Post Chemo Spa & Shape Up

Hello again..

It is so nice to hear from all of you and compare notes on a few things. Sounds like to me we're mostly moderate drinkers and there's probably nothing wrong with that. Like you, Cathy, I decided not to drink during chemo because I sooo afraid of what my liver was dealing with. I also thought it might be a good excuse to take a break....but around the 3rd or 4th week of chemo I got sooooo stressed and upset the doctors and nurses told me to take it easy. Take an Ativan they said!!! I said, how about a glass of wine instead, and they said fine. So I did and it was all downhill from there. We drink several times a week, but I try to keep it under 1 1/2 drinks. Otherwise there are regrets. There are some nights when there is nothing nicer than having a taste of Wild Turkey with my dh!!

Like you Raye & Mary, I have a "new normal"....I have a much shorter tolerance level. I just feel like, well, life is short and I don't know how much more I have of it, so I don't want to have time for nonsense. Relationships have shifted a lot...some people I just don't have time for anymore, but I am much more connected to the people that matter.

My stamina is improving, but I do feel a little like I was hit with a truck. I'm in my late 50s, and maybe part of this is just slowing down and getting older. I had taxotere, and I am wondering if the effects of taxotere might be worse than some of the other chemos. I know it has affected my brain, and my vision has worsened by at least a diopter in the past year after being stable for many years. I'm a little different but it's not all bad...I think my drawing skills have actually improved now that I'm back to it. I'm bolder and more adventurous than I used to be.

I'm taking Femara and the SEs are minimal except for LOTS of hot flashes. Sometimes I get so hot I feel like I'm heating the house up...I'm certainly always turning down the thermostat so at least we're saving a little energy!!

Carol....that's wonderful news about your scans!!

Mary, congratulations on your new running shoes. I just had to buy some too because I left them in Maine (chemo brain?!!)!!

Raye, I wish I hadn't missed your Giant Avatar. The trick is you have to downsize it. Use any picture program and change it to 100x100 pixels first. You are so darn glamorous you make ALL of us feel good.

Where is Casey...somewhere on her boat I guess? Drinking Mango Margaritas...What kind of boat is this, a sail boat or just a regular motor boat? Hope she doesn't get too far out to sea!!!

Dottie, you look great in your avatar...full of energy.

It's so nice to be back....

I just had my nine month anny since chemo. And coming up on one year since mast. I don't really miss my boob, but I wish there was a little more skin to stretch... it's still so tight. I have a reminder set in my Outlook for 9am every day to stop and stretch. I should do even more.

Mizzy - thanks for the tip on the 100x100 pixels. That did it. My girlfriend here at work measured my hair today and it it 4"!!! I was thrilled. About 11 months out of chemo. Sorry to hear you are having those hot flashes! At least you will keep warm in the winter. They kept me warm last winter during chemo. Since I'm triple neg, I don't have to (or should I say "get to") take any of those meds. I, for one, am glad.

Six months for our chemo spa, wow. And I still haven't worked out.

Dotti, I am tight myself and had my first mast in Sept of 06 and my last one about 2 months ago. The proph mast isn't as tight as the cancer side, as they removed lymph nodes, I think. I need to do my pilates again, as this really helped with the tightness. I try to keep my shoulders back and maintain good posture, but with the tightness, it can be hard!

Speaking of drinking, I went out last night and had...3/4 of a beer. ha. Just wasn't in the mood!

You ladies take care!!

Go Tribe!!! (had to say it)

Raye

Raye, You are adorable!  Your avatar is gorgeous. Mary, I love when I do lat pull downs at the gym.  When I am done with each set I just hang with the weights there and get the best stretch.  I think, too, playing with my dog has helped strengthen my arms. She has a little stuffed animal that we play tug of war with.  It has absolutely helped.  good luck wit the blond - I found this stuff called Naturtint.  No ammonia.  I have stubborn gray and it has covered it all.  Casey, I'm sure your boat is the best therapy.  My brother has a 42 foot boat and I just love going out on it.  I love the water and I don't think I could ever live far from the ocean. That must be such a wonderful escape for you.

HELLO MIZZY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Raye,

I love this avatar best.  You are a beautiful young woman!

Carol,

I agree, the stretch from the lat bar feels great.

I also like to stretch using a foam roll.

We finally stopped scrubbing and went fishing. (The boat is a 35 foot Bertram.)  We caught 13 king mackerel in a couple of hours and sold them to the fish house. The next day we went out on a friend's 60' boat,  me as an observer, my hubbie as a member of the crew.  He and his buddies had entered a fishing tournament.  They let me reel in one fish but mostly I just napped.  In my opinion there is no better place to sleep then on a boat. He fished the next day too; I went for my long bike ride, only to get stuck in the rain.

