Day 109 - No Steroids!

Today was a great day. No pains to speak of... well, maybe two... and they're called children! haha!

I forgot to post last week that I don't have to take the steroid dexamethasone. Dr. Luoh said if I didn't have any reaction to the taxol on treatment day, then I wouldn't have to take the dex the night before my next treatment. This is great news because the dex can make me retain water and make me more hungry. I feel like a friggin michelin man. I hope to loose the water retention weight which of course is right around my belly. I don't want the reconstructive surgeon to have any reason to do a skin graft from my stomach. I want the tissue expanders.

So, in lieu of my upcoming double mastectomy and immediate reconstruction (with tissue expanders), I've created a poll. Please participate in my non-scientific poll to the right. Would you increase, decrease or keep the same size of your breasts?

Day 75 - Round 5: New Chemo drug Taxol

Here I am... drip, drip, drip. I have about less than hour for my Taxol drip. Three hours is really long, but not as long for Brad. Sitting in that hard visitors chair... while I have a comfy cushy one that reclines. However, I would not like to have to sit in this chair at all.

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Updated, I am now home. I got into a nice conversation with the couple sitting next time in my last hour of the the drip, drip, drip. We started talking about laptops. They are in the market for one and asked how much I spent on mine and what I had. They said that someone told them to get a HP. Brad and I kind of laughed at that because Brad's brother and dad had an HP that crapped out on them. I told them that they can get a Dell like mine for 549.99. They were shocked. I told them that I have 4GB of memory and it does all the stuff I like. She does more word processing and I said that it might be best to upgrade to something like Microsoft Office. I don't have it on the computer... I have what's installed. In addition, they want to Skype. I told them that I have a built in camera and it does the trick. I even showed them the pictures that I took with it and they were surprised as to how clear it is. I think I've got them hooked on a Dell. After that we started to talk about Chemo and why were were there. She first had breast cancer about 20 years ago and has recurrences since then. Makes me nervous. But she's a very upbeat woman and she's living with it. She is also dealing with lymphedema. Her whole left arm was swollen. She said back in 1992 she had a mastectomy and they took out 17 lymph nodes! 17! But that was the standard operating procedure back then. So she doesn't have any nodes to push on or get the lymphatic system going. Eva is her name. I think her husband's name is Rick. In any case, I think that with me they are going to take out half a dozen. I think that's better odds if I get lymphodema it won't be as bad as hers. Her cancer I believe has spread to between the two breasts. It was a beautiful conversation. I liked them a lot.

So back to my treatment.

I got there at 8:45a. At 9, I had my blood drawn. Then it was wait until 9:30. I got to go back into a room shortly around 9:30. Wow! On time. I got several texts... but one of them I was desperately waiting for... a text from Shellie, as she was meeting us in the infusion room. I got that text and she went and picked up some food for us... Subway... cuz I was hungry for a meatball sub. Just as I was placing my order, the Nurse Practioner came in, Sandra. We first talked about side effects from the new medication because this is the first time I was taking the taxol. Side effects include muscle and joint pain, kind of like having the flu, my hair may grow back (wowsers, cool. I have heard about this), neuropathy (where I get tingling in my extremities... this can happen at any time, but she says it normally happens with the 4th dose), finger and toe nails will be discolored (that's happening already) and skin as well (happening already). She said that my nausea should go away and I won't have it. Next on my list was post medications... she said that if I do get nausea, I could take any of my anti-nausea meds as needed. So that's all I have to do. She did say that I will be taking the dexamethasone (steroid) the night before I have taxol treatment from here on out. Sweet! Then I would get my neulasta shot 24 hours after my treatment. Okay, this is doable. Sandra said most women ask why they do the AC first... they say the taxol should be first. I laughed and said that is so wrong, it should be exactly the way it is because then one can look forward to having a good back half of chemo. She agreed. I like her.

