Round 5, Day 10: my morning walk

Knocking on wood, I am hoping that I am now over the worst of Round 5.  Picked up my new prescription last night for stomach pain and am hoping that I won't need to take it because the list of potential side effects looks almost as bad as the stomach pain itself.  Stomach is still off, but not as bad as it was on Thursday.  My mouth still tastes like a toxic waste dump, but I am starting to be able to drink a little more which is good because I was getting seriously dehydrated.


Went for a walk this morning and brought my camera along...here are a few pics from my morning walk around the 'hood.

Finally made it back to work yesterday.  It is definitely a good distraction.   Hoping to achieve that ever-difficult-to-achieve balance of busy and rest this weekend.

Round 5, Day 8: Aack

My stomach continues to be the punching bag for Round 5.  Have had major stomach pain for the last 24 hours.  Worked at home today for a few hours (reclining on the couch).  If not better by morning, will go on quest for more medicine to help combat this.  Seriously, the end of chemo cannot come soon enough.

Round 5, Day 6: just passing time

Round 5 is plodding along.  I think I might be getting better at Day 5 and Day 6.  Just got back from a very, very slow walk.  And went on a very short walk yesterday evening.

Although I had another meltdown (it was #5 in 3 days, at the chemo room), some good came of it.  I scored some extra Ativan -- wonder anxiety/anti-nausea pill.  But more importantly, the woman who was being treated a few chairs down from me told me she was glad I had cried in the chemo room....it made her realize it wasn't just she who felt like that sometimes.  And her chemo companion then offered to get me some food.  Very kind.  I then went onto put on a fashion show, trying on all kinds of wigs and scarves and hats that other chemo patients had donated.  Several people got really into it and I had all kinds of admirers and supporters.  Snagged a free scarf, hat and extra wig too.

Back to the couch for now.  Pics later.

Round 4, Day 21: And then there are the bad days....

Today I feel like whining a bit, so stop reading if you don't want to read whiny, not-so-upbeat Phyllis.

* * * warning, whining ahead * * *

 I am sooooo sick and tired of this process.   I am seriously dreading Round 5.  My anxiety level has been through the roof the last few days.  I think the heightened anxiety may be due in large part to impending genetic testing which I will undergo in a few weeks to find out if I  have the BRCA gene mutation which will make it super likely that I will experience a recurrence some day and be more susceptible to ovarian cancer, among others, and likely need more surgeries.

And I think I am just suffering battle fatigue.  My stomach has suffered throughout this process.  Stomach pain, IBS, acid reflux (that woke up me at 3:30 last night, it was awesome), mild to moderate nausea that continues well past a week after treatment.  Drinking almost anything tastes disgusting for about 2 weeks.  My throat and ear continue to hurt a bit.  The redness on my left breast has not completely gone away and that adds to my stress, although Dr. C thinks it's likely just edema and not anything of major concern.  And I am tired.  Despite feeling mildly nauseous for the better part of a week each cycle, I have still managed to gain three pounds or so, topping the scale at my highest weight ever.  I am tired of not having hair on my head.  My eyebrows are now coming out.  I am basically missing half of each eyebrow.  I guess the eyelashes are next.  And did I mention I am tired?  I have been having trouble getting to sleep at night over the last few weeks.  What is really frustrating is that as so-so as I feel right now, this is the best I am going to feel physically over the next three weeks.  This is as good as it gets until October.  So, I have had four crying bouts in the last 24 hours including one of those crying-in-the-bathroom-at-work afternoons where I dab my eyes with a cold paper towel and pretend that nobody will notice. Actually, I don't think anyone did notice.  The taxotere causes my eyes to tear up so, I guess that's the silver lining of that side effect -- no one pays much mind to my red teary eyes.

* * * ok, whining done * * *

Mom is my babysitter this time around.  She's bringing the entire series of Freaks & Geeks.  It will help me get through these next seven days.  And despite my anxiety and self pity and whininess, I know I will get through this.  September will come (Dad and Heidi to visit in a few weeks), as will October (grand tour of VA three weeks after last chemo).  Lots of fall hiking awaits me.  Much to look forward to.

