Starting Chemo in JAN 2007

Oh Skye, Sweetie. I wish we could all come there and hug you and beat the crap out of your insurance office and your dr. I guess if we don't fight for ourselves, no one else will.

I have been thinking about the fighting issue anyway, in regards to stats. We are all bright, proacative women. How much validity do the stats have .... my tumor was triple neg. The stats make that sound like a problem. My dr doesn't think so, I mean other than the fact that it WAS cancer, after all. And I wonder if the fact that we are on it, that we read and research and fight, do you think that helps us? Or is it all just luck anyway?

I dunno, just feeling a little blue tonight. Maybe reaching for straws. I do feel good, am so blessed that i am here for my daughter's wedding. I could have had any number of illnesses last november that would have been fatal by now. So I know I am lucky. But I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Melia

Melia, glad you feel good and have your strength back so you can enjoy your daughters wedding.  That's how I feel today about my daughters 7th birthday, which she is as excited about as if it were her wedding day.  I worry, though...I want to be around for that day.  And I don't want her married at 19!

Robbin!  Soooooooo glad you finally got the tamoxifen!

Oh Skye, I am so glad that you got to the bottom of the sitch, but what an annoying thing you found down there!  I think I am about ready to come over there and SLAP the office staff in your Drs office because that is absolutely inexcusable.  You should have been scheduled for those other scans a long time ago, and if they do not schedule them NOW I agree with Tina that you should go in there in a skeleton costume. 

Amera, that is quite the neighborhood you live in!  I am glad that your surgeon is so on it with your imaging regimen...I have had to run mine from the back end, so to speak.  Each of the Drs on my team says that the other one orders them, so in the end nothing gets ordered unless I march in there and say that it is time...that is how I got my MRI in May.

have to cut this short, but before I do, I have to share a minor annoyance with you guys....

MY EYELASHES ARE FALLING OUT AGAIN!

ECK. 

Ok, ladies, I'm heading out to buy that skeleton costume. :-) Thanks for all the support, now I just have to wait til Monday and go at it again. Maybe I could just wear my werewolf mask.



Rebecca, eyelashes out again? That's unreal! I guess these ses can keep coming back to haunt us. I have to say, my nails had all recovered I thought, and then two weeks ago I started getting darker areas on my toenails and much more noticeable ridges on my fingernails. But the big symptom everyone on the HER2 board claimed with Herceptin of soft nails and splitting cuticles has not occurred at all for me. I guess we just can never know what's up next.



Happy rest of weekend, gals. Must get ready for Packers party here tomorrow. - Skye

OMG Melia I am rolling around on the floor....you are so funny.  No, I was lucky enough to be lashless, browless and bald inside my nostrils as well.  If it is a cosmic joke, the universe is not very funny.  I have no clue why they are falling out again, but the good news is that I can already see little baby ones underneath the skin.  i suspect that this has something to do with the growth cycle.  Who knows.  It is unfair, but what am I going to do?  Well, for one I am going to thank goodness that I had the foresight to buy my big bold eyeglasses because i do not think that anyone is going to notice that I have no eyelashes when my eyes are behind my fabulous purple specs!  Now we just have to pray that my eybrows do not follow my lashes (they are looking pretty ratty again, and kind of thin).

Enjoy the wedding, and savor the prep melia...my heart is with you!

Oh Rebecca....  icky about the lashes.  Sorry to hear that.  But, yes, the funky glasses help.   I have to get Paul to take a pic of me w/my new ones.  I've gotten a lot of compliments...from guys and girls.

Jaclyn's party was a huge success.  We got to Friends 2B Made at 10:30 and over to Max & Erma's for lunch about 12:30.  The kids ate lunch (14 of them), we had a cake and they have an ice cream bar in there.  Two moms stayed and we had some really great french onion soup and 1/2 sandwiches.  It all sent so smoothly and the girls were all so well behaved.  No one was running around like a nut...they must be growing up.  Hallelujah!  I was sort of tired, leading up to the party, worrying about keeping a good eye on so many little girls.

