Cancer Sucks

My mom was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer back in October. Breast cancer is generally pretty treatable, but triple negative is more aggressive, fast growing, and more complicated to treat. The good news is that it responds really well to chemotherapy and if she goes into remission, it is less likely to come back later. She went through chemotherapy this winter, and had a double mastectomy in April. She's still recovering from the mastectomy, but not even that could keep her from going to Quilt Market this week, just 4 weeks after surgery! She will still need to go through radiation and reconstructive surgery, but I'm feeling pretty good that the two seemingly hardest parts are over. 

My mom has been so optimistic the whole time she's had cancer and that rubs off on the rest of our family. It was hard to see her lose her hair and be so sick, but because she has a good attitude, it's less scary for the rest of us.  We feel like this experience has brought us closer together and we have seen so many miracles.

Her hair is even growing back! 

The Finley Fam

Best Dad Ever

A lot of wives say that their husbands are going to be the best dad, and I'm going to say it too, but my husband really will be. If you've ever met Riley you'd know that he'd rather be holding a baby or playing with the kids than hanging around adults. And he is a total baby whisperer. Seriously. Babies love him. And he loves them. He's already planning on teaching our little boy how to fix leaks and ride a horse, so he'll be all set for life.

Riley's been wanting a baby for a long time and I can't wait for him to meet our little boy because I know he will just want to do everything for him (which will make my life easier). I married a really good guy and I just love him to pieces.

Good thing we had a new niece and nephew last year, right?

Baby Lyman at 20 Weeks

We had our 20-week ultrasound on Thursday and everything went great. It made us feel better to know that 1) our baby was, in fact, a boy (I was a bit skeptical after our 16 week appointment) and 2) that he looked healthy and normal. Not deformed. All ten fingers. Enough fluid. Etc. The best part about it was that Riley was literally on the edge of his seat the whole time saying things like, "this is amazing!"  and "that is so cool!" He looked like he was about to cry; it was just the sweetest thing.

Baby Lyman waving to us 

When we first got married, people told Riley to just wait 6 months and Talia will want to have a baby. The funny thing was that right around 6 months after we were married, he's the one who wanted to have a baby. I was definitely not ready, so we waited to try until we'd been married about 2 years. I was still kind of nervous about having a baby (our lives would change so much and I just loved our life the way it was) when we first started trying, but when we had a hard time getting pregnant I felt so bad that I'd made him wait and now we had to wait even longer. When we finally got pregnant, though, instead of being a bit apprehensive like I was at first about having a baby, I was just plain excited. We're not nervous that having a baby will be hard while Riley's in school (he graduates this month!!),  or about not having enough time just the two of us, or about pregnancy being hard, but we're just excited. I think Heavenly Father had the perfect timing for us.

So far I've had the easiest pregnancy of all time. I have never had morning sickness and didn't start really showing until 20 weeks (wore maternity pants for the first time this week. Hey yo! They are sooooo comfortable!). The only symptoms I have are peeing a lot, being tired sometimes, and my back hurts like crazy when I sit for too long. I thought for sure I would have terrible morning sickness like my sister but I felt totally fine. Everyone tells me I'm lucky, but when I never felt sick, we were worried that I might miscarry. I'd heard there's a higher chance of miscarrying if  you're not sick,  but once we made it past the 1st trimester, we felt much better.

I just know that because I've had a great pregnancy (I hope this I doesn't jinx it!) that I'm going to have a hard labor and/or a terrible baby. Haha. It can't all be easy, right? But we are so excited we don't even care.