Starting Chemo, November 2013 Group

thanks all...I got the blond a a haha.....but everyone LOVES IT....go figure....sorry pat about cat situation. I have tried to avoid that w litter and OLD cats plus my puppy...man....virginia....go to cancer society .even diff locat ion ons......oh I hate this skipping program. when I found the one that was neat was at 2-3 locations....and the girl who help....really couldn't too new. the wig was in the bottom of a box....she said NOONE wants this....if u want it for giggles ....take it! all at n/c...now everyone LOVES it best!

pat

you poor thing!

hope the antibiotics kill it fast!

seems like pets are the issue of day. am so sorry pat. really keep on top even if they need to do IV antibiotics at home or facility. I have been in the position of immuno comp w/infection. the key is don't ignore ANYTHING. its better to be parnoid and make sure you're ok!blessings!

Lisa that's great news. Yes to the hydrocodone off and on for the first few days after the port. Finding a comfortable sleeping position can be a challenge too. Take heart that it will pretty quickly settle down and won't be too bothersome. My dogs and cats have been a great comfort to me during this entire ordeal (excepting the attack by the demented one!). I'm just so used to being scratched and bit occasionally that it never dawned on me that it was suddenly dangerous. Husband has been taking care of cat boxes and dog poop so thought all was safe.

Paulette you look so young and glamorous as a blond you can't possibly be old enough to HAVE a daughterinlaw!

1st chemo NOV 7th

My hair started falling out Nov 19th. 😭 I had already cut it shorter and layered, since my hair was pretty long and thick, guess I will go back and get a pixie cut , then I will start wearing my wig. This week was great! More energy and no pain. Dry mouth is less dry, eyes are a bit dry now. No other complaints here. I am still working and sharing my story with some of my patients, I do mammograms for a living and if this is my purpose, if I was meant to make a difference in these ladies lives by sharing my story and encouraging them to be proactive, the so be it.

Hope your treatments go well and no side effects!

Who gets round 2 next week? I go in the day before Thanksgiving.

wev have two OLD cats...one I hve to give insulin to twice a day ! And we have a dog was about 2 years old now... Who I'm allergic to but I love and she loves me! All 3 pets we left by my children! My dog, Ellie is a big ol mixed with a dachshund so we call her a dogel ithink the official name is doxal. Essentially she is a beagle in a doxin suit!! It was her that actually made me be concerned that the lump I found was cancer! She kept sniffing me funny and just pawing at me. That's when I went in to be checked by the doctor over the weekend at a quick care center! I can't complain because she has been my companion and is now sitting outside beside me in the middle of the night because I can't sleep! The most difficult thing is for me to try to leave the litter boxes alone! I have a Time broken down gloved and masked up... But my doctor wanted me to be very careful with the litter boxes! It would be better if I did not touch them at all! Sorry for the bite wren and the scratch.. Lisa, I'm with you about the port! But it will be better in the long run! It has been a blessing to me as I have to have fluids nightly through it! So much better than getting stuck all the time. But mine is still sore and I had it put in a little over a week ago. It seems I shuffle trying to not lay on one side and not lay on the other side so I have no options! See if your doctor can give you some numbing cream that could help the pain, the extra pain meds are fine for now! I know I've had to do that! I hope we all can get some good sleep tonight! Its 220 est now and I'm cooking brownies. lol....oh...I wanted to lick the spoon!!!!!oh mannnnn...nothing appeals to me....I think I want something then don't....when I make it.......uggggggg.....i already had a pbm eating now its insane!!!! I KNOW I need to eat but don't wanna....said like a 2year old with a temper tantrum voice!!!!

Greetings sisters - I started AC on Oct.. 29th, so figured I fit in here. I had my second round on Monday and it has been tough for nausea, but I do feel better today. Fatigue has been a big issue - but after the first round I felt not so bad by week 2 and when out for a walk I thought, why not try and run (they said do all you can) and that went ok. So 2km that day and I was up to 5 km the day before my last chemo (before cancer I was a 10 to 12km runner, so I am taking it easy!).

So glad to have some folks to check in with. This is my second cancer round - I had a NET - a neuroendocrine tumour removed from my pancreas in Feb. 2012. It is a funny kind of cancer - very, very, very slow growing. Mine had not metastisized but because it does grow so slowly it is very common to have it for years before discovery. For my part that was about 5 years - which meant about 5 years of increased insulin as I had the insulinoma kind of NET. The upshot of that is that there appears that there may be an increased risk of breask cancer from the high levels of insulin I had coursing through my body - so here we go with round 2 of cancer. While the NET sucked in that the insulinoma made me hypoglycemic (until removal) and the surgeries on my pancreas were tough, breast cancer is harder, I have to say. I escaped chemo last time, not so lucky this time. I am 39 so am frustrated with having spent so much of my 30's sick, but trying to stay positive and mostly I do!

I am doing chemo first as I have a lymph node involved.

From other posts - I have 3 dogs and 1 cat and I swear they know something is wrong. They are grouped around me when ever I am on the couch! Wren - sorry to hear about your bite, that is hard!

Good wishes to everyone here - hang in there!

day 4 after first AC and I still have thighs headache! The nausea is jot that bad today so if it was not for this headache, I would be feeling so much better! Lisa, the day after in got my port I also felt like I was slammed. I just gave into it and stayed in bed all day. The next day I was fine. Paulette your hair looks great. Not looking forward to that. I figure I have about 10 more days.

