't a pulmonary embolism and was just pleurisy. But good heck does that hurt. :|  The days after that are when it started getting worse though. My entire body began aching and I was so fatigued I literally couldn't get out of bed. I'm not gonna lie, those few ..read more

I've had so many of you asking when I was going to blog again. I find great therapy in writing and blogging is a great place to update everyone in once place. So here we go again... :) December 8, 2016. That's the day I found out melanoma wasn't done with me yet. I had made it through 3.5 years of being NED (no evidence of disease). This is a huge deal in the melanoma world. For those 3.5 years every scan I held my breath. Every scan I didn't sleep for nights before. Every scan I pictured the worst. Not this one though. I thought so little about this scan I forgot I even had them coming up. D ..read more

I ended cancer treatment just over a year ago. In 100 years the memories will still be there. It never really goes away. I still remember the sounds, the smells, the nausea. The empty feeling that lingers deep down. The feeling of helplessness that comes over everyone's faces. It was a long and hard fight. I won.    Some days I wonder who I'm kidding though. Won? No. Not me. I don't see a winner in the mirror. I see sadness. I see a broken and beaten body. I see everything I lost.  Today I was brushing the hair on my head. I say that because it's not my hair. My hair was long ..read more

Lots of changes in the Dixon family. We almost moved to Iowa.. and then Virginia was a possibility.. then we some how ended up in Texas. All I know is there is no mistaking we are where we were supposed to be. The past year has brought us so many trials. However, the blessings that have come from those trials are too many to be counted.     I sadly had to leave the Huntsman behind when we moved. My new hospital is MD Anderson, 4hours away from where we live. Leaving my doctors at the Huntsman was an extremely hard decision. I grew to love them so much and I trust them immensely.  ..read more

One year ago today I took this picture. About 10 minutes later the phone rang and my life changed forever.   Ever since then my life has been a whirlwind. Hospitals, chemo, being so very sick, tired, doctors, needles, 4 surgeries, ambulance rides, losing my hair and fearing for my life. It's also... been filled with kindness, wonderful friends and family, new friendships, a new perspective on life and lots and lots of love.   One year ago was the worst day of my life. But because of that day I've been blessed with so many of the best days.   So thank you cancer. Thank you for o ..read more

What's seven? Seems like a relatively small number. But it's huge when it refers to lives. 7 lives. That's how many people (that I'm aware of) have been diagnosed with some form of skin cancer because of my story. They heard my story and got their skin checked just to be safe. Their whole life changed because of that.  These 7 people are the whole reason I started this blog. To make people aware. I never understood how serious skin cancer was until that horrible day I sat in the doctors office. I waited too long. There were so many signs and I ignored them all. So if I'm going to have th ..read more

Such a long absence from blogging! I took a little vacation.. Not literally.. Just a brain vacation :)  Totally unintentional, but so needed. After I finished up chemo I was exhausted. Mentally and physically. I got out of the hospital and pushed all thoughts of cancer out of my head. I focused on recovering and spending time with my family. After spending months of only thinking about all things cancer, it was a necessary thing for me to do to fully recover. I'm still not 100% yet. I get tired really easy, sometimes my body still hurts.. But I am now a survivor!!!!!  Chemo was awf ..read more

This is a post I've been trying to write for so long. I can't ever seem to get the words to come out right though. So I ignore them and some how the words bubble back into my head. I decided it was time to write them down even if they only sound right to me. It's time. I'm coming to a close on the treatment side of my melanoma. No one knows how scary this is for me. I will then head to a world of scans and waiting. No one knows how scary the scans and waiting are. Even scarier than treatment. When I'm doing treatment, I'm DOING something. Being proactive. When that's done... I spend the rest ..read more

"In the Gospel of Jesus Christ you have help from both sides of the veil and you must never forget that. When disappointment and discouragement strike... You remember and never forget that if our eyes could be opened we would see horses and chariots of fire as far as the eye can see, riding at reckless speed to come to our protection." - Jeffrey R. Holland What a comforting statement. I bawled buckets after reading this quote. Not only have I felt the strength of the words on paper, I've lived through them. Our family has been the recipients of such kindness and love that it could only come f ..read more