I got out of that appointment at 10:04. I had to wait about 15 minutes to get into the infusion room. So they were running behind. I got my favorite nurse, Nicole. I like her a lot. My first order... saline drip. Then the next thing I got... 20mg of dexamethasone, 8mg of Zofran and then a 15 minute drip of pepcid. After that I got a 50mg drip of Benadryl. Ugh. Right at the beginning, Shellie came to visit us baring gifts of food (thanks Shellie!). That was awesome since I was soooo hungry. We talked about work, treatment and kids. Shellie said I looked great for just going through AC and chemo in general. Brad got a picture of us (will post later). I also got a picture of me and Jon which is a guy who is awesome and works there too. I told him earlier that I had a surprise for him... which was Shellie. They talked for awhile. It was nice because there were several people who came up to her and remembered. :) Reminder it's been nearly 4 years since she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Our visit was short, but well worth it. By the time she left, I was getting dizzy and tired from the Benadryl. So I took a half hour nap while I had to wait for taxol. When I woke up, it was time for taxol. They started the drip... I waited up for about 15 minutes, felt no change and went back to sleep. I was tired from the benadryl. When I woke up, I had about an hour and a half left. I went pee and that's when I got a new chemo neighbor. (see above for that) Chemo was finally done shortly before 3p. I was so happy to get out of there. That was a long day. My neulasta shot is tomorrow at 4p. Sweet night.

Got home and mom had dinner cooking in the crockpot. It is so nice not having to worry about dinner. Chicken and artichokes. It was yummy. After dinner, we all did our job with getting the kids in the bath and ready for bed. Now it's quiet and I am able to update the blog.

Brad is now running out to auto repair shop, because my car was starting to shake and shimmy on the way to our appointment. After a call to Chris, they think it has something to do with fuel in my gas take. This stuff that Brad is getting is supposed to dry up the water in the tank. If it's not that, it could be the fuel injector. We shall see.

Tomorrow, I will be going to work. That's something Eva and I talked about. She said that work helps her move on with her life. I said that is the same thing I feel. I don't sit at home and wallow to the fact I am sick. We also discussed in brief about our mortality. It was nice to talk to another person about breast cancer and other stuff. They were very sensitive and knew exactly what to say.

I'll keep you posted with what sort of side effects I have this weekend. Pray and keep your fingers crossed that I won't have the nasties. Oh yes, I forgot, Sandra said that the benadryl medication... they can decrease that dosage if they find I am not having an allergic reaction. That would be good. Less time in the infusion room!

I'm tired now and want to go to bed. Till tomorrow...

and I'll post pictures when I get them uploaded.

Day 74 - Round 5: Taxol chemo prep...

Nothing much new on day 72 and 73, hence no post.

Definitely at the halfway mark for my chemo treatment. Tonight is the eve of the new stuff. Tomorrow I go in to get my dose of taxol. It should be an interesting day. Tonight I have to take a dose of dexamethasone. My nurse called me to remind me. So I asked her why I needed to take the dex. Angie said that it's a rare occurence of people getting an allergic reaction but along with the dex and a dose of benadryl, it will ward off any allergic reaction. Interesting. Then I asked her what will happen tomorrow. She said that I will get my dose of zofran, dexamethasone, zantac and benadryl. The zofran and the dex are for anti-nausea and the zantac and benadryl are for allergic reaction. I won't get emend for anti-nausea! Hooray, I guess they are fairly confident that I won't be nauseous. So tomorrow I will be tired during treatment. I find that benadryl makes me loopy. This should be an interesting day. She guesstimates that if all goes according to plan I will be in the infusion room for about 3 1/2 hours. That's not too bad. Now I know that there's no guarantees because there are always delays. But hopefully all will go according to plan. I won't be seeing Dr. Luoh tomorrow. Instead I will be seeing Sandra who is Dr. Luoh's counterpart. Along with being one of the first people in the building, maybe there won't be such a delay. One can only hope. Angie said I'll most likely be out of the building at 2:30p! Yay, before rush hour commute.

My friend Shellie also will be stopping by. She wanted to see me and I told her that I will most likely be there all day long. She offered to bring lunch. Nice. Maybe I can con her into getting Subway because I am jonesing for a meatball sub with lettuce, tomato and bell peppers. It will nice to have visitors.

