A year ago!

A year ago yesterday is when it was confirmed that I had cancer! WOW what a year! Looking back now, how fast it really went. Didn't seem that way at the time. Yesterday, was the BIG snow. I spent the day hanging with Nancy and Jaxon. Watching the weather about the snow, watching the snow, taking pictures and texting about the snow, shoveling the snow, playing in the snow. SNOW, SNOW, SNOW!!!! On and off throughout the day I tried to find parallel, correlation, or meaning to the day. Something to signify that importance of the day for me. And well, I just really couldn't! It was a totally different day, with new trials and tribulations, new highs and lows, a new day...a year later. This is what a took away from it. It is a new year and it doesn't have to be a year of anniversaries of last year. It is a year about NEW things! It will bring its good and its bad, but it is a NEW year. So last year was the year of CANCER and this year, well we will have to wait and see! But in the meantime we will move forward and have as much FUN as we can!!!!!

Treatment

Hello all, well anyone who might still be reading my blog. I am actually sitting in treatment at this very moment. I am using our fancy new laptop. My results from the ECHO and DEXA tests were normal. I saw the Dr. today and she didn't have much to say. All is going well. No news is good news....right??? It is always interesting to sit here and listen to everyone, although it is a bit quiet today. I don't have to have blood work for 9 weeks and I think at that time they will do another Cancer Antigen test. It is hard to believe it has been a year since this fight began. I am so hoping and looking forward to a year of traveling and activity. We have a trip planned to Tulsa soon and then Puerto Vallarta after that! Its time to get back out there and LIVE!

The New Year

We have entered 2011. I am feeling good. Continued joint pain and HOT flashes but otherwise doing well. I just had a couple of test this week. An ECHO to see if my heart is tolerating the Herceptin and a DEXA bone density test to see how my bones are handling the forced menopause.

It is sad to go get treatment and to see all the women who have just began their journey with breast cancer. I think there were 8 of us in the infusion area at my last treatment. I believe I was the furthest along. Everyone looked so bald and so sick. I felt like I was just dropping in having a little down time in my day and they were so in the middle of all the hell.

Jen is amazing (she told me to write that) and Jaxon is .... well still being Jaxon. Today he was doing a little puzzle on his I phone and I told him I would give him $5 dollars if he could tell me who the picture was. He said "Mona Lisa", I gave him $5!

Now what?

This blog was started to keep everyone posted as I progressed through my journey with cancer. It has served its purpose, well at least it has given me a place to post and organize my thoughts. I guess by definition I am cancer free. The cancer was removed with my surgery, no cancer in the lymph nodes. I am so happy that I am finally through with chemotherapy and the surgeries are past me. It does not appear that I am having any major side effects from my Herceptin or Arimidex. I do have some random joint pain but I am not sure if I can blame it on either of those medicines. Oh and the hot flashes, well that's something I knew was going to happen.

Now it is time for me to get back to normal, well my new normal, as I like to call it. I don't think things can ever be the same. But really no matter what is going on in life things move forward and things change. I am looking forward to next year and I am hopeful that it will be full of great things........but at the same time I am waiting for the cancer to come back or be somewhere else. I am sure this has to be normal and I am also sure these fears will lessen as more time goes by. In the meantime, I will move forward, cautiously optimistic.

Where to start....

I last posted pictures of my drains. At that time I was feeling great, well as good as could be expected following a major surgery. The next week I started going back to the gym, doing some minor chores around the house, and even got one of my drains out. I decided that since my dad is ill I should take the opportunity of some downtime and go visit him in Poplar Bluff.

Jaxon and I loaded up on Thursday Nov. 11th and headed to Poplar Bluff. The next day I woke up not feeling very good. I tried to push through the day but just seemed to be getting worse. I finally took my temp. around 5 p.m. and found I was running a 101 temp. Not good when you have just had surgery and have a tube hanging out of your body.