I am now home in WV and my hubbie has embarked on his new career as a professional fisherman.  We will now spend part of our time living apart, something neither of us is keen on but are willing to try for a while; at least until he finds out if he can make a living fishing.

I'm going to use the time we are seperated to learn Spanish courtesy of Coffeebreakspanish.com.

I just deleated my long diatribe about alcohol, normalcy, stamina, hot flashes and hair.  The bottom line is I should drink less, every once in a while I sit there and think, "Damn, I had cancer......", my stamina is better than it has been in years, I am sick of hot flashes and the interupted sleep and I want my straight, thick hair back. 

I should try and get some sleep.

I hope you all have a very good Monday.

Casey

Hey Casey....

Great to see you!!  We thought we'd lost you somewhere in the Bermuda Triangle!!! 

Now I am really sorry that we missed your DIATRIBE...you thoughts are very interesting.  Did you save it?  Please post it anyway.  After what we've been through together you don't have to worry about shocking us!!!

We're still drinking...same rules,never go over one and a half shots.  A few nights a week.  Somehow I think it would be better if I didn't drink at all, but I just can't get motivated to quit.  Beer is a good solution, because I can never get a whole one down!!!   

What your husband had decided to do is very interesting....what are you doing at the other end that is so important?!! ...probably being the major bread earner.

My DH & I have had a similar quandary.  I love the Maine, and we both want to move there eventually, and we are sitting here in Michigan watching the value of real estate plummet, while there are still good deals in Maine (for how long?) and wondering if we shouldn't just sell our house and buy one in Maine NOW....problem is he has a career job here with the gov't that is very, very good to him, financially and otherwise.  I can't get a job here either.  Maybe I should try marketing art out-of-state.  Michigan is in a one-state depression.

I would LOVE to sleep on a boat, never have.  Once took a ferry across Lake Michigan on a very foggy day, the gentle rocking was so seductive I wanted to take a state room.  Instead we went into the theatre to find some comfortable chairs to sleep in, but they were showing Ground Hog Day!!!  What a hoot!!!!

Mizzy

PS...Lot of interesting stuff going on on the boards lately.  There have been lots and lots of problems lately and many people have left.  The ones remaining are trying to clean things up.  It will be nice if it stays that way. 

You ladies are wonderful - thank you!!!

Mary, you will look fabulous blonde! Whew - with that bod! You will look like a million bucks, more like a billion. Can't wait to see the photo.  What a strange feeling that must have been with the implants in the water. I know after my masts, I was a bit worried about doing push ups as well - afraid I would tear my incisions or rupture something (what, I don't know).

Mizzy - my hair was the same way. Tallish on the top and short everywhere else. Just wait, in a couple months it will get even better!  The curls sound adorable. Don't fret about the weight, it'll come off. I am happy that your appetite is back (means you are happy!) - don't shoot me.  128 territory sounds like a fine place to be - as does Maine. I say go for it. We've got to live in the moment!

Carol - Lat pull downs sound wonderful. I am finally getting that desire to work my body with weights and running again.  

Casey - Buenos Dias! Best of luck to your fisherman and to you with your classes in Espanol! I took Spanish I, II and intermediate in college. I remember bits and pieces and love the language, just wish I could speak fluently. I too have thought of learning more with CDS, computer programs, etc.

Ok, time to get busy ladies. Have a wonderful Tuesday.

Planning on visiting the gym with a girlfriend today. She may join. Yeah, I need a work out buddy! On the facial hair front, I am afraid my eyelashes are breaking off and thinning - the left side. grrr. I heard this could happen, but I thought I had passed the threshold, being 11 mos out from chemo. I just hope they don't fall out completely. Oh well, if they do, so be it. Whatcha gonna do.

xoxo

Raye

Guilty as charged.  I'll get to it, planning on tonight...running to Dick's at lunch to get some new running tights. I know, I know. But, I feel GOOD, so I am not concerned.

How are you other ladies doing?

Keeping you all in my thoughts.

Raye 

Howdy girls. I had been holding my breath all week waiting for results from Derm Doc on biopsies from last Thurs... both were NOT melanomas so I'm happy. One is carcinoma which will take a little digging to get it off my forehead, and the other is right on the bra line on my chest which she will freeze off. Yea!

I also went to GYN yesterday who told me I've gained six pounds since last year and I NEED to get back to the gym. I told her about several stressors in my life right now, and she said "Tell them your doctor told you to drop some of this from your life right now." I love her. I'm so involved with my Union at work (on Exec Board), and also Board of my golf club, and lots of DRAMA in my neighborhood with a snarly previous good friend... YIKES ... nobody needs this stress, and I think I need to go sweat a few times a week to feel better. I love to sweat (on purpose, of course!), and I just need to make time for the workout after work. My good friend takes spin class and loves it... but I don't think my stamina is that good yet.

