Starting Chemo February 2009?

Janice.  You dont deserve that  you are a good kind person.  Hang in there, what comes around goes around.  

webbie  I do the same with the ketchup bottle.

I love the rainbow head.  you crack me up.   

Webbie -

I LOVE IT!!!! Lay it on for all the world!!!!

And if  you DON'T, kick that bitch's ass REAL HARD and DEMAND that she buy you a WIG!!!!!!

P.S.  I think my "date" tonight MAY have been GAY!!!!1 

OMG  You poor thing

Have you DH tell them dinner is whatever they bring.  You are not there to wait on them.  If they are not much help then they need to go home. 

WEBBIE  I am loving your road to hell blogg

i made my own ice mitt thingy today.. a ziplock bag filled with crushed ice (conveniently located in the chemo room and a towel.  i just kept my hands cold. 

who knows if it worked.  I'll continue to do that tho i forgot to ask Dr. Onc. if she knew of any published studies.

(i love the Road to Hell too).

Hi all, amazing to read so many stories, so much going on.My heart goes out to you all who are in such discomfort (physically and emotionally). I haven't posted in what seems to be quite awhile but may only be a week or so, actually I think I last wrote on page 39 or 40. First off I want a Nobel Prize to be awarded  to the inventor of vaseline. It's been my lifeline this past week since TX 3. SE  galore. My mouth corners (do we have corners there) were both cracked so it made it hard to open my mouth which made it hard to see the thrush. The pain in my mouth is none to fun especially when brushing my teeth or taking thrush medicine. Right now my face is so blotchy the blotches are having a contest to see whose biggest. Of course the timing on all of this is great because I'm catching a plane at 6 am or should I say in just about 6 hours from now to go see my family to celebrate my dad's 80th birthday. The hubby and I are flying to Minneapolis and will be there for the long weekend through Monday. But back to my bitch list. My taste buds are clamoring for an orgasmic experience but instead pretend they remember the richness of chocolate and the satisfaction of good pizza. I think I taste the food but it's not quite there. I've decided to convert to being Southeast Asian because I absolutely love Vietnamese and Thai food now. Somehow the richness of flavors is reaching me. Being a vegetarian I have always had limited choices when going out to eat but I've been pretty successful with these two cuisines. I'm actually feeling much better as of yesterday after a myriad of symptoms. Timing wise I'm pretty pleased that I'm won't be flying and traveling with no energy and some distress. So although I'm looking like crap with a blotched face I can still be social and happy. Thanks to the March strand person yesterday who posted about the beautiful scarves at goodwishes@franceluxe.com.  Their scarves are beautiful and the owner, Laurie Erickson, is quite the sweetheart with giving away these beautiful works of art to us baldies with cancer. It really is worth a look, see. As I'm sure with many of the women here who read this strand on a regular basis but don't post much this is a very meaningful place to be and a great place to learn a lot. So heres to all of ya. Here, here!

Hello Fabs---I am finally feeling much better this morning.  I slept without the aid of any pill and was glad about that.  I dragged myself to work cause I need to.  So glad I have tomorrow off......

I took Ice packs with me during the taxotere.....No one even commented about it.  Itis good to know about only putting in the fingertips, Kerry. 

I hope you all have a great Friday.

in laws - eek

i would just sit weakly with a blanket and a cup o tea,... and say make yourself at home.. they'll know what to do..

you can always pretend to be asleep if they aske too many questions..

Suzmarks i invested in a multipack of medicated chapstick and have a tube in every corner.  i even wipe the inside of my nose with the stuff. (cute tip)

I ended up in the ER last night.  I had some swelling and slight pain in my lymph glands in my neck that run up right in front of my ear but last night around 9:30 pm the pain level was a  9 out of 10.  It was too late to go to a insta care clinic so to the ER I headed.  I called DH who was 50 miles north of our home working at a hospital that I was headed there and to not worry, he didn't need to stop working.

My dh - I love him so much.  He left there immediately and was at the ER about 10 minutes after I got there.

This is a huge brand new hospital where Huntsman Cancer Center is located.  Huntsman has two locations here in Salt Lake and this is where I get my treatment.  It also has a Level 1 Trauma Center.  The ER alone has 140 beds.  I knew it would be a zoo there but they also have all of my history on their computer and sure enough the waiting room was packed so I played the chemo/cancer card and got in right away.