I ended up in Urgent Care with chills, nausea, fever and severe pain along my left side. The Dr. felt I needed to be admitted to the hospital but thought I was safe to get back to Springfield. By that time I couldn't stand up without having ringing in my ears and feeling faint. My friend Lisa saved to day and drove me back to Springfield. I stayed the night at my house but Saturday was not feeling any better so I headed to the Emergency Room.

I was finally seen by the surgeon on call who confirmed that I had an infection but did not feel I had an infection in my wound!?!?!?!?! He did feel that I needed to start IV antibiotics and admitted me into the hospital. After only 2 rounds of IV antibiotics the pain in my side finally started to decrease. My fever broke on Sunday and things began to slowly get better. My physician finally saw me on Monday morning and took a sample from my drain tube to test for infection (GO FIGURE!!). It came back on Tuesday as a staph infection. Yes that is correct, staph infection in the area of my wound. Fortunately by then I was feeling much better and was ready to go home. I was released with a heavy dose of oral antibiotics that I was to take for 10 days.

When I got home (Tues 16th) I realized I didn't feel as good as I thought. I still had some soreness, my arm movement had regressed secondary to not using it for 4 days and I was scared to death that some germ was going to invade my drain tube again.

No rest for the weary, I was at the hospital on Friday Nov 19th starting my first round of Herceptin. As mentioned before, this is an infused medicine but without the common side effects associated with chemotherapy. I did have the chills that night and was tired the next day but I am not sure if this was associated with the treatment or not. Will have to wait and see what happens the next time around (Dec. 10th).

The next week flew by with the Thanksgiving holiday. I did get my other drain out on Nov. 22nd. Today I returned to work. I had computer training all day which I think was a nice transition back to work. Tomorrow will be my first day to see patients.

I have had a really hard time with the thought of going back to work this week. I did not feel ready, it did not seem that I really had enough time off. This was supposed to be my time to heal from all the !@#$ I have been through all year. Some much deserved ME time. It just didn't seem possible that it was already time to go back to work. This morning I started reviewing the last month that I have had off and realized that in the last 27 days, I only spent 6 of them truly by myself. The light bulb went off, no wonder I felt like I had no ME time...... I really didn't. So I guess ME time wasn't meant to be and I have resolved it is time to get back to "normal"........Well I am not sure things will ever be normal but I will continue to move forward. Is there really any other choice!?!?!!

Drain tubes!!!

The first picture is the drain coming out of my side. It is held in at the skin with a stitch. The other 2 pictures is were the tubes drain into. One for each side. Have to drain 2-3 times a day and record the amount of drainage.

Pathology report confirmed

Saw the Dr. this morning. He confirmed the good news of the pathology report. 12 cancer free lymph nodes, no cancer in the right breast or the ovaries and clean margins around the tumor that was left in the left breast. All very good news.

He seemed satisfied with the way everything looked. I go back to see him on Monday. He wants to get the drains out as soon as possible but I have to get down to draining about 30 cc (on each side) before he will take out the drains. Yesterday I drained 275 cc on the left and 75 cc on the right. He is hoping to get the one out on the left by Monday.

I have an appointment to see P.T. next Tuesday. I am going to learn some techniques to decrease my risk of getting lymphadema. I will also get a sleeve as a preventative measure to be used when traveling.

Post surgery

Well it is finally over, the dreaded surgeries are finally behind us. I went in Tues. morning for my surgeries and all went well. I had several visitors when I got to my room. Thanks for the visits, kind words and gifts. Sorry if I said anything weird or strange, I may have been a little drugged at the time. The overnight stay wasn't too bad. The pain was tolerable and I was able to go back to sleep after each time the nursing staff came in to check on me. They took out my catheter, IV and even gave me a bit of a sponge bath all in the middle of the night. Kind of odd but very glad to get rid of the catheter and IV. We left the hospital yesterday around 3pm. Last night I slept in a recliner and I slept pretty good. I was able to take the bandages off and get in the shower today. It was nice to take a shower, although I did get light headed and my ears started ringing. Cut my shower short but I didn't pass out. Jen let me get out of the house for a few hours today. It was nice but it did wear me out. Overall my pain isn't too bad but today I have had these sharp pains in the area of my chest. I got a copy of my pathology report today. I think everything is good, but I want to discuss it with the Dr. first before I start celebrating too much. I do see the Dr. tomorrow at 8:45. Like I said looking forward to him going over the pathology report with me to make sure I understood everything that I read. I am going to relax for a bit and then probably settle down to go to sleep. Thanks to all and to all a good night!!!!

