March 2012 chemo

Hi Alecia-

I just wanted to say Hi because I saw we were in a very similar situation.  I'm new to this forum today.  Tomorrow is my second round of AC.  I too have to have ACx4 and THx4.  I do not have to have radiation because my lymph nodes were negative, they did have something they called "abnormal" cells but the number was lower than what is required to be considered micrometastasis.  I chose to have a double mastectomy because of my Her2+ status even though only one breast was involved.  I will be 34 in April.  Good luck to you!

Thank you Sissy.

Sissydi - I will start A/C on Tuesday, the 13th.

To the new Marchers - Welcome!

To the courageous women undergoing treatment - I pray that your SEs are manageable and all your days are good ones! WE CAN DO THIS!

Hi Steph - welcome and thanks for saying hi, wishing you an uneventful treatment tomorrow. I am going to be 35 in May. I decide against the MX after many weeks of deliberation, now I am at peace with my decision. With the radiation hopefully everything will be zapped. Good luck to you too.

Hello Marchers

I would like to join your group.  I have read some of your post trying to see what I am in for.

My first tx is Friday March 9.   I am not familiar with the different types of chemo treatments yet.

I will be having dose dense chemo. I do not know the mixture.  My Onc said I would have 12 weeks of chemo one time a week and then 12 tx every other week.  Is this normal?

I have not read about anyone else with this number of tx.  My Onc said I had a agressive cancer and he would treat it agressively.  I have been on Herceptin for 5 tx every 3rd week. 

I have not had mx yet or a port inserted.  I feel like this is when the cancer gets real to me.

I really appreciate the ladies that have dropped in to say years down the road life will be different.  I guess I should be wig or turban shopping.  I need to get my chemo list together.  Any advice would be appreciated.  I'm in for the long march! 

O yea   my birthday is March 13.

Hi, Bev. Welcome, though I'm sorry you have to be here. 

I live in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The medical care here is good, but it takes searching, on the patient's part, to find out where to go. I have had to go to six different hospitals for scans, tests, surgery, and doctors. I am now on my third oncologist. I was supposed to start chemo yesterday but was informed by my oncologist that the 5-FU that he prescribed was out of stock in Saudi Arabia because the company that had been producing it had stopped making it. Luckily, I was able to get into a government hospital for the chemo and will start next week. They have a supply purchased internationally. I will be doing three rounds of FEC followed by three rounds of docitaxel. I had hoped to avoid chemo, but my Oncotype DX score turned out to be 30.  That's another story - getting one of my tissue blocks back and forth to California for testing. Oncotype DX is not well known here.

I am a middle school teacher and hope to be able to continue working during treatments. I am prepared with disinfectant spray and wipes for the desks and will have the students use hand sanitizer when they come into the room. Are there any other teachers out there who are working during chemo? 

Good morning Marchers! It's been a busy week so I haven't been here as much. Tying to honor work obligations before the great unknown next week. And, tomorrow I get all my long curly hair chopped off. It seemed like a good idea to take control and get a good proper short haircut before the inevitable... I don't know. My diagnosis was a weird roller coaster (first they tell me it is aggressive, must do chemo then surgery, then no it is actually contained, and we should go ahead with surgery and then radiation... Then after surgery the pathology informs that it is in fact invasive and I wil need chemo after all...) so I sometimes wonder if I'm going to wake up one day to find out this isn't really happening, so surreal.

So the hair comes off. Maybe it will be ok, honestly I haven't had an actual hairdo in forever.

I hope everyone is having a good start to the day...

Fluffqueen0

My last msg was for you.  I am also new at posting and not sure how to do it correctly.  Congrats on your last Herceptin tx.  

I would love to hear from you later as life gets back to the "new normal" for you. 

 Bev

Welcome Joan. Good luck with trying to continue teaching middle school while undergoing treatment. I was a middle school teacher for 34 years here in Florida. I hope your schedule is not as grueling as mine had become. I was teaching 6 classes a day. Short lunch and had to walk the kids too and from the cafeteria which was across campus from my classroom. I ended up retiring a year early because it was wiping me out. I didn't know it then, but I already had this sneaky lobular cancer growing inside of me. I found out a few months after I retired. I hope your school situation and student behaviors are better than they had become at my school. When I talk to my friends who are still working, they are miserable. Best wishes in your cancer journey and your admirable work as a teacher.

Lumpynme, I'm definitely drinking lots of water. The good news, though, is that waking up on Day 4 the feverish feeling is gone. Instead the symptom of the day...which I had yesterday, but was being overshadowed by the feverish feeling...is shortness of breath. Even sitting still, it just seems like I can't get in a nice deep breath. I'm getting ready to go out for a walk. Yesterday I didn't even make

 it halfway around the block. Hopefully I'll do better today. So far, no problems with vomiting or constipation. I had started eating prunes a few weeks before treatment. I eat two in the morning along with my Kashi Go Lean cereal. It has a lot of fiber and protein...top it with a banana and skim milk. Good way to get your digestive system going first thing in the morning. Anyone else having that shortness of breath feeling? There are so many things that I wonder if I should call the doctor about. It helps to have others to run things by, just to get a sense of what apparently is normal and what isn't.

Good morning, Ladies!  Today is Day 8 after first Chemo (TCH).  I had chest pains yesterday and I called the answering service for my Dr.  He never called me back.  This is the second time this has occurred.  Is this normal for a Dr. not to return messages?  Do I have to call him 500 times to get ONE callback?  This seems highly unusual to me, especially since without patients, a Dr. does not exist.  At any rate, I feel MUCH better today (Thank God).  The heaviness is gone, the heartburn is gone, the constipation is gone.  Hopefully, all stays well.  The only thing is that food is not very satisfying.  I keep eating different things trying to feel some satiation.  So far, very little.  Fortunately, I have 10 pounds to gain back (lost due to stress) so the eating should not be too detrimental. 

fedfan - I haven't heard the shortness of breath symptom for chemo BUT I was just watching Morning Joe and it can be (probably not, but I think worth mentioning) a sign of DVT. I would take it seriously and call your doctor today.  Apparently, 20% of all DVT cases are Cancer patients.  She did not explain why, but I can guess one reason.....sleeping in odd positions where blood flow to the legs is not good.  In my case, DVT became a worry early on with my chair sleeping, but luckily not (difficulty sleeping with TEs).  I urge you to atleast call your doctor on the shortness of breath.  P.S. Thank you for being a teacher - you guys do the hard work for so little pay!