From there to Jac's soccer game and she did great.  She def. has natural ability there.  Paul is out at a block "party".  They have an outdoor huge theater screen for the Buckeyes game up about 1/2 mile from here.  He's at a school friends house and I only know of people that know them...  he's got a cell phone so I'll go get him before 9...  it's getting dark around here long before that now.

Oh, wanna laugh?  Paul's company told two of the guys he works with, LONGGGGGGGGGGG TERM friends of ours, that they could not come to drop off their kids at Jaclyn's party.  Can you say Gestapo?  The lawyer is heating things up with them.  They are unreal.  The Firm totally.

OMG Tina -  Are these people serious - a seven year old girl's BD party is now TABOO - OY!!

Glad YOU had a nice time, and all the kids too.  Or is "THE FIRM" also going to dictate the social activities of seven year olds. Too unbelievable, for sure document all this for your lawyer.

A lovely day here - we were invited to a neighbour's sukkah for dessert and coffee this afternoon.  Sukkot is the festival of the fall harvest, and the deal is you are supposed to build a little hut outdoors in your backyard, using special bamboo branches for the "roof", so you can see the stars.  Then you are to eat your meals outdoors in the sukkah.  It's a great excuse for more eating and drinking - and I did cheat a bit today.  I had one small slice of a homemade fruit flan - my neighbour assured me it was made with low fat sour cream.

Rebecca - sorry about your eyelashes.  Two steps forward, one step backward.  Oh well, they probably will grown back longer and thicker.

Oh, Caya, I cut the most gorgeous pictures of a Sukkot get together out of Better Homes and Gardens a few years ago.  It was so pretty, w/a trellis over the patio, fall leaves everywhere.  I was ready to host a fall party!

One of my hobbies is collecting pictures of nice homes/interiors/exteriors.  I also got the most to die for Hannakuh table setting...rich, royal blues, purples and greens.  Sooooooooo pretty.  One day I'll host John and Wendy here to say thank you for all they did for us last weekend, coming up here and staying w/us.  Wendy's dad was in Auschwitz and wrote a book that was recently published.

Yeah, Rebecca, unreal, huh?  Your depiction is about right.  I swear, I felt that the "investigators" whose company name I will not say here for fear of google were watching the party.  And the DH has done NADA!  Totally nothing.  He made them 10M this week!

Tina, I'm truly dumbfounded by the companies activities. I'd make sure that your husband's attorney knows.  The party sounds like a really good time, though. Aren't those times precious?

Sky, I so want to hear about you visiting your physician's office wearing a skeleton costume!  I just laughed and laughed when I read about that. IT sounds like a photo opportunity. I'll be sending some thoughts of clarity and power to you tomorrow, keeping you in mind as you battle on.

I see my surgeon tomorrow. It's the one year check up. I had my mammogram on Tuesday and the films sit in my living room for me to hand deliver to the surgeon for review.  Yow, the woman  so kindly worked to get me the best, most comprehensive photos which meant she nearly pulled my left jaw to my shoulder. I thought for sure that I'd look like a stroke patient after my mammo.

I had some family over for lunch yesterday and I told them I'd considered taking the films to the copy shop and get paper copies. The we could play "Pin the Nipple on the Breast". I was reminded that there were children present.

I'm going to talk to Dr. Grange  about a prophylactic mestectomy. Honestly, ladies, I just don't want to keep doing this. I don't want to hear again "The radiologist wants another view to check an area." I don't want to keep groping my left breast thinking I may have missed "IT". I don't like being middle-aged droopy on one side and flat on the other. I'd rather just be flat. I think my biggest challenge will be losing weight and getting my flabby belly under control so it won't stick out beyond my chest.

I had a long talk with my administrator who told me "Cindy, I'm sure I'd do the same thing but just know, you're only taking control of one aspect of your body. You need to realize that you know fear now as it relates to your body. You will have more moments of wondering and possible dread." But my coworkers/supervisors are more than willing to work around whatever I choose to do. I'm blessed that way.