Mary -- we want to see your blond doo, eh?

Casey -- I took french in HS, so I don't know what you are saying, but it sounds fun! Hasta pronto!

Mizzy -- LOVEly pics!! you look great!

Raye -- I LOVED your avatar, but your four-legged one is cute too! I think my hair is about 3" and I need to get highlights to cover the gray... yikes...

Okay, bedtime!  Hope everyone is well!

Como va mujeres!!

Dottie and Mary, my goodness...sorry to hear the news about the carcinomas and BRCA.  Mary, that is sad news.  It is so good your double mast is over with.  I don't think the ooph amounts to much.  If it's any help, Mary, I'm 58, I had menopause at age 52 or so, I am taking anti-estrogens now and I'm no cripple at all.  Running, working out (well when I do I can).  Just those hot flashes.  I think your conference friend certainly has the right attitude.  Stay active, don't dwell on things.  Mary, I see many good things in your future!!

Dottie, hope your surgery goes well.  Keep us informed!!

Well, I think we're all looking great, considering what we've been though, and Raye, what is this shyness you have...I loved your avatar. Mary...where's yours??!!..I miss your pretty face.

I'm sitting here in front of the fire, sharing a whiskey with DH. It's cold & rainy out, but we ran this AM. Hooray. I'd really like to clean my body out of as many of the artificial chemicals as possible and be as drug free as possible by our Thanksgiving check in. Right now I'm taking Cipro for a UTI, and I read that it could make you sleepy and dizzy. OK, so I am sleepy and dizzy. But I don't remember feeling sleepy & dizzy when I took it before; I guess I forgot to read the label.

Casey, good luck with your Spanish.  I took it in graduate school and it was fun to learn, but then my advisor thought I should plan to go to Brazil so I took a few years of Portuguese and didn't particular like the professor my third year, so I opted out...then everything turned into a mishmash of high school french, spanish, and portuguese.  Ah bien, mios amigos!!!  C'est la vida!!!

Mizzy 

PS...Take heart.  Hot flashes burn up more calories!!! 

Mizzy,

Sorry to hear about the food poisoning.

Yuck and more yuck.

Mary!

Size 4. Wow, teany tiny.  I think I might have been a size 4 when I was six or seven.

I am sorry about the BRCA diagnosis.  I understand your fears of osteoporosis. Chemo put me into early menopause and I worry about osteoporosis from that. Is there someway to monitor the ovaries (Ultrasound?) and therefore let you keep your parts?

My husband was a Russian language major in college and spent a semester in St. Petersburg. He doesn't speak it fluently anymore but he took his Russian lit books with him to the beach so that he can brush up on his skills on non-work days.   

Dottie,

Don't sweat the weight gain.  I am sorry that you are dealing with so much stress.  I have decided to banish all psychodramas from my life and am proud to say that I have only had two this year and both of those were work related and have been firmly squashed by my post cancer, post depression do not tread on me self.  I say SQUASH PSYCHODRAMAS!!!! You are a cancer survivor and all the other stuff is just little #($&U&@.

Never mind the workout, let's all have a stiff drink. 

Hi Casey,

Wow, that year in St. Petersburg sounds so intriguing.  For some reason, even though I have no ethnic connections to Russia myself, I am fascinated with Russians--I would have love spend time in St. Petersburg myself.  

Our next trip to Europe--which I am afraid is a very long way off unless I figure out how to contribute to the family income --we going to do the train thing instead of the car thing, and go from Berlin, to Prague, Krakow, Budapest.  One of the fascinating things about Eastern Europe is that it is still preserved, because the modern building craze of the 50s to 90s just didn't happen there. 

When I was painting, I used to buy my paints from a small company in The Czech Republic--very high quality at prices too good to be true.  So I tried  to help the owner  company expand his market a little, although I am afraid my efforts weren't too effective.  We got to be very good friends...I do miss his sincere and thoughtful emails in broken English!! 

And I couldn't agree with you more about the psychodramas. Life is too short!!

Margla, Dottie, Carol, Raye...hope to hear from you soon.  Found Thomcat somewhere else in the forum and she told me she's coming back soon...she's just been very, very busy with work & travel.

I am having a much better day today.  Cut my Prozac dose in half yesterday and the flashes nearly disappeared overnight!.  I am down to quarter Ativans at night and  am sleeping nicely.  I am looking forward to cutting them out completely, and I've only got a day and a half left of Cipro!! What a pill dependent society we've become...!!!

xxxooo Mizzy 

Mary, it's nice to hear from you and see that your spirits are up.  The food poisoning wasn't too bad; I've had much worse at Panera a couple years ago, and never ate there again .You are right about the idea of having teenagers touching your food! 

