Starting Chemo May 2008

adrienne? how are you doing? (I've lost track of you and am feeling a bit adrift...)

Grace, Happy shopping. We,all need to splurge once in awhile and you definately deserve to spoil yourself! I got you on the list.

Kristy, so sorry about your rads. It's only one day but I completely understand.

Eddie, here's hoping they give you something. Hope you feel better soon.

Angels...yeah for completing your first week. I'm so jealous. I start Monday. 

Jean, Minnesota dontchaknow. Hot flashes have been pretty bad. I'm driving my hubby crazy with the bed sheets and blankets.

Fammy, please stay in touch with your Sept. rads but check her too. As everyone has mentioned, were all different. I also had DD (dose-dense) AC 4 x and Taxol 4 x. I had treatments on Wednesday and planned nothing over the weekend just in case. I had some bad days but overall, did pretty good, only a few days of nausea. The taxol had bad bone pain, but agin, had nothing planned and stayed off my feet. You will definately need help with your little ones. My kids are older and took care of me. Please ask for help. Your family and friends are there for you Follow doctors orders and take your meds. So sorry your here with us but welcome.

Mary 

Just a quick check-in to say hello - and yay, Karin, glad to see you back, hope the clouds continue to lift - after a hectic week at work.  The weekend should be fun (I'm taking my daughter to Stratford, ON to see a play), but I'll be off-line for most of it.  I'm *not* taking my laptop to the b&b, even if they do advertise wi-fi.

Hope all of you with sore throats and other ailments feel better quickly. 

Fammy, I'm so glad that this thread was able to provide you with reassurance.  It gets said over and over, and it truly does bear repeating, that all of us are different.  Some of us had a rougher time with the chemo, some of us had it pretty easy, for some of us (me!) the first couple treatments with a drug seemed the worst, for others the effects were cumulative: but you know what?  We all got through.  And so will you.

Linda

Don't have long, grandson has me playing Playstation 2 "Ben 10" with him, told him I needed a little break and to battle the creatures by himself till I get back. He's already in here asking me am I done yet?

Mary - Just finished rad 21 out of 34. Starting to get reddish brown at SNB site but it doesn't hurt yet.

Linda - Hope you have a great time in Stratford with your daughter.

See you all later I still have a lot of reading and catching up to do.

Linda ya goof.. Stratford is like 45 minutes from here.

Have Fun!!! 

More tomorrow, I have a date with my BF

 Love ya'll. 

xoN

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KERRY!!!  Yes, sounds like quite a man you have there, but then, what a woman he has!!  Here's to your 50th, and at least 50 more!!!

Very intriguing, Rock!  I love hearing that sort of thing.  (Not sure why, but I do.)

Noelle, dang!  Is Stratford really that close?  I did check on a map, and it looked a lot farther (I must have the world's worst spatial sense) . . . if I had known, I would have PMed you and tried to arrange a detour. 

Happy birthday, Kerry!!

Gotta go . . .

Linda

Kerry - Happy 50th birthday - you should be entitled to celebrate for at least a month!

Karin - Great to see you posting again!

Headed out for a run & catch the Komen 3 day walkers going by.  I have some pals that are walking it this year. 

Wishing everyone a fantastic weekend!

Jean

thanks a lot guys... I really do appreciate all your input... I can't wait to look back at all of this when it's all over!

Keep your prayers coming... thx! Good luck to all of you.. and once I find out when exactly I start chemo, i'll start another group.. possibly the october group... we'll c!  It's so much easier going through something so hard when you know others are going through the same thing!!

Happy Birthday Kerry! Celebrate, you deserve it. Going to the last day of the horses races today. Should be fun. Have a great day all.

KARIN!!!!!  So glad you are back, and posting again, and most of all feeling better.  I missed you, and was worried about you.

rock, you rock, it doesn't surprise me that someone wanted to get to know you better. You are a lovely person, and you deserve anything you want.  I understand about the ego...though it's been a while for me!

Fammy, welcome, feel free.  We'll be glad to be here for you thru chemooooo, but I do believe you also need to be in touch with a group who's going through it with you.  We're (Well, almost all of us) waiting for you on the other side of the chemoooo river, which you are just about to dip your toe in!!!  But we'll have a lot of good advice for you, which you can take back to your chemoooo group----you can be their guru!!!

Kerry, happy 50th!!! I'll be right there with you in November.....here's to another half-century, and not the cricket kind!  But I loved the cricket sayings and the way you applied them to yourself!