Today I need to go shopping for a new coat tree. I don't have a coat closet in my house so everything gets piled on the coat tree in the living room by the front door. One of my nieces pulled it over yesterday,managing to avoid wiping out her mother when someone leapt forward to deflect it. However, it did break into multple pieces. So I'm off to shop a little. 

Have a great Sunday, everyone!

Cindy

PS Has anyone heard from T4T? 

Jan, if they ever link chocolate and cancer, I'll just go move into the chemo room. It'll all be over. I know that crankiness you feel, I've been in sort of a mood myself. Every time I hear, time to forget you had cancer and just go on with life, I privately think, well I'd be able to forget it if I didn't have a port sticking out under my collarbone, GI Jane hair, no feeling under my arm, Femara pills every day, big scar on left side and one much smaller boob, stinging sweat glands every time I sweat, and a nose that runs from Herceptin, not to mention a scary bump and ominous comments from my oncologist. And many of you have bigger lists than that. I do accept my anger over those things as normal, and am learning to accept those things themselves as part of my New Normal. I'll never have that Old Normal back and I can't Pollyanna it away. Sometimes we will simply be upset, for as long as we need to.



Which are just the sort of thoughts that made me howl at Cindy's "pin the nipple on the breast game." Cindy, we so need that comic relief. That was a hoot. Hope you found the perfect coat tree.



I had a very nice day with the in-law group here, except my oldest son phoned at the last minute to say he and girlfriend couldn't come because he'd bought Brewers tickets and spent $70 on great seats, and I cried for an hour. I don't think it was because he wasn't coming, entirely, sometimes it just takes one little thing to open the floodgates. Anyway, tomorrow I call the onc office again so wish me luck! - Skye

Oh guys I soooooo share your angst, and it is not just that I spent last night cleaning up round three of the pukefest (yes folks, the tour was complete...all three kids got it)  I still get angry every time I put that bitter pill in my mouth.  I try to mask it by surrounding it with vitamins of various types, but i still know the real reason why I am popping pills twice a day and it HURTS, and it often makes me want to cry.  The only time that I smile when I am taking my meds is when Owen sees me taking my pills, because he ALWAYS comes and hugs me, and tells me that I am a "good mommy for taking my pills".  I know that he means this in the simplest terms...that I am good because I am doing what I am told....but I usually think of it as being a good mommy because I am doing everything I can to be sure that I am going to be around to raise them.

Amera, my Dr is also very anti-scan, and I think all i can expect are mammos and a yearly MRI.  It is very frightening, and in the pit of my soul I feel like we should be doing or watching SOMETHING to be sure that the cancer does not come back.  But as you so correctly noted, more scans is not always better....the false positives will drive you nuts for sure.  Hang in there, and us scan-deprived girls can hold each other's hands.

Isn't it funny that we are expected to have an "epiphany" and find a "higher purpose"?  I think that your plaintive question  echoes the sentiments of many of us Amera.  It is so frustrating, and sometimes I feel like I failed because i do not think I was transformed as a person by this experience....I care more about breast cancer awareness, and am doing some fundraising, but other than that my attention has turned inward towards my family, and appreciating them and the fact that I am HERE and able again to be able to do the things that I love to do like walk with the kids, wrestle with Frances and make a classroom full of students simultaneously crack up and learn something. 

So the long and the short of what I think about it Amera is that I think that the "epiphany" is one of those things like turtle faces that is given to us by those who have never had the experience of having cancer.  I think that cancer makes you more of who you already are rather than changes you into something new, so do not feel bad that you did not have an epiphany.

Wow, my fingers got away from me here....YIKERS!

Jan- I agree with Skye - if they find chocolate is a cause/link to cancer, then I will book a room in the chemo room. And the drinking thing - I think everything in moderation - If I feel like having a glass of wine once in a while, I will. Sorry you had a crabby weekend.  I think we all are having those moments lately, as Amera said, alot of us were diagnosed around this time last year.  Also it's October 1 today, we have 31 days of PINK everywhere to remind us of it all.

Cindy - Pin the Nipple on the Boob was a great laugh for me. Maybe you should call up Mattel or Fisher Price...