Will I have the same side effects on round 2 of chemo?

Ellen, I managed to get really bad spinal pain from the neulasta shot, but it didn't surface until day 6. I was actually at the MO office to pick up a pain med rx yesterday when I showed her the cat bite infection. It was only severe for 2 days. One thing that's frustrating: I called the drs office to ask about the spine pain. The nurse said she'd never heard of it as a SE. Then when I saw the MO (we were in a flurry of activity over the infection) the dr said, "oh, of course the pain's a SE of the neulasta." I don't know if the nurse had truly never heard of it, was just in a bad mood and being dismissive, or what. But sheesh.

Ellen glad your home!! Ya those shots really amp up the white cells which grow in the marrow. I wonder exactly why that would be though!

I didn't switch to the hydrocodone for port placement pain until this morning. I was planning to do it last night, had an hour and a half to wait before the tylenol-3 wore off, accidentally found myself a pretty comfortable position, fell asleep, and didn't wake up until 6:30 this morning when my husband woke me up as he was letting the dogs out lol. So I was pretty ouchy this morning---between the port pain and (hopefully my last ever) menstrual cramps) after going thru the night with no pain meds, but at least I had a good night's sleep!

The reason I got woken up by letting the dogs out is weird enough to be worth sharing: We fenced in our backyard this summer, BUT, there is no door leading from the house straight into the fenced area. Sooooo to save us the trouble of taking the dogs out a door and through the gate on a leash, we built a ramp leading up to a bedroom window, and put a doggy door flap on that window. Weird solution, but it works perfectly. The downside at the moment (for the dogs) is that the bedroom with the doggy flap is also "my" bedroom: It's my office (I work at home) and is also the room I sleep in a lot when I'm sick or sore or otherwise better off in a room on my own instead of competing for blankets and bed space with my husband, the dogs, and the cats. So last night I slept in here with the door closed and the dogs were stuck inside the house all night til hubby got up and let 'em out.

My husband has also taken over kitty-litter-changing duties since my BMX, and will continue to handle (haha) all that while I'm doing the chemo thing, and while he hasn't complained about ANY of the other stuff he's had to deal with, and has even taken over some things that he didn't NEED to take over, he really hates dealing with cat litter. So we have an impending solution for THAT as well: His dad built a "catio" for their cat; a cat-door-flap in a bedroom window that leads into an enclosed, screened in, patio for their cat, with an area for the kitty litter box, and an area for the cat to lay in the sun and enjoy the outdoors without actually being loose outside and at risk of running off and getting lost. I've admired that thing ever since they built it, so within the next week or so, they're going to build one for our cats, as well.... complete with a hinged trap door on the bottom so that all hubby has to do is open the hatch, and dump the kitty litter and box liner into a trash bag underneath. So no more kitty litter and kitty poop (and kitty litter smell!) in our house. I can't wait....and I know the cats will LOVE being able to lie on their patio and have some fresh air and pretend to be wild animals lol.

Taking hydrocodone for port pain and for cramps today and feeling much better.... sleeping a lot (because why not?) and drinking lots of kefir to counteract the constipation I'll wind up with if I don't. Oh, and I picked up this little gem yesterday from a nurse at the hospital: I had told her that I had some hydrocodone at home if the tylenol-3 didn't do the job and she asked me if it, or percoset, or any of those drugs, tended to make me itch. I said YES! She told me to try taking Zantac ---or the store version of Zantac-- when I take the hydrocodone and see if it helped. I tried it, and she was correct. No pain and no random aggravating opiate itches, either. Bonus: No indigestion from the pizza I had for lunch lol, though of course the kefir helped with that, too. In any case, while the port site, and especially my neck, are still quite sore today, I CAN tell that it's less sore than it was yesterday, so I don't think it's going to have me miserable for DAYS. Sure am glad I changed that schedule so I wasn't getting the port and first chemo on the same day though. Yikes.

Here is the deal on Neulasta/Neupogen - these drugs are granulocyte colony stimulating factors - they prompt manufacture of white cells in your bone marrow. The marrow expands as these cells are over-produced and this accounts for the pain you feel - generally, in the largest bones since they have the most marrow. This is why hips, back, legs usually hurt the most after receiving the injection - but pain is not necessarily limited to those locations. The reason Claritin helps lessen the discomfort is that the antihistamine helps control the edema that accompanies the marrow swelling. Also, frequently the first injection of Neulasta/Neupogen is the worst as it is the first time the marrow has swelled. It is like buying a new pair of shoes - they hurt as you are breaking them in, but are less uncomfortable each time you wear them - same can be true for this drug, as the marrow becomes accustomed to the expansion it can be less painful.

For those on taxanes - Taxol and Taxotere - bone/joint pain is a well established SE of these meds, so your bone pain can be from either your chemo drug or Neulasta, or both.

it is day 6 post my first tv chemo, on day 4 started with terrible stomach cramps with day 5 of violent cramps and diarrhea to the point I thought I might black out.MO sent me for A Ct scan wich was normal. Now I'm on lomotil, just hope it helps with the intestinal cramps. I am frustrated as I thought I would be somewhat feeling better by now. I have lost 8 lbs in 6 days and I have been eating and drinking! I hope the lomotil dies not back me up as I don't want to repeat this cycle.