Catching up!

I can't believe it has been almost a month since my last post. Sorry! The first few weeks I was just living a "non" treatment life and the last few weeks have been busy getting ready for Jaxon's Birthday. I will try to catch up on this month

Pink in your think:

The above is a line from a Disney Pixar Short. It has played over and over in my head this month. Pink is everywhere! Since it is Breast Cancer Awareness month, it is hard to run away from it...at the store, on TV, Runs/Walks, campaigns, I even saw pink bubble wrap yesterday?!?!?! This has mostly been positive for me, it is like everyone is out there supporting me (yes, once again my narcissism shows). But there is something therapeutic or "safe" knowing that for at least this month everyone has a heightened awareness of "the boobs"

Echo cardiogram

I had this test on Oct. 8th. It was essentially the same as when they did my baseline test before I started chemotherapy. That is good, no heart damage from the meds yet. The herceptin's (I start this in Nov) biggest side effect is heart damage.

Mammogram

I had this test also on Oct. 8th. The area where my cancer was first seen on the mammogram was still present. Doesn't mean the cancer is still there, could just be "scar tissue". We won't really know about any remaining cancer until we get the pathology report after my surgeries. No new areas were found in either breast.

Oncology appointment

I had this appt. on Oct 15th. The Dr. reviewed the above tests with me, told me my blood work was good, and basically gave me the thumbs up to proceed with surgery. We set the date when I would start infusion therapy again, November 12th or 19th (I can't quite remember). This will be the herceptin, it is kind of like chemotherapy but is supposed to much better tolerated. It is called target therapy and will target a certain "part" of my cancer. I will continue this every 3 weeks until June 2011.

Cancer walk

Oct. 16th - I think I heard that there was over 4000 people that showed for the walk. It was quite amazing and a great day to be outside walking with friends and family. Although we weren't able to stay together as a group, I so much appreciate all those folks who walked to support me! All 4,000 of them : ) Oops there was my narcissism again!

Surgery appointment

I was lead to believe that going to schedule my surgery would be a piece of cake! WRONG! I have been counting down the days until this appointment, ready to finally get the date so I could move forward with all the planning and details. I left with Nothing and did not find out the date of my surgery until Thurs. Needless to say it has been a bit of a sad, angry and stressful week for me.

Surgery

My surgeries are scheduled for November 2nd. I will be have my ovaries removed, double mastectomy, and an axillary dissection of my lymph nodes on the left side. The plans are for an overnight stay and I am planning on taking off work through Nov. 26th.

I can't really begin to process all of this surgery business. Today was Jaxon's birthday and tomorrow his party. I will focus on him this weekend and begin to prepare myself mentally, emotionally and physically next week.

Rash

I have broken out in a rash all over my body. I have had this rash two other times over the last 2 years. Yes Dr. Kukal, I suspect it might be stress related!

I will try to do better with my postings. Good evening all and thanks for the continued support

Side effects?!?!

Was I talking fondly of side effects in my last post? Well today I am cussing them. Friday afternoon after I thought I was in the clear, the evil mouth sores took up residents in my mouth once again. The dreaded, blasted evil mouth sores..... I will definitely not miss them!

I really wanted to post some pics that were taken on the last day of my chemotherapy, however, as usual my computer appears to be out witting me. Were is Shane when I need him!

This Friday was a great day and it was nice to know that it just wasn't an off week and somehow it did feel different. Jaxon had his BIG trike a thon at school and we went to a high school football game.

I ran into a friend over the weekend whose battle with cancer is much more of a struggle than mine and my dad's cancer continues to spread. Although I appreciate all the continued prayers and good MoJo, I know these folks need the prayers much more than I do.

Moving forward!

