Anyone else basically alone/minimal help?

Thank you SpecialK. Unfortunately she's having increasing pain. I know her sis and feel so bad for her, special needs like and must be so scared and confused. She's 62. BFF is 64. Makes me grateful for at least being of sound mind to be able to understand and handle it.

OMG. My bff who is going to be helping me after bro leaves for LA 5 days after my sx just got very bad news on her sis. She has liver, pancreas and colon cancer. So so upset and in shock. She's mentally challenged so she never wanted to go in for a check up. The only time was the occasional times where something was bad and it was to the ER. The sis knows now and Anna my friend is getting her tranquilizers so she can get her anxiety under control. Docs are saying she should continue on as usual in her life the best she can, and she wants to keep going to her special needs school. Oh man. I'm crushed. I love her sis too.

I hate to bring this up as I feel what I have is nothing compared to her sis and am embarrassed to still be concerned, but assuming everything goes well and with my positive and determined attitude, you guys think after 5 days after sx when bro has to leave, I'll be ok on my own. Not great but ok? I simply can't bring up her helping me now and wouldn't blame her if it would be too much.

3 full days left for me! ah!

Trying to think of what you can eat and not worry about constipation with it and all. Bro is the only one in here and he can do only simple quick things, so even chicken soup is out. Plus is so warm here so I'd want meals that are cold or don't taste bad cold.

Scrambled eggs with tomatoes and green peppers cooked in, TJ's herbal rice medley (or does rice of any kind constipate you?), fish, frozen spinach with greek yogurt mixed in--- and very very simple things to throw together in a jiff for him to handle?

Thanks! Not a big fruit fan but will have to become one!

Sorry I've been a bit MIA. While my own sx seems to have gone well according to my ps yesterday at my po, my bff Anna who is also a help with me got confirmation yesterday that her sister indeed has metastatic cancer that started in the pancreas and has spread to her liver where there is a large mass there. I almost hate telling her my news as it's like nothing compared to her sis who is in constant pain and the clock is ticking for sure as it goes with pancreatic cancer. So between my resting and trying to be an ear and help her research it, I've been mia. Her sis while 62 is mentally challenged to where her capacity is of like elementary school child. Simply heartbreaking.

While discomfort and the 4 drains are a pain in the butt to deal, it isn't as bad as I thought. PS has me seeing him once a week so next appt is Mon. I see bs for po on Fri then it goes for 6 mo as long as nothing comes up for him to recheck. I think I'm more worried about the se of chemo and tamoxifen. I see MO 9/23 again to figure tx plan.

Bro leaves early evening today. Been here from LA since last Wed. Poor guy has done a lot. May not look like it but wow, the little things like bring me a cup of water can be huge at times. He's very queezy about body fluids. So we went from before him coming here no way can he deal with that to at times being in the bathroom stripping the tubes. He's ran a lot of errands for me, washed my car and waxed inside of it. Looks brand new after months of neglect. Going to miss him. He's spent though. While he sleeps 9 hour nights, stress has him looking like he slept 0. Feel bad for him. He's sticking around till 8 pm tonight not cuz I have stuff yet to have done but Anna is coming over after work and would like to see him one more time before he heads back to LA. Who knows when he'll be back up to see me because since this is such a secret with the fam, he has to be careful with mom and dad. Mom's easy as she's in Seattle but he sees dad every weekend and it can be weird if he skips one. So this past weekend it was a friend of his from out of state came and he's busy with him in LA catching up. Otherwise if it wasn't sneaky and especially if dad knew, he'd stay all he wants cuz dad would cover the pricey car rental beyond the week he has it for. That expires at 5:30 am tomorrow so hence the leave at 8:00 pm and get there before 5:30 am to get it in on the dot.

Anna has done a lot for me over the years. Bro loves her too for it and she's a great person. Wacky family with crazy mom and all unfortunately. So there are 2 of us for me and bro in terms of emotional and mental support for her too.

If anyone happens to know a site like this for pancreatic cancer, please let me know. I have never seen such a thorough informative and supportive site like this one is. Wow. God bless whoever started this one.

I'm thankful I read this site for 2 months and was very prepared. Thank you to all of you here who helped me very much in the process. You all have your own stuff going on and yet you take the time to help little ole me and others. Much love to you all for that.

I did suffer and I think do still from constipation from Norco and none of the otc stuff worked. What worked for me was a handful of prunes and then I had the D problem for awhile. lol. I think I'll need to do the manual flush with prunes so to speak until I'm done with Norco, which will be when the bottle is empty and I'm afraid to not take it and wind up in pain. Thankfully no pain per se for a couple days now but the tightness and discomfort and swelling is nuts!

I have no idea now how the staging thing goes with me with my #s now. Just by virtue of the largest diameter of it was 7 cm would put me a III but I look there and can't figure out what it would be since they said the nodes they took out are clear, clear margins, and they think they got it all. I know mine was weird shape, they say like a dumbell type thing. It did look weird at biopsy like a tumor with 4 leaf clover wings or something. As for II it reads no greater than 5 cm. So it's like mine is in a gray area? Do they go by nodes more than size?

Bro left Tues eve. Did a lot. I'm functioning pretty well. 1 week and an am out from sx. I stayed on Norco 1 every 4 hours until I decided to stop it yesterday at the 6:30 pm dose time. Don't feel any different. Maybe I didn't need it or so much. Never did test it cuz was afraid of the pain. I have a few left in case something goes south.

One thing I think is weird is I feel more tired and could sleep more than I did before. I sit up and walk to the kitchen/bathroom in this small place but since my couch is set up comfy, I lie down and have 0 problem falling asleep. More problem getting up when I awaken. Any idea why it would be more so now than when more fresh out of sx?

Last night I was too chicken to take a shower so I just managed to wash my hair for my appt with bs this am. The driver called to confirm she's coming.

Antibiotics should be done on Sat, which is the week dose they gave me.

Thanks everyone! You are all gems! Vogli: I'm in Fremont. If you are still going to med appts and feel you can't drive yourself there, check out drivers for survivors. I signed up and I just call in and they arrange for rides for me. Phone: 510-896-8056. You can call this # and they can point you to one in your area if this isn't the right #.

Also, how do you add notes to your dx/sig? I am either stage IIb or IIIa on the border because of the 7 cm size tumor and the microscopic amounts of cancer cells found in sentinol node 1.

Thanks again all! Love to you all!

When I saw bs for po yesterday, he said I should get port placed if that's in the cards a couple weeks before I see MO 9/23. Does that sound about right? To not cause delay. And am I able to be on my own after it? I did have bro for 4 days at home which helped and am not sure about this now. TIA!