I say yes, you say no, OR People are Strange

Tamoxifen was a relative breeze for me. Arimidex was another story but since I stopped in late September I feel a little less crippled every day. Faslodex gives me horrendous pain for the two days following injection but then the pain tapers off throughout the month...until the next dose!



Odd how we all react so very differently to the same drugs, isn't it?



I had rads treatments 13 and 14 today and so far so good. My skin's getting pink and I just started getting nerve "zaps" down my shoulder and chest, no doubt from surgery and radiation damage to the brachial plexus. Now I know why the Vulcan nerve pinch works so well!



BTW, today is Day 5 of "The UN Invented Medicare to Enslave Us All" and none of my doctors have dumped me. However, Medicare failed to eradicate my enormous chin zit. What a disappointment.



Off to the barn to visit my favorite man. See y'all later!



E

Linda - you give me great hope...you had joint pain (wrists) for a year and then it went away?  I do seem to be going through phases with Exemestane...first the hot flashes & insomnia (mostly gone), then the hand numbness (less so now), and now the finger stiffness and trigger finger and shoulder pain.  Oh, and now my hands swell up while walking. At the rate I'm going, at 4 months, I should not be able to move.

Kam - what is exemastane?  Is that a generic form of something else?  I don't recognize it.

Well, Enjoyful and Athena are absolutely right.  Everyone reacts differently; just as menopause is a hot killer for some, others only notice the empty drawer where tampons used to live!

I like to think that it takes some time (and for some, a LONG time) for one's body to get used to lack of estrogen.  Given that estrogen really does affect every body function, the lack of it can be a severe jolt to the system.  I actually forgot about my two trigger fingers (!) but digits returned to normal after about a year on Femara.

We spend our lives trading off -- "If I do this, then I can't do that" -- so we just simply do what we, individually, think we should do.  For those whose SEs are intolerable, they choose to maintain the status quo.  Life certainly doesn't offer any guarantees of any kind, regardless of what we do.

That said, Enjoyful, so happy to hear that you're getting through rads so well, so far!  I bet horsie has a lot to do with it!  Tally ho!

Lindasa, I love your post. Yes, it's ultimately all about negotiating and compromising with ourselves and making decisions that take into account our very unique goals, priorities, medical histories and bodies. These decisions are so very difficult and individual. Many women have no SEs on TAM and may welcome today's news.

Thank you, Kam! Someone has to be on the front lines of the nanny-state socialist Hitlerian plot that is Medicare. I am taking one for the team.



Yes, please find details on this magic cream! I've been using Miaderm, which came highly recommended by ladies here and on Amazon. I don't think anything will fully protect my skin since that's the radiation's primary focus. When my neck looks like crispy bacon, my rad onc will consider her job done.



KrispyE

http://youtu.be/cwg4DB-EeEA

Once upon a time

Morning Medicare Report -



I sit in a waiting room floored with depression-inducing fabric. The walls loom, as walls do, but in a particularly vomitous shade of mustardly peach. My two companions, also Medicare slaves, grumble about their interminable wait. Through a break in the wall I see another waiting room, one where the patients roam free, with a sky-blue ceiling so high they can't brush their fingertips across its cerulean surface. A room where the floors are carpeted in an amazing green and plush carpet. Sunlight-like light pours from the unseen light fixtures. That must be the waiting room of the Others, those with private health insurance. The nurses call it "outside" but I know better.

"Walls of mustardly peach"?  Oh, the horrors of it all.  Stay strong, E!

Kam~Is that the Egyptian Magic Cream you're talking about? I've seen that online. I've been looking for something really good for starting rads down the line. Do you know if they don't like you to use aloe Vera gel? That's the best thing I've ever found for burning skin.



Blessings

Paula

Soteria, check with your radiologist to see what they say.  My sister recently went through rads and her radiologist would only let her use one certain cream, which did work pretty well.  I don't know what the cream was but I can ask her if you'd like.

It been a long time since my rads, but seems at the time I heard a lot about Emu oil.  Don't know if that was used during or after or both.  my RO did tell me to use clear Aloe Vera gel and it worked fine for me up til' the boosts.....but that was just 7 days so even though I did turn into a little bit of a crispy critter....using the gel still it healed was fine.

Jackie

p.s.  E---it should all be in a book and it would be a best seller......from cancer blogs alone.

On medicare, I was reminded today why I love my arch-conservative, to the right of Djengis Khan DH. He bursts out over lunch that when right-wingers (mind you, he is one) claim that healthcare is socialism they are performing an auto-erotic act, after all, says the old man, it was excessive military spending that brought down the USSR, not healthcare.

After once again pointing out that Eisenhower wasn't exactly a commie, he suggested that we take half our military budget and divert it to building infrastructure. Tell Lockheed and all the other nice boys in the military-industrial complex to build management systems for the electricity grid, healthcare etc and figure out a way to get some broadband to the people. He was all fired up today.

Momine,



Your husband speaks logic rather than spout right-wing propaganda. I salute him for his independent thinking!

Yep...E you definitely have a socialist medical system now.  No fish tanks my Canadian radiation centre either.  We can't even see the 'others' in their beautiful waiting rooms.