Starting chemo Thursday, May 31 - June Group?

Good luck to everyone that is undergoing treatment this week. I hope that the SE are minimal and that y'all bounce back quickly.



Melrose: I fourtunatley have no yet had any issues with neuropathy (yet...fingers crossed) however my mother suffers from it horribly. We are going together tommorrow to try the supplements that you suggested. It's amazing how far reaching the support on this board goes.



Ellebee: we are similar creatures. I love your posts. I'm like you I was feeling better about myself than ever when this hit me. 34, about to get remarried to an absolutely amazing man and BAM now I have no boobs, my hair is falling out and I don't feel the same about myself. I worry too about my kiddos worrying about me. Not sure if I had shared this or not but I moved my parents in our guest house in 2009 and my father became terminally ill in 2010. We cared for him at home until he passed this past September from Cancer. My heart breaks that my kids are dealing with this Cancer crap all over again.



I had a pity party in the middle of the night last night ......probably due to the fact that since my surgery and then the chemo my sleep cycle is out of whack. However, I wanted to share a few things with you guys that made me feel better.



First off I had never heard of the chemo beanie. I am ALL ABOUT THOSE!!! I'm going tomorrow to pick some up. I think I prefer those to wearing my wig!!! Thank you thank you thank you!!



Next, last night at about 5am I found a neat website. I don't know if it has been discussed before but I find it to be genius. It is a cook once a month site that offers different types of menus. Traditional, Whole foods, gluten free etc. You choose which menu fits your needs. It is so in depth I have been on it for hours. It is free and you choose the menu then it leads you to a printable shopping list, then the recipe cards and lastly the instructions for the day you cook everything.



For what we are going through I think it is fantastic to pick a day when we feel good and then cook and freeze everything for our families for a month!



I'm rambling .....I tend to do that now....here's the link hope it helps. I will let y'all know how it works out for us :-)



http://onceamonthmom.com/

simplyblessed - Thanks for the link.  It sounds great.

Several weeks ago, before I could even imagine what it would be like to lose my hair, I ordered a headscarf from www.goodwishesscarves.org.  You choose 3 fabrics that you like and they send you one.  It is very pretty and came with a swarovski angel on one of the tails, as well as a card of well wishes from the entire staff.  It is amazing that there are so many good people out there.

Hi Pam.  I sure hope tomorrow gets better for you.  I just spent another two days in the hospital, this time for severe dehydration and three abscesses on my abdomen :-(

I thought I was doing pretty okay after chemo, but last Friday I nearly passed out at the store.  I literally could not walk.  Now this is just getting ridiculous.

Infusion #2 is next week, hopefully I can be as proactive as possible to keep those side effects at bay.

Cmmom --- did not see your post until after my page refreshed when I submitted my post. How scary!! Did they say what caused the abscesses??? So glad you are feeling better. {hugs}

I wrote a long post yesterday and somehow managed to delete it :-(

Elle - I am 38 and feel blindsided too.  This isnt supposed to happen to young people even though now I am learning about so many people who have had it and it does seem to be affecting people younger and younger :-(  my doc has a 22 year old patient.  

Marcia - I havent cried much either, but I have been super emotional lately and shed a few . .  . I'm guessing that it is chemopause?  I hate crying, but admit I did feel better afterwards.

Cmom - how scary! but glad you are out of the hospital now.  Did the docs give you some tips for how to prevent for next cycle?

Simply - glad the doc is going to look at it.  Hopefully they can clear it up.

Pamela - I am right there with you, day 7 of round 3 of ac . . . this round has been way harder than previous ones :-(  I have struggled with constipation - well I am going it is just rock hard even though I am eating tons of fiber and taking dulcolax (thanks for whoever suggested it) and drinking water like a fish.  I also feel more tired and have taken more naps.  I really dreaded going in for this infusion because I was feeling better and it was hard to knowingly go in and make myself feel bad.   Oh and my physicians assistant told me that if you struggle with ac you will do better on taxotere but if you breeze through ac you struggle with taxotere.  I dont care if it is true right now, but I am clinging to that hope that it will be better.  I just have to get through this one and one more ac.

I also have a question - are you working?  Before infusion 3 I was feeling good and thinking I could work, but now I am glad I am not.  But I do kindof miss having something to do every day.   

Marcia- I have she'd only a few tears too. Unusual for me because I am a ral crybaby!



Pamela- hope you are feeling a little better today. Glad you can feel that lump getting smaller! Yeah for that victory!!! I have children too. My 3 oldest are great(20,17,& 15), but the youngest is only 8(9tomorrow) and he is having a hard time following directions too. He gets upset when I ask him to the littlest thing. Luckily the older three help keep him in line. I'm not sure what I would do without them!



Simply- hope those infections clear up quickly. That has to hard. Keep us updated.



Radioactive- hope those se clear up quickly. I have had the opposite problem and neither sounds fun. You asked about working, I teach so I have the summer off. I should have my last chemo just right after school starts. I am going to try to work through it. I will still have the Herceptin once a month after, so I will see how it goes. I am a little worried because I just get so darn exhausted from all of this. I hope I can keep up with the kiddos.



Have a great day all!!

The NP told me 6 hours, but I thought the MO had said 4.  I still have two more AC infusions before taxol, so I haven't given any thought to the icing.  I guess I'll have to look into it.  My 3rd AC is on Thursday.  I'm trying to get some things done around the house before I head into my crash.  It's amazing how much stuff my family accumulates!  I did a lot, but now I'm tired.  My friend's son is having a yard sale and I'd like to give him as much as I can. 

pam - yes neuropathy can be permanent.  I did do the supplementation I mentioned above, did have fingertip and tongue tingling between tx that would resolve before the next tx three weeks later.  At tx#4 I started to have numbness on the soles of my feet which persisted but did finally resolve by about 2-3 months after the last tx.  There are a significant number of ladies on the TCH and triple positive threads who have some amount of permanent neuropathy, some of it severe and debilitating.  I would advise supplementing during the taxane portion of your chemo so that if you do have some neuropathy, it may be short-lived, or not as severe.  Same concept as the icing of nails, and treatment in general.  When you are done and looking at this in the rear view mirror you can know you did everything you could to walk away cancer free and SE free.

Ellebee - That's good news.  I can't imagine sitting for 6 hours!  Today was the first time I heard that it would take that long.  I will get one taxol infusion before I go back to work, so that will help me gauge how long I should plan on being out of work.  I was hoping to work in the a.m. and have the infusion in the p.m., but she said they only do it in the morning because it takes so long.  If it is only going to be 3 hours, then maybe I can go in in the afternoon.

Wow, a lot of you are working - you have my admiration :-)

Cmom - hope your docs can help you out and your numbers start going up again.  It sucks not knowing exactly what is going on in your body, yet knowing somthing is off.

I have to start doing some research on taxotere .  ..  I hope it doesnt take 6 hours at my place although I did find that it kindof depends on the nurse and time of day.  Last one was at 10am and I think it was better than at 1:30pm - different nurses, but I think at 10 you just have more energy, not to mention I think at 10am she wanted to go to lunch so she made sure and didnt dilly-dally.

Hugs to whoever is going through the hair loss - I dreaded the thought of losing my hair, but have adjusted quite well.  I did cut it all off just as it was starting to fall out, but my hair was really long and I wanted to donate it.  At least no hair in summer has its benefits . . . just trying to find the silver lining.