Rebecca - 3 rounds of the pukefest - OY!! It figures all 3 kids would get it - I hope you and DH are spared.

Yesterday I had the CIBC (a big Canadian bank) Run for the Cure.  Over 30,000 people participated here in Toronto alone, and last year they raised over $26 million dollars across the country.  The final tally for 2007 won't be in for a few weeks, hopefully it will be much more.  It was a beautiful day, both my DDs came, along with some neighbours and friends, it was a group of 11.  I did the whole 5 k.  I will make sure DD emails me some pix so I can send them to Jan or Rebecca to post for me.

Today my younger DD Cassie and I have appointments with a new female GP in the area, as you may remember that our beloved GP recently had a heart attack (she is recuperating well) but will not resume her practice. So hopefully we will click with the new one and I can start the paperwork to get our files transferred over.

Have a great day.

Girls I opened my newspaper this morning and the entire health section was printed on pink paper! But relating to questions about wanting some reassurance other than a yearly MRI, there was an article about a new blood test that is being developed that can detect cancer cells on their way through the bloodstream, and thereby be stopped before they make tumors. The best part was that they found these cells in only ten percent of the post-treatment patients.



Hey did anyone else see Desperate Housewives last night? Lynette (cancer patient) started out waking up bald and fumbling for her wig. I said to dh, before this show is over, that wig is coming off in front of everyone and I was right. They even showed her in a scarf, and scenes from next week show her in the chemo chair kicking her dh out of the chemo room for bad behavior. Must-see TV, indeed! These people did their homework!



Gearing up to call the onc now - Skye

Hi all,

Tina,

I can’t beiieve Paul’s company is dictating who they can and can’t socialize with- sounds like the Gestapo.. I am glad Jac’s party was a success.

Caya,

The sukkah party sounded like fun. I remember them, but have not participated in a very long time. I am glad you had a great day for the “Run for the Cure.” I hope your new GP turns out nice.

Joni,

Have a super great time!!

Jan,

I am sending you lots of hugs. These roller coaster of emotions are totally normal. We have feelings, and we were hurt in more ways than one. You have every right to be angry. You wouldn’t be human if you couldn’t express your inner feelings. Pity parties are therapeutic. I do feel better after my parties.

When is your surgery scheduled? I hope you are feeling better today. Lots of hugs.

Skye,

You said it all, and so eloquently. I also cry for no apparent reason- just one word can set me off.- and I thought it was just me!!! I also watched “Desperate Housewives” and got a big kick out of it when Lynette took off her wig in front of everyone. I am so tired of the turtle faces, but my hair is just not long enough to go solo yet—but soon..

Is your skeleton costume on yet? We are all behind you when you make that call (think A T & T or Verizon or whichever one it is). Good luck.

Amera,

Quote: What was that about not sweating the small stuff anymore?

Lol- that stuff is what gets my tears going.

Oh Rebecca,

Yuk!! That would make me cry!! I agree with you- family is very important right now- at times it can keep our mind off all this stuff.

I hope everyone has a great day today.

Viddie

A woman at work who had BC 6 years ago, was wearing a giant pink plastic ribbon lapel pin today. There are walks, "pay $5 to wear jeans for BC" day, all kinds of stuff. And I think it's all great. Just not for me. I am the poster child for breast cancer at work these days. I am NOT going to wear a giant pink pin. I just cannot be any more identified with BC than I currently am.

That said, I truly appreciate that it is raising money for this dreadful disease. And I really don't want to sound ungrateful. Sorta like, I will benefit from the fund raising but don't want any part of it. I am so conflicted. In fact, I was wearing the giant pink pin last year when I went in for my biopsy. And I found it in my desk at work just today. It made my stomach hurt. It holds such bitter memories for me that I threw it in the garbage. Of course I burried it so that no one would see what I'd done.

I am still just too close to this whole ordeal to  champion the cause. I encourage everyone I know to get mammos and do self exams. That's my contribution. Maybe someday I will be able to put a happy spin on all the pink stuff, but not now.