My husband works on a flex schedule and takes every other Friday off.  It gives us a nice long weekend together twice a month, but he gets up at 5:30 in order to get that extra hour in every day, and the result is that he usually spends the first day of every weekend just napping and recovering. I certainly couldn't handle his schedule. 

DH & I went running last night instead of sitting by the fire, and we both slept beautifully for the first time in weeks.  I actually had a normal day, waking up at a decent hour.  It's warmed up to the 60s and we practically have Indian Summer.  Cats enjoyed it too...we have a swinging door in one of window screens.  Well, our smallest kitty brought in a live mouse which I had to chase around the living room.  Finally got it into a trash basket and whisked it outside and got all the cats in, but about an hour later I noticed I was missing my coon cat.  So I called her and she proudly tromps in the front door with the same mouse in her mouth, dropped it in the hallway and went to eat in the kitchen.  I don't really like mice, but I felt sorry for this one and was sorry that I hadn't hidden it better.  So I went to dispose of his poor little body and he had woken up!!  Heart beating furiously, so I scooped him up again and hid him well in the bushes.   I even thought of bringing him a little cheese and then I realized that I was really getting carried away, so I didn't.

Well, that was a bit more off topic than I meant to get, but I am thrilled to find out that three of us are interested in St. Petersburg...hey, how about a rendez-vous there, say about two years from now!!!

Congratulations on your workouts Raye & Dottie.  Dottie, I hope that surgery on your forehead wasn't too troublesome.  Now what is a spin class?

Mizzy 

Hey gals, 

So nice to wake up and see your new posts.    But Dottie, I agree with you, Halloween isn't one of my favorites.  We live in a golf course neighborhood too and people truckload the kids in here on Halloween.  I've been trying to talk my husband into going out to dinner.  But I think he's going to break down & buy lots of candy.  Hope you have that drama resolved...life it too short!!!  Envy your trip to Phoenix; I have an old friend there from school...we were roommates years ago...and I still think she's the most solid person I've ever known.

Still haven't had the courage to get on the scale.  Yikes!!  But I'm down to quarter Ativans and I have only one more day of Cipro and feeling LOTS better.  But these short days make you lazy, you sleep late, it gets dark to early to get outside, so you sit by the fire instead.  I really have to get into a habit of getting to the gym!

I see we're still waiting Carol & Thomcat to check in..

Mizzy 

Happy Halloween all!

Mary,

20% risk is way too high.  Even though your body has already been so assaulted, having ovaries does not seem as important as a long life. Thanks for the chuckle about the vajayjay.... have you ever seen THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES? Very funny, moving, horrifying, uplifting and real.

My husband went to Ohio State.  He graduated (I think) in 93'. He majored in Russian because he thought it would be easy and I think it was for him. He loved Russia but said it was a challenging place to be a woman, very patriarchal and often derogatory toward women.  What was your experience like?

Mizzy,

I would like to hear more about your painting. What is your work like? I realized this past winter that there is more to abstract painting than I thought when I asked my friend PJ (who was an art teacher in a former life) to help me create a large work for a wall for our condo in NC.  I decided I wanted to do something a'la Jackson Pollack.  Oh what a pale immitation of the real thing (but we had fun). 

Dottie,

The golf outing sounds mahvelous!!!  I am a terrible golfer but for me it is right up there with snowboarding (ie s**** and giggles). I can't help but laugh at myself.  Barry and I haven't played the last two years which is a shame as there is a public course two miles from our house and the in-laws gave us their old clubs.  Remember to wear a hat and sun screen!

PS What movie did you see?

Carol!

Where are you?

Cathy,   

I hope you had fun trick or treating. What did your little one dress as?

I always enjoyed watching the old chinese men and women do Tai Chi in NYCs Chinatown (My aunt had an apartment near by and I would walk through Chinatown on my way to Little Italy for some yummy Italian pastries)and thought I would enjoy class. One of these days I will take one.

I hope your doctor's appointment goes well.

I have my first yearly with my oncologist on Friday.  Time flies when you're having fun.

Raye,

Glad to hear you are hitting the gym. Do you keep your camper at a year round destination or do you roll on down the highway in it?  Ever been out west?

Time for Coffeebreakspanish before bedtime. I am learing to say, "Este es mi marido. Sey aimo (Sp?) Barry."

I am a year behind in my lessons and I can't wait to get the Rossetta Stone this weekend because being able to speak but otherwise being illiterate ain't goin cut it.

Happy trails ladies.

Have a wonderful day!

Casey