Calling all TNs

Dang, I'm tired! Just got in from feeding horses after a long day of watching my son play rugby.

I will look in to the glutamine supplement. I take Glucosamine/Chondroitin/MSN (for my joints), garlic, biotin, fish oil, Vit. D and multi vitamin. Stopped taking other stuff once the TNBC panic subsided.

laurajane- just for you....

This is not an Alien. It's my cat: "Butt".

 

I danced my petunias off, so much fun. I got to hear so much fabulous music from Brazil, Africa, Columbia, India and beyond.Just lovin' all of you guys and "Butt" too! ! Great to go to sleep tonight with a smile on my face. Sweet dreams to all. Thank-you.

So much happened this week and I think I am starting to feel overwhelmed by all of it. My last post I went to my granddaughters grandparent day brunch at school. That was a wonderful time.

Later that day I went to the "Wig Barn" . Now that was a totally traumatic excursion. It is s et up at a Hair Salon in a like closet room. You bring someone with you and they let you in there. There are shelves and shelves of wigs and hats and scarfs etc. However noone to help you. You bring your own "helper". You can choose whatever you want and its all free.While my daughter and granddaughter tried to make it a good fun thing all I wanted to do was cry.I finally picked out 2 wigs- a longer one sorta wavey and a shorter one more like I usually wear my hair. Then Jen found a box with ?Hairpieces. Like Hair on a band that you put a hat over. She took a couple of those and a couple chemo hats. She also got both wig stands and shampoo. Of course its all free but I think this whole process finally hit.

Then 3 days later ( Monday) I went and got my drains out. Oh was that a wonderful feeling having them out but we noticed one place that looked funny on the right side incision ( my non-malignant side) . BUt since I still had my staples it was okay.

Then 3 days later(Thursday) I went back to the Dr and got my staples removed at 0930am. That really felt great but my daughter pointed out to the surgeon that area?? that looked funny. He wasnt too concerned becasue he had sutured to the skin level and the staples were actually just holding the skin edge closed. Said just to watch it.

3 hours later I am sitting in the Breast Cancer Coordinators office ( she is an RN) at the Cancer Care Center and guess what happened? Yep -- felt a wetness and looked down on my right chest wall and my shirt was rapidly turning red. I grabbed a handfull of kleenex and told the RN in there you better go get a towel. When I lifted my arm the dam burst and suddenly I had serous stuff rapidly turning to a lava flow of dark red -old blood running all over the place. The incision dehised about an 1 1/2 inches and must have had a pretty good sized hematoma holding out under neath. My daughter wigged out and thought I was bleeding to death and went screaming out of the office for someone to get help I was bleeding all over. In the meantime back came the RN Coordinator loaded with dressing supplies and a clean pt gown. Before we were done I had saturated 2 5 packs of fluffs 2 abd's and a handful of kleenexs not counting what was all over my shirt and shorts. She put on a pressure dressing as I called my Dr's office. He had just went into surgery but sent me back to the office and his nurse steri-stripped it. With orders to call him if I noticed any s/s infection.

The next day I saw my oncologist ( Friday )-- and he wasnt happy about the dehise but had faith I would stay on top it and do everything I could to get it healed. Plan is to start Chemo in 3 weeks. Cytoxan and Taxotere with steroids. Also my primary care Doc called me at home to check on how I was doing and ordered more pain meds. Along with the Fentanyl patch she ordered more Loratabs for breakthrough pain. God love her.

Okay 2 days later ( Saturday) pulled off dressing to get in shower and noticed purelent drainage. Yes it was an Oh *hit moment. So a call to the doc. Since I was suppose to see him monday I asked about getting it cultured so we at least had an idea what was growing by monday. He agreed. Told me what he wanted me to do. (Note-to walk into ER with my insurance its a $125 co-pay up front for my insurance) I told him the girls at work would do the c/s and we could then just turn it in. He said good plan. I ended up going into work ( ICU) and the girls at work did anerobic and aeroboic would c/s on it. The charge nurse wrote the order. They also loaded me up with dressing supplies/gloves to take home with me.

Now if I can get this healing ( diabetic so its gonna be tough) I will start my Chemo Oct 7.