The ER doctor thought that my glands were swollen due to TMJ or some other jaw problem associated with dental problems.  He even called the on-call oncologist (not my personal oncologist) and basically told me all they could do was pain management.  They took all sorts of blood work.  My white cell count was 3.9 - not great but not really low either.

 The ER doctor told me to follow up with my oncologist this morning.  No problem, my car was left in the ER parking lot since they gave me two shots of morphine to take the pain away.  I should have not felt any pain but I was around a 5 out of 10 at that time.

I got to my oncologist office and guess what!!  I have cellulitus on my scalf and an infection in my right ear which is why my lymph glands were swollen and I had hard "knots" on both of them.  I pointed out the red splotch to the ER doctor and he dismissed it as "not important" nor did he see the redness in my ear like the oncology nurse did.

Thanksfully I went to the oncology department today because they gave me antibiotics to take care of the cellulitus and the infection in my ear.  Had I just listened to the ER doctor, I would have ended back in the ER over the weekend.

The nurse practitioner thinks that I may have gotten the cellulitus going because of wearing wigs.  I don't wear them often but they do feel tight around my head and the red splotch area is right where my wig touches my scalf.  So I am back to just wearing scarves and hats for now.

So much for spending the day at the barn - dangit!  I am so tired from being up way past my bedtime and then getting up early to fetch my car.

My dh is home trying to take a nap because he didn't get more than 3 hours of sleep last night himself.  I am heading to bed myself but will check in later.

Jancie~  big {{{HUGS}}}

Lisa~ My port site still isn't healed (was put in the end of Jan) and the "pocket" is still sore.  I'm still getting good blood "return" from it though.  But, I swear, the thought of using it at all (even just to flush or give fluids) makes me vomit... literally.  I'm gagging just thinking about it right now... lovely.  I guess I'm glad I got it (my onc wouldn't do AC without either a port or PICC) but I can't wait to have it out.  I'm sorry you are having a difficult time with yours... I'd be really, really pissed off if I had a port that couldn't be used... ugggh. 

Webbie!!!  Cool pix!!  You have the greatest attitude, must come from the Chemobrain.

Regarding expanders: hang in there, girls, the expanders are hard, but the final implants are much softer. I remember my son wouldn't sit in my lap when the expanders were in..! I couldn't believe the final implants would be different, but they were!

Regarding multiple mastectomies: yes I had a bilat in 2002 and another bilat "revision" this past January. I was very angry to find out that there was breast tissue left behind after my first surgery. When I asked about it, my former onc said something about an improved cosmetic result with the implants...but, DUH, if I was worried about cosmetics I could have had a lumpectomy for such an early stage cancer. They never discussed the amount removed with me; I have now learned to Never Assume Anything.  This time  I made sure that my new surgeon would remove ALL breast tissue possible on both sides. 

I had no chemo or rads following the 2002 surgery. I understand that now DCIS patients with small  margins of healthy tissue are candidates for radiation followup.

regarding Mouth sores: I use Rembrandt Canker Sore toothpaste, also sold as Extra Gentle. It has no Sodium Lauryl sulfate (detergent).  I have had very few mouth sores.

Hope this helps....

Thanks ladies for all of the wonderful hugs and good thoughts.  I have literally slept for the past 6 hours and only woke up so I could put on some Lentil soup for dinner.  I am heading back to bed but wanted to check in and also respond to MrsRocky.

My lymph glands are still swollen and extremely painful.  I have quite the stash of pain pills!  I told the ER doctor last night I only had 2 Lortab 7.5 mg from my surgery so he gave me 6 last night and 12 more on a prescription.  I didn't realize I still had so many left from my surgery.

The good thing is that every time my horse decides to kick my arse in one way or another I don't have to automatically head to Insta Care to get pain meds unless of course I am dealing with a broken bone.  I remember the last time my friend drove me to the insta care after a huge horse wreck (horse ok, me on the ground) and the x-ray technician said "Ms. Jancie - did your horse throw you off AGAIN?"  Pretty sad when the x-ray technicians know you by name and the likely reason why you are there to begin with.

And did ya'll know it was BECAUSE OF A HORSE that I learned I had cancer?  Don't remember if I ever shared that story with you or not.

Please Janice...Dont keep me hanging.  What happened?