Road Trippin' — Lung Story Short...

Summertime, sunshine and my one year mark. May had finally come marking my one year of new lungs. I had a pre-celebration in Minneapolis with Laima a week before while I was there for a bunch of appointments. I had a road trip for those May appointments, which I had planned to be away for about two months. The trip started the last day of April and Laima had joined to help me drive. My plans were to drive from Colorado to Minneapolis and stay for about five days for appointments. After continuing to Chicago for a few nights, then Ohio for one night, Brooklyn for a few nights and then, finally Massachusetts. I left Laima in Brooklyn with her friends, where she used to live after spending a few nights there myself. My two months in New England consisted of many many activities, such as a bachelorette party weekend for my bestie by the white mountains. Then all the pre-wedding activities and the wedding day of course which I was the Maid of Honor. I spent most of my time hanging out with friends I have not seen since I had moved away to Colorado.

Celebrating my one year lungaversary with Laima in Minneapolis.

Olivia’s bachelorette weekend, wine tasting

I also spent time with my parents since their house was home base during my travels. They probably weren't too thrilled with me being gone half the time of “being home” since I was in and out all the time. I got some time up in Maine at my aunt and uncle’s house. Spent a few weekends down in Cape Cod, camping and then another weekend with my college besties for another bachelorette celebration. I was also asked to be in another friend’s wedding, Amanda, for next August which I'm super excited about. We became besties while interning at the New England Aquarium’s animal care center years ago. I also got to see Sam Smith in concert, again. I went with my best friend Olivia and her BFF from college. Voice of an angel… just letting you know in case you were unaware. He certainly puts on an amazing show, amazing voice live!

Sam Smith with Olivia and Kelsey at the TD Garden!

Some other random things I did during my trip was meeting a few of my CF friends. I was able to meet up and hang-out with my friend Lauren who lives in Boston a few times. She doesn't have a transplant yet so I had to be extra careful hanging out with her. I was also able to meet up with my Cyster (what we call other people with CF) Ariel in Ohio who also has not had a transplant. I was also able to meet two post-transplant Cysters on my drive back to Colorado. Ashlee in Pennsylvania by the Delaware water gap for lunch and Erida in Ohio for dinner! Both in one day! Now that was a long ass day of driving, almost eleven hours by myself which was the farthest that I’ve personally driven, ever!

During my two month trip, I still needed to get labs drawn weekly. My transplant coordinator wanted me to go to an affiliate of Brigham and Women's in Boston, which I used to go to. She wanted me to go there specifically because just in case anything were to happen because they would have all my labs in their system and would be familiar with me. My levels were up and down throughout my trip. The bruising on my legs got a bit crazy during the month of May because my platelets were very low.

They're still low currently and I'm still bruising but not as aggressively. My legs still look like a gosh darn dalmatian. My WBC (white blood cell count) was low as well. Low enough to almost need those damn Neupogen injections to help promote the growth of white blood cells. Luckily, I managed to avoid needing them.

During the month of May, I magically had an appetite and I believe I was able to gain some weight. I ate a lot of pretzel goldfish and cream cheese snacks to help out the cause. Oh and cheese. Cheese helps… Then randomly I could tell me appetite started to dissipate and the struggle for eating continued. During my “I actually want food” saga I was able to stretch my stomach (Earl), once again to eat whole individual size pizzas and the whole burgers and eat everything on my plate and want seconds. See that's the life I want. I want to want to eat food. I want to think about what I'm eating next or where I want to go to eat with Laima when I go visit her in Minneapolis.

Something we now say when I go visit her there is “going on a food tour” because basically we always go to our favorite food spots. But we also go try new places that Laima has discovered. Even if my appetite isn't up to snuff, we still go and I still eat at least something. I feel like I'm going to have to make a blog post one day just about our “food tours”. I definitely have pictures of most meals we have for some odd reason, maybe to remind myself that food is yummy and I should eat. I sometimes watch shows about food to make me hungry. Hit or miss if It works or not.