As I am making it through these side effects for the last time I try to reflect on the journey. The side effects will soon be gone and then I will have something else to focus on or even worse, nothing to focus on. I am so ready to get this horrible taste out of my mouth and yet I know in a very short time I won't even remember it. I will be glad but there is something about remembering that is important to the process. There is something about getting treatment and moving forward that is healing and hopeful. I know that I am on a much needed and deserved break. I know my body needs to recover and prepare for surgery. The majority of my body and mind is so excited about the next month, looking forward to doing things and not worrying how I am going to feel. But there is a very small part of me that feels a little stranded, a little lost. The part that needs a plan, needs something to check off the calendar, maybe the part that needs to feel the side effects to be re assured that we are moving forward.

Ok, that was deep enough! How about a shout out to my friends, family and even strangers who helped to celebrate my last day of chemo! I was greeted as I got up wobbling from the chemo chair by a mob of smiles. Nancy had lead this awesome group of people to what really is a quiet, no kids allowed area. That of course did not detour Nancy and I love her for it! The hugs, the smiles, the kind words, and the gifts were so much appreciated. I felt so looped up, I hope I didn't do anything to silly.

15 down and 1 to go!

It is hard to believe that 8 months of my life has flashed before my eyes - with the main focus of my existence being to make it to the next day. To make it through each side effect as it either knock me on my butt or just annoyed the the piss out of me. Marking off each chemo on my calendar, holding my breath every Thursday until I got the results of my blood work, and counting down over and over how long this was going to take. One more to go, it is so hard to believe that time can move so fast and yet so slow at the very same time.

We went to St. Louis this weekend. We had such a wonderful time with our friends. I am blessed to have so many people around, who have supported me through this journey.

Where to start....

I saw my Dr. on Friday prior to chemo. We have some tentative dates set, which gives us a better idea as to when the surgeries can take place. I have chemo the next two Fridays, that is it, all done! Then I will have a 2 week break. Following that, around Oct. 8th, I will get another mammogram and an ECHO. I then see my Dr. on Oct. 15th for a follow up. If all is good at that time then I will be cleared for surgeries. I will have to get with my surgeons to get the final details in place. But looking like the end of Oct.

My mouth sores were bad again so they took me off my oral chemo medicine for another 7 days. When I go back on it they are reducing my dose to 1000mg (one less pill a night). I will have to keep taking this until the day before my surgeries.

I ended up in Urgent Care yesterday. It appears I got something in my eye while doing yard work. It started hurting around 1pm and at 6pm I decided I had had enough and called nurse on call at St. John's. She recommended Urgent Care and sure enough i had got a cut on my eyeball. They gave me some medicine and told me to stay out of the sun, no TV, no computer, no reading for 24hrs. Well I have mostly followed the rules. It feels much better but I am a little worried about the fluorescent lights at work tomorrow. I have a patch, just in case. Won't I be a site...a patch, a bandanna, .....aahhrr Matey!!!

Words for the day

Caring Coworker (thanks)

Word for the day!

Mouthsores! 4 to be exact

How to spend a Friday when you're not getting chemo!

One more to go in Round #3

I have made it through another chemo session. 4 more to go, very exciting to most of my body except my breast which are starting to FREAK out! Today I experienced an increase in anxiety realizing how close I am getting to mastectomy time. I started re-researching all the statistics trying to re assure myself that double mastectomy is the way to go. Still working on re assuring myself!

This weekend was better than last weekend. Not as tired as the weekend before. My face looks horrible. Does anyone remember the guy in the movie Hellraiser, that is kind of how my face looks. Ok, well I just looked up a picture of the guy from Hellraiser and my face looks nothing like that (he has pins sticking out of his face) but that is how I feel so I am going to stick with that description.

I have been taken off my oral chemo for the week. They are trying to get my mouth sores under control. I still think they are related to my infused chemo. They seem to cycle with when I get that medicine not the oral medicine that I take everyday, but I guess we will see what happens on Wed./Thurs., that is when I usually get them.