I am going out of town next weekend with my son's girlfriend--I will fly to Austin on Friday, then we will drive about 50 miles north to a little, artsy tourist town called Salado and spend two nights in a beautiful B & B--she wanted a girl trip for her birthday. We did it last year in San Antonio, and that's what she asked for this year.  Makes me feel good.  We don't get a lot of alone time, so every year we get closer.  I really love her, she and my oldest son have been together for 8 years--since they were 17 and 15--but I don't pressure them to get married.  They live together, and have three dogs, and they seem pretty happy.  We'll see....it's really difficult when you have this person in your life whom you love, and you have no control over whether or not things stay the same....here's my control issues rearing their ugly head again!!!

Noelle, you sound so good.  I used to have curly hair, but it was not natural--I got spiral perms twice a year for years.   I loved it because it was so easy.  Maybe my hair will come back curly now, post-chemo, I hope so.  My hair is naturally straight as a board but thick and healthy (or it was before it all fell out)....

Eddie, Cris, Jen, Adrienne, any one I missed, hope you are feeling better every day...

Hope everyone has a great Saturday, I am off to the library...

Love,

Sue 

Hey girls,

It's been a heck of a week and only got worse at the end.  Here's the summary version.

On Monday afternoon, dh states that he has a scratchy throat and by Tuesday morning, it's so sore that he can't talk.  He spent all day in bed and on Wednesday went to the doctor and found out he had bronchitis!!  Even more terrific.  So the girls and I spent the week at my mom's.  Katie is prone to pneumonia and I didn't want her exposed, and I couldn't be exposed for obvious reasons.  He is better now, by the way.   

So, we got through all that and yesterday, I dropped my mom off at her church as she was going on a weekend retreat with the ladies to Santa Cruz.  About an hour later, she called me and told me that my brother (not the one who lost his wife last month), had been scheduled for an angioplasty yesterday morning, but was now being kept in the hospital over the weekend and is having bypass surgery on Monday (Sept. 22).  When I talked to him later that day, he told me one artery is completely blocked and the other is 80% blocked.  Sigh.  So I drove to King City, about 40 miles from us, where the ladies had dropped my mom off and brought her back home.  She is now on her way to Las Vegas to be with my brother and sister-in-law.  Please pray the surgery goes well and that my sister-in-law can handle the stress.  She has had her own medical issues for several years and is rather frail herself.

Since my mom is my primary caretaker of my girls during the week, it is always stressful and hectic when she is gone.  Not to mention, I'm rather worried about my brother.  Up until about 6 weeks ago, his primary diet was meat and beer.  However, to his credit he changed that dramatically when he didn't pass his stress test.  But you can't undo 35 years of eating that way in 6 weeks.  Other than that, he's in fairly good health (no chronic conditions), so I think he'll make it through, but it is major surgery and that's always scary. 

Sorry I'm not commenting like usual on everyone - I just don't have it in me today.  I did read everything and missed you all on the days I couldn't check in.

Cris,

I agree, take care of yourself.  It's easy to take on the whole world again, but you ain't well yet, sister.  I wish good things for your brother and his wife, your mom, your dh and YOU.

rock, I mostly got reading for escape books at the library--a new one by Chris Bohjalian, a cookbook, some books on cd for the commute, other not-so-memorable stuff.   I'll let you know if any of it is good.  I basically read a book every day or so--if I am waiting in line, on my lunch break, for 1/2 hour in the morning and at night, most of the weekend, you get the picture.

Readingly,

Sue 

Noelle -- so, um, you know, just a casual question, like... about how long did it, you know, take to go from, kinda shadow-like eyebrows to, um, something like "almost normal"?  you know, like, days or hours? You know?

** ps noelle sweetie-boots. i think i'm gonna make an announcement around oct 31 re: getting people to click on el book and see if it creates a little boost on amazon.  i am convinced their rankings are completely rigged.

****

Cris. An IMPORTANT QUESTION.  Where do you think your daughter got her gymnastics talent? I ask this as a person who never got the hang of even a basic front roll (tho there was a period where I could do a handspring and a headspring).

Karin

I am so, so glad you are back and even more, more, more sorry my troubles with dh drove you away. I apologize, dear one, and promise to keep that to myself from now on. I will be more careful and I am sorry about being too open. If I'd known it would make you stop posting, I never would have said anything. Again, please accept my apology.

Kerry,

Happy, happy, happy happy birthday.