August 2010...anyone starting chemo besides me?!

Good evening, warriors!

I hope you all are doing well!  I was just coming on to say I had surgery today and I hope this will be my last one for a little while and sure enough I looked down and saw that my t-shirt was wet...wet with my blood!  One of the incisions is bleeding quite a bit.  Waiting for on-call to get back and I hope I am not on my way back to the hospital

Felisa: I hope you got rid of the wound vac!  Rads will be so incredibly easy compared to chemo, a total piece of cake!  Speaking of cake, you should have a little "done with chemo" party for yourself

Rachel: I hope you had a great time!  Mexico is so nice and relaxing.  It is always a good time.  I just so love to get to the equator during Jan/Feb.  Feb is my worst month for being tired of the cold and ready for spring.  In my past life (!) I did a week to 10 days in Feb.  

Good times, I have to go tend to my wounds now!

Felisa: the wound vac is the greatest thing in the world as it serves to expodite healing that would take significantly longer without it.  You are almost there, hang on!!  

Rachel: thank you!  Yes, it has been a lot of surgeries and a lot of crap, this entire road.  I hope you are enjoying Le Mis and having a nice girl's night out!  I totally can remember what it was like to come back from vaca so rested and relaxed only to be thrown right back into that corporate stress ball.  After a few days you totally feel like you never left.  When I worked in Manhattan I did not, at that time, realize that the preponderance of people I knew were alcoholics.  They drank every night after work, on the trains home etc... It is the pressure and the stress.  In any case, a girl's night out and Le Mis should fix you up again! 

Well I did not have to go back to the hospital as the bleeding slowed!  Good times!

Good day, warriors!

It has been so warm here and now is foggy all day today.   The cost of nice weather!

Sptmm: I can’t believe you marched right by the comment I made about your 4lbs and how I would be deeply concerned if I put that much on as, in your case, that is 10% of your body weight now!  Yeah, when I was typing I noticed that there was blood on my forearm and then was just waiting for the on-call.  Thankfully I did not have to go back but I woke up this morning and it was bleeding again but it must have just been the way I slept.  I had a stubborn keloid (and I never keloid) where the port was and my PS was kind enough to help me with that even though it had nothing to do with her.  They cut that out, cut out a mass in my lower abdomen that went off to pathology even though it is considered scar tissue and they did a key part of your DIEP 2 surgery coming up!  It was all done under local which made me happy.  I did not want to general.

Iowa: I was just talking to my friend about how I love pineapple!  Another friend gave me some contraption from Pampered Chef which was supposed to ease the coring process = did not!  Made a mess.  I just picked up another pineapple yesterday!  Good to know it helps w/healing!

Tex: I just dropped the equipment off.  They did not try to talk me into keeping it.

That is all, that is all!  Have a good weekend, girls-

Good evening, warriors!

I hope everyone is well.  Unfortunately one of my incisions from surgery opened while I was sleeping and I woke up to blood everywhere.  All over my sheets, my clothes, my bedding, my mattress.  Seriously, I could not believe it.  It looked like a crime scene.  It was the middle of the night so I was thankful I was able to stop it with pressure as I def did not want to go to the ER in the mid of the night.  One thing after another.  Went to surgeon, patched it up and am hoping it just does not open again.

Tex: Hope you got some naps!  Yeah, these gadgets are overpriced junk.  I really try not to buy anything when it comes to kitchen gadgets.  The Pampered Chef garlic press is the best, however!

Ginger: on migraines, do yourself a favor and look up "pseudotumor cerebri." Our old friend Tamoxifen, and my old friend Levothyroxine, can both cause this.  Menopause is a big cause also 

Felisa: I hope you are doing just fabulous!  I was thinking of you yesterday when I was at Yale. There was a woman next to me discussing her dismay with her wound vac! 

Iowa: as I try to heal this wound that popped open and forced me to donate all that blood to the universe, there I was buying pineapples tonight!  Just got through eating a bunch and now I have that sort of "raw/irritated" feeling from pineapple in my mouth but who cares if it helps!  It sure was good going down also! 

Well, I hope everyone is doing well.  I am going to do some filing and then am hitting the hay early.  I am so tired between this head thing and the headaches and the fact that I have to sleep in one position, not moving, surround by pillows in hopes I don't cause that wound to open again.  

Night, all-

Good day, warriors!

Just watched "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead" and what I found most interesting is what both fat and average size people are eating.  That guy spoke to people of all sizes who had one thing in common: they were/are on a steady diet of Coca Cola and anything fried/fast food.  It was just odd to see how some people can eat crap all day and have it not affect them outwardly and how with others, it shows in their weight.  In any case it seemed appropriate to watch it today b/c I decided today was the day to perfect the Dr. Oz "green" drink and also make it a few times so I get really good at it!  I really had no idea when I turned it on it was all about him fasting his way through losing 100 lbs.  It was a good movie.  I did finally perfect the Oz green drink by adding twice the amount of lime and *coconut!!*  That coconut gives it a nice kick as does a banana!  He swears by it and I have to say, it is super healthy and pretty tasty = not too shabby!

Rachel: years and years ago I saw Les Miserable on Broadway.  I am just not a big musicals person. I liked "Tony and Tina's Wedding," "Wicked," "Jelly's Last Jam," and more recently "Billy Elliot" but I am just not loving musicals.  I love repertory theater but I am also a little tired of seeing "The Crucible!"  The perennial classic, "A Chorus Line," I saw when I was in high school.  I am just glad you had a nice girl's night out!  It is so healthy to do that every now and again.  My friend from Ireland was in NYC a few weeks back and he saw Les Mis and he,too, complained about the length of the film!  That was enough for me to skip seeing it in theaters! 

Rach, I think everyone would be a baby relative to walking outside in 20 below weather!  I whine when it is below 30! What always amazes me is there I am with my Russian Ushanka and sure enough, some teenager walks by in cargo shorts! How is it that they can wear shorts in 20 degree weather?!  

Tex: I am doing ok.  Aside from cooking all day I am also letting air get at my wounds.   I hope this helps as my surgeon is on vaca next week and I don't want to have problems.

I so love the now not-so-new Rihanna song "Stay" but am a bit dismayed as I am sure it is an ode to that thing she is obsessed with, Chris Brown!  She is unusually talented.  Unbelievable.

I blew off NYC plans tonight b/c I am just too cold! Of course from friend's apt, to cab, to restaurant, to club, to friend's apt and perhaps to train would not have to deal with the weather too much but then again, I am an excuse factory these days!! 

Hoping a good weekend is your's for the enjoying! 

Felisa: I was wondering about you!  I am glad you are doing well.  I sort of wondered where you were and was rather hoping you were feeling so great that you were out living it up!  It is so sad that you and I have had such a battle with the surgical byproducts of this disease.  We could easily start our own site called "and you thought your breast cancer battle was bad!"   Sadly I have never told my full story on this site meaning there have been things I have been through/am going through that I did not ever reveal.  You were meant to come to this site so we could support each other and hobble to what will hopefully be a successful finish line! Hang in there and understand that if you do the right things, eat all the protein you can and like Iowa said, get some pineapple that may assist w/wound healing, you will be heading toward better days   I hope you are doing better today.