I am trying to keep a very positive focus but this is beginning to really set in. But everything has moved so fast I think thats why its starting to overwhelm me. Mammogram to surgery to now-- not quite 4 weeks I think.

Holy crap, Cathy! How scary. And of course it's the weekend. ((((hugs)))). I'll be thinking of you. Please check back in after you see your doc again Monday. Or if you just want to vent.

Another question:

Is anyone else losing time? Sometimes an hour goes by and it seems like a minute.

Cathy:  So sorry to hear about the problems you're having.  My sister went through something similar, and it took awhile to heal, but eventually did, and she went on to chemo and did fine. If there's one thing I learned through my own journey, it's that something unexpected will come up and throw you for a loop. Hopefully you'll heal up fast and it will be smoother sailing from here on.

Sugar77:  Love the new avatar photo!   Your hair has filled in nicely.  I just had my second round of colour, and I am so much happier with the results.

Titan:  I'm liking the shorter look too.  And it is way easier to manage. I have a pretty strong wave, but it's not long enough yet to be full-blown curls which I'm glad about.

Have a great day, ladies.  The weather is spectacular here in Toronto. 

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Cathy:  Just saw your post and my goodness, hang in there!  Sending you many good thoughts that you can heal enough to do your chemo!

Swanny:   spelling/???? ha!  that went out the window first, I think!

claire:  regarding time:  I think I have always had this problem, but, yes, sometimes a week feels like a minute and I have no idea where it went or what I did!  crazy time travel, huh?

Claire & MBJ- silly girls. The reason you lose track of time is because you are being abducted by aliens and they erase your memory before returning you. Isn't that obvious? lol

 

Oh cathy, so sorry about all you have been through. This disease just sometimes seems to take us by the throat! Hang in there - I am trying to take my onw advice here too !- It has to get better. I keep thinking about how next year this time I will be feeling so much better and you will too!

Right now I am 3 days away from my last date with the red devil, and of course I am feeling pretty good now. Just tired, but dealing with that. I hear from everyone Taxol is easier, and I'll be having that series next. I just try and look at every treatment, every test as another notch on the bed post of hell!

Hugs to everyone!

Cathy: I am sorry you had such a wild week.  Hopefully the worst is behind you and hope next week goes much easier.  Hugs to you.

MBJ:  I love Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday, I bet your hair looks really cute.

Most of the posts are making me laugh today.  Especially that cat.  I have not seen a cat sit that way.  

About spelling.  I am having the neo-adj chemo and I can't spell neo-adj whatever. I guess I should figure that out.

Alien abduction?  I think that I might prefer that over going through all this chemo and stuff . . .

OK, it's official. I am appointing myself Humor Coordinator on this thread. Whenever I find something that I think will give us all a little chuckle I will post it here. I've always believed that laughter is the best medicine anyway. So, why not.

Posting Photos (laurajane)-

-first, you have to have an on-line photo album site (Snapfish, Shutterfly, Phanfare, Photobucket, etc.)

-second, you have to locate the "external" link feature on your photo site (If you can't find it let me know and I'll visit the site-I already have accounts with most of the above anyway- and I'll try and walk you through it).

-third, you have to Copy that link (copy to clipboard feature or just copy/paste) and put/paste it into BC.org using the icon (looks like a tree) shown to the left of the smiley face in our "Post a Reply" window. To recap: go to your online photo site & copy/paste the external link to your photo, come back and click the tree icon here in BC.org, paste the link into the URL box and hit the "Insert" button. Your picture should then show up in your post (Preview it first, just to be sure)

If it doesn't work, it may be a browser problem. As some of you may have read, I have lost the ability to use emoticons and post pictures in BC.org using Mozilla Firefox. I have to switch to Safari. Most of you are probably Windows PC users  (I use a Mac) and are using Internet Explorer, as it's probably the most common browsing tool thanks to Bill Gates (or not if, like me, you prefer Apple).

Anyhow, hope that gets you all merrily on your way to sharing your pictures in here. I'm an amateur photographer (jack of all trades, master of none) and really get a kick out of seeing people's funny pictures---or serious. Whatever floats your boat...

If you are totally lost after reading this you will proably need to confer with an alien. Don't worry, I've got that covered also... lol.