Overall, it has been a decent Monday and I am looking forward to tomorrow, hoping my mouth quits tasting like rust. Doesn't really taste like rust but it has a nasty taste and the taste of rust seems comparable to what I have been tasting for the last 3 days. It will be over soon, usually by Tues./Wed.

What in the world am I going to do when I don't have side effects to guide my days!

Round 3

I have started round 3 and without complaining too much it has been a crummy weekend. The usual side effects but a little more tired and nauseous than round 1 and 2. My face is all broken out and I even took Tylenol PM both Fri and Sat. night. I thought this helped with the rash the last time around but rash is here is full force and I had a terrible sleep Friday night. I have new medicine that I get the privilege of taking for the rest of my chemo to try and keep away the mouth sores.

And a good note the Dr. says the tumor is barely palpable. That if you didn't know it had been there you probably wouldn't be able to find it at all.

I thought I would post some pics. I feel like all I do is complain on this blog but hopefully these pics will show that all is not that bad.

Misfits

Picture this: I bald women walking her overweight, arthritically stiff dog. Walking beside a women who is in a brace from her wrist up to her shoulder. That was us last night going for our little walks. I am sure we looked like misfits!

My wonderful sister in law took care of Jaxon all day yesterday and still has him today. It has been such a big help and we are so grateful for her assistance.

It has been interesting switching roles with Jen for awhile. She has been taking care of me for 6 months and then last year with my hysterectomy. It has been amusing and also a learning experience.

On the non constructive side of things I have thoroughly enjoyed every minute that I have been able to say "see, I told you so, know you know what I mean about........." Luckily Jen is on drugs so she has mostly found this amusing.

On the constructive side of things I have been enlightened on the role of caregiver and hopefully I will be a better patient, especially when I have my mastectomy.

Jen is doing overall good. She is in pain but she is being a trooper. I am very impressed with her. She has already done her exercises today and we have taken a few short walks since we have been home.

I am doing overall good. I feel good but have mouth sores in my mouth and all over my lips. I am using my medicine but they aren't going away. I feel like my lips have been "Botoxed" I am actually resting more taking care of Jen than I usually do when I have chemo. I feel good enough to get chores and projects done, take care of Jen in between and then I am even finding some "me" time. The moral of the story: In order to take care of myself, I must first find someone else to take care of!?!?!?!

Plastic Surgeon Visit

Although I have been looking forward to getting information, I have been dreading this appointment. I am not sure why. Maybe the stereotypes in my head about seeing a plastic surgeon and vanity. Maybe the fact that it was the last Dr I am seeing before I have to make the decision about my surgery.

I must set the stage for this appt. so that everything to follow makes since. On Wed. mornings on the way to work, I often stop by the gym and let Jaxon visit with my friend Melissa while she is teaching a fitness class. Well, little did I know that both the Dr. and the nurse I saw today are in that class.

The first thing that they both say to me when they walk in the room is in regards to Jaxon and the morning workouts. The first thing that goes through my mind on both occasions has a little to do with overexposure of my body parts to these women and the chance that I will be seeing them both in the morning! Luckily, before I run out of the room I am able to reassure myself that we are all healthcare professionals and it is not really that big of a deal.

The appointment went great. Both the nurse and Dr. were compassionate, respectful and knowledgeable. I was able to get all the information I was hoping for.

All along I have not been for the option of using my own tissue and muscle for reconstruction. The Dr. gave me 3 good reasons why she felt that this might not be the best option for me. It exactly lined up with my thoughts.

We discussed the option of implants and also the option of mastectomy without any reconstruction with the option of implants in the future if I decided that I did not like that decision. There is also another procedure that they are doing at Wash U that I might decide to at least look into further. I need to try to get some more information regarding our health insurance (it will be changing next year) and cost but I feel like I have a lot more information to help me make my decision.

No decision yet, but a little calm as came over me and I feel confident that I will be able to make the best decision and that is something I have not felt since I found out I was going to have to have a mastectomy.

I am going to try and step away from cancer for a week and focus on Jen and her surgery. Just a small hiatus but I think the half way mark is a good time for a "break"! I just hope my body, health and side effects all cooperate with me.