My mom is in town now. Picked her up at the airport last night and she'll be here for the next week. She is here to watch the girls. Becky is on spring break and was planning to be out of town and it was a great excuse for her to come out. So far the girls are loving having her here. :-)

Hats off, literally, to Monty a.k.a. Jen! I got a beautiful hat in the mail from her today. It's gorgeous and it fits perfectly. Thanks for spoiling me. It was funny because I was just thinking that I needed some new hats. And my wish came true.

Day 64

Still riding the roller coaster. Today I took dexamethasone and a combination of compazine and benadryl. That seemed to keep the vomiting at bay. I only threw up twice! That's good, right? I felt sleepy all day though. I didn't do much at all. I did manage to get a few loads of laundry done. Now I just need to fold the laundry. But that will come later. Just laying low. I did manage to get a little food down. In the morning it was english muffin with peanut butter. For lunch I had chips and for dinner I had one of Elaina's left over chicken strips from lunch.

Day 63 - Neulasta Day

Today all I took was dexomethasone. I didn't take any other pills. I felt fine all day long. I did have one really big bout of fatigue. I cured that with a nap in my car. Then it was time to get my neulasta shot. That's about it. Same old. I did get to bed real early.

Day 52 - Dreaded Sunday

So I am attaching on to the last post that I created. I am sitting here in bed. I just took the suppository form of compazine since I can't seem to get anything to stay down. However, I do feel better than what I did yesterday and the Sunday after round 2 chemo. I feel more with it and I don't have the nausea. Funny, huh? What I do have is the urge to puke. But it's not always there... it's there just when I need to. So I took a compazine about 30 minutes ago. It's supposed to work for 12 hours. I like it better because if I have to puke, it's still in my body. Unlike taking the pill form where I could just puke it out and then it would be a moot point. I skipped the dexomethasone and the zofran. I woke up this morning feeling pretty decent. After Brad left for work, I threw up. Then I felt better. After that I had some toast and water. About two hours later, I threw up again. Most of the toast was gone, but there was a little left. Got the kids up and ready. They had their breakfast. Then Grandma Evelyn got here. I threw up again. A little more toast. Shortly after that bout, Nancy stopped by to drop off my prescription which I didn't get a chance to pick up yesterday. Thank you Nancy! And now here I am... up in bed... blogging about how crappy I feel. I am wondering what I can have to eat that won't make me wretch. Crackers? Mac n cheese? White Castle?? It's funny, when I drink water it makes me feel worse. Isn't hydrating myself supposed to make me feel better? Hmmm..

A little shout out to Kate! Thank you so much for my hat! I love the color and it's keeping my head oh so toasty warm!

Oh yes, and another ache to add to my day... my neck and chest hurt from the neulasta shot. Fun times!

*** Update***

Still hanging in there. Still throwing up whatever I put down my mouth. It's funny, it's the water that really makes me feel ill. If I drink a couple of gulps, it comes right up. But I do like feeling like this than to be nauseous all day long. At least I can put away laundry and just sit and watch the girls play. It's still a crappy day.

Right now Grandma and Grandpa have the girls. They are taking them out for some dinner. Where they are going, no one knows. They are gone. I had some jello for dinner and some mashed potatoes. Maybe that will stay down. Who knows. Still feeling like grossness.

Day 37 - Nausea and acid reflux

What a day! It started off kind of good, then went bad and then good and then bad.

Today was my first day of taking zofran. It was good for awhile, but then I took the dexomethasone. That made me feel awful. And I had to go to a birthday party. I managed to get myself ready and had Brad drive us and the girls to the party. We got there and I started feeling a little better. I was actually climbing all around the gym structures. Another off moment was the fact that I had some acid reflux going. It felt like I had something wanting to come up and out. It wasn't nausea. It was a burning sensation. So I called the on call oncologist to see if I could take Zantac for it. She approved it. Yea! The zantac helped. I had nearly a pound of mashed potatoes and gravy. I was craving something bland. All day I was having ups and downs. My final down... as I was getting ready for bed, I threw up. I felt better afterwards, but I still threw up. It wasn't much... just a little something from dinner. I took an ativan and went to bed.

We will see what day 38 brings.