Round 4, Day 18: Counting

I am v-e-r-y slowly counting to six, and I am almost at five.  I am feeling much recovered from Round 4 now, and in six weeks, I hope to be feeling much recovered from Round 6!

Several weeks ago, I met with a radiation oncologist to learn about my next phase of treatment.  Am going for a second opinion consultation tomorrow just to confirm recommendation.  Generally speaking, it will be six weeks of treatments, five days a week (M-F, because the cancer cells rest on the weekend).  And it will start 4-6 weeks after chemo is done, so around mid-October.

Thus will start a new phase of counting.

Speaking of October, it was pointed out to me, and then I noticed, that there may be some early signs of fall.  Here's one right down my block... just counting the days until then!! 

Round 4, Day 12: What day is it?

In about an hour it will be 8-9-10, 11:12 (and 13 seconds).  (Math geek at heart, I think that's really cool.)  But I only knew what date it was this morning by checking with my computer.  Lately I find I have no idea what day or date it is.  But I usually know what day in my treatment cycle it is.

My "middle weekend" (days 9, 10, 11) of round 4 was not such a good one side effects wise.  My stomach was seriously off and on saturday, I had a pretty bad bout of nausea while at, of all places, the massage therapist.  Took my first compazine (the extra pill for break-through nausea), since I'd already taken zofran that morning.  It did knock out the nausea, as well as me -- I was a very groggy zombie for hours after.

Yoga on Sunday (at Circle Yoga) was nice.  The women there all wanted to know how I'd been doing and I was greeted with a hug.  It's like a support group but with stretching and yoga poses.

Implementing my resolution to take better care of myself physically, I decided to work from home today.  Slept in past 9 a.m., and stopped working around 4:30.  Acupuncture and then 2 miles on the treadmill at the gym.   And off to bed for lotsa sleep.

Flashback: surgical consults

After my birthday and MRI, the next few weeks were filled with stressful surgical consultations.  March 16, I met with Teresa Harrington & Dr. Cocilovo at Georgetown.  I can't imagine more patient and compassionate medical professionals.  I learned, thankfully, that the MRI did not reveal anything in the other breast or give reason to believe that the lymph nodes were affected.  Basically, I learned all about the plan of attack -- surgery, which due to the small size of my tumor, could be a lumpectomy, followed by chemotherapy (because of my Her2-neu positive status, regardless of the earliness of the stage), radiation, and hormonal therapy.  I learned about staging, the importance of obtaining clear margins.  I learned that medically a lumpectomy + radiation is supposed to be equivalent to a mastectomy.   I learned about sentinel node biopsy, a relatively new procedure (in the last 10 years, I think), which can help avoid surgical removal of a larger number of lymph nodes if the initial nodes are negative.

I made an appointment for a second opinion with a very well regarded breast surgeon.  Suffice it to say that gathering all of my films correctly, getting to the right place at the right time and getting through this appointment managed to make a stressful few weeks even more stressful.  BUT -- I got what I came for.  Dr. #2 confirmed everything that Dr. C had said, and even pointed out to me how small my tumor was, and that the radiologist at Georgetown did a really good job of even picking it up at all.

Meanwhile, focused on trying to find things to relieve the anxiety... meditation, walking, hiking.  A few notable distractions were the Peeps diorama show at the Washington Post (I did become obsessed with peeps for a while there), an outing to hear local girl band, the Sweater Set, a concert at the Czech embassy, and Passover dinner at a friend's house to round out the month of March.

Round 4, Day 6: Not much to report

Reporting that there is not much to report.  Friday, saturday and sunday mornings went for short walks in the morning.  The weather was blissfully not 100 degrees this weekend.  The weekend went by relatively quickly with a visit from my brother, and additional visits from friends ($100,000 pyramid, anyone?).  Pete took very good care of me and handed me back off to friends today.

Have been taking the zofran proactively this time around for a longer period of time to try to prevent the queasiness.  I think that the extra week off, although not something I wanted, has made this round not as bad as it otherwise could have been.  I'm very tired, but time is passing.  In about a week or so, I will really feel 2/3 done.