At the beginning of December, we celebrated Miri's first birthday! I know everyone says this about their kids, but I'm joining the chorus that I truly cannot believe that it's been a whole year since she was born (although when I think about what was going on at the time and look at pictures it feels like a lifetime ago). She is such a gift to our family and I find myself staring at her in disbelief on a daily basis...I still can't believe that she's here and alive and thriving. I'm in awe of the Lord's generosity to us. 😭 She is doing fantastic -- apart from a little constipation (poor baby!) she's our first legit hands and knees crawler and is starting to pull up on things all over the house, I'm sure she'll be cruising soon. She's chattering and saying "mama" and it makes me so incredibly happy! 😍 She is such a snuggly mama's girl and it's amazing to me that we have such a strong bond even without the nursing relationship (when we were having all the up's and down's and challenges with nursing I knew logically that our bond went beyond whether or not I was able to nurse her, but of course there's that part of you that makes you doubt whether or not it'll all be ok in the end). We were able to make it a few weeks past her birthday on exclusively donor milk -- such an incredible and unbelievable gift from the Lord through so many amazing mamas! I know I've said it a million times, but the whole donor milk experience was so insanely humbling and gratitude-inspiring...I don't think I will ever be able to fully articulate how thankful I am for all these generous women who fed my baby when I physically could not. By the end, we had over 20 women who gave us milk, ranging from some of my closest friends to connections through friends and family to complete strangers. I wanted to publicly thank and honor these wonderful women:

• Molly
• Lydia
• Alex
• Kristen
• Katie
• Julie
• Ella
• Abigail
• Margaret
• Bridget
• Rachel
• Skylar
• Jacqueline
• Mary Cate
• Ellen
• Mary Kate
• Amanda
• Rachel
• Catie's sister
• Elise
• Emily
• Carrie
• Jessie
• Jessica
• Danielle

I'm so unbelievably grateful for them. 💕

In terms of me -- I'm doing well overall! Feeling good for the most part and bopping around as usual (haha). At my January follow up, Dr Hanna said she felt like my estrogen levels had been reliably suppressed for long enough to switch meds (surprise!)! I was on tamoxifen daily, now that will be replaced by arimidex daily and we're adding in verzenio twice a day. The arimidex works in post-menopausal women to interfere with estrogen and cancer cell growth. I'll likely be on it for 10+ years and the side effects are menopause-y things like hot flashes (like I'm already experiencing!). Verzenio used to be used for stage 4 patients but has been shown to be helpful for people who have a high risk of recurrence. It's only taken for 2 years and has potential for more disruptive side effects like diarrhea and low blood counts. I felt pretty nauseous all day after my very first dose but since then have been feeling fine, thankfully. Please pray that my hormone stay suppressed (the new meds don't work if I'm not post-menopausal and Dr Hanna said she does have some concern that because my ovaries are so young they'll try to make a comeback and break through the meds) and that I continue to have minimal side effects. In other news, Dr Hanna also told me this month that apparently my baseline DEXA scan pre-hormone therapy showed that I have osteoporosis! Very odd that I would already have that this young and we were both quite surprised! I've already been doing all the treatments with vitamin D and calcium and IV zometa every 6 months (if you remember, I felt like crap after my first infusion of that but I recently got it again and felt fine, thankfully). Working on getting my weight-bearing exercise in on the regular too! Oh, I don't think I mentioned this before, but Eric and I ran a half marathon together in November! We had such a great time training "together"/at the same time and running the actual race together. I was just so thankful throughout the whole process to be at a place where my body was able to do the training and achieve that goal. Another huge gift from the Lord that I don't take for granted. When I told Dr Hanna about our run, she said "well if that's not a picture of health then I don't know what is!" I also just had my 18 month post-surgery follow up with Dr Crawford and he's happy with how everything is progressing and didn't find anything concerning on physical exam. Praise God.

I'm just feeling really thankful these days. Life feels really sweet and I'm frequently overwhelmed by what a gift the quiet mundane of the every day is. I'll take as many "boring" days as the Lord will give me. I'm trying to fight the sneaking fear that something terrible is right around the corner and stay present in the moment (and have been mostly successful in that). Just so thankful for life and health and each of you beautiful people God has put in my life. 💕 All glory be to God!