Chemo 4 over. Disconnect day

11 days of freedom!


Headed in... dressed AND showered. Adjusting to bag life. I hung it outside the shower today then dashed out to get it pulled.


Back home and at work. Again.

All is well with the world.
Cold sensitivity is still there.
Diarrhea eased up
Feeling tired but early wake up at 5:30 exacerbates that I'm sure. Not sure what's up with that issue. Emptied bag at 5:30. Couldn't go back to sleep. Sigh.

Back is holding steady. Not sure if that's due to milkweed balm that was recommended or paying closer attention when I'm clenching and forcing relaxations. Either way I'll take it!!

6 hours later the reality



Sleep sounds lovely right now 😄

Pig in the house! 🐷 🏡

The pump affectingly know as the pig is back. I have heard a few more hints about how to muffle her

She is now being tucked between two pillows AND nested in a blanket to boot 😜 AND wear plugs. I didn't hear a thing when I went to bed!! Zzzzz

At 3:30 I woke for bag empty. Ok that's better than last time for sure. I think I had three empties the first night last time. I ate heavier at lunch the day prior so I think that helped.

The only thing was a crawled back in bed and laid there and laid there. Yep could NOT go back to sleep. I got up and went to the recliner. I did Facebook for a bit then about 4:30 or 5:00 I thought. Hum I could sleep now so
I grabbed my blanket and pillow and went to lay on the couch. It was actually NICE to have a backrest and be on my side. Zzzz snores for an hour before Butch's alarms started. One of which in the kitchen. Sigh. I did go back to sleep
After that, thank goodness. 😄

I snoozed until my alarm went off in time to have me roll up to the computer for my job.

Worked and had thoughts of sleeping at lunch. Didn't happen. I made some lunch for Lizzie and me as she was here. Enjoyed a bit of downtime during lunch then back at it. I'm on a roll the last few days (6 now) I've been doing full days of work. It's about time.

I DID take an hour nap after work though 😄 zzzz

It's been 6 weeks since surgery. It's time to get back at it. I still have 32 hours of annual leave on the books and have 4 whole hours of sick leave leave on the books. That's a good thing is I didn't have to dip into borrowed sick leave or beg for leave just yet, so that's a good thing.

I still may have to in the coming months for the reversal however we will deal with that when the time comes. It's still a way off.

As of today symptoms are about the same:
Hoarse throat
Cold sensitivity that goes to even tap water
A bit of diarrhea (Again less notable with bag)
Increased appetite today. Want to eat everything in sight!! Keeping it under control with calorie counting
Tires eyes (could be the interrupted sleep?)
Back pain is minimal- not creeping in too badly
Sleepy...9pm and ready for bed.

Chemo infusion day number two

Chemo infusion day number two!
Mom came with me to experience what the process is. She was so cute. She wanted to come pick me up. I warned her it was a LONG process and not advisable. She scoffed, then experienced it herself. 😜

I came in at 9:30
Wait out front to get vitals
Vitals taken weight loss still at 50 lbs
Wait in the back hall to get nurse assigned
Go to infusion room
Wait to get blood draw
Go back and wait in the back hall
Get assigned room
Wait for doc
Talk to doc
Go to infusion room to start the actual infusion. It is now 11:30

Start pre-infusions
Start infusion at noon


Waiting to see the doc


Number TWO

And now we wait for it to all get pumped in and the pig 🐷 put on for two days. :)

Going home I went by to see Liz. It HIT me in the Starbucks... hum. Get your Benadryl and GO HOME. Yeah. Standing AND talking was not working as my voice was super froggy and crackling.

Weird. Ok. That's a new one. I felt a little hoarse and "breathy" sounding last time. Interesting. So far so good. Going to bed at 10. As the rest of the time will be earlier feel that this timing is good time.

Oh and even room temp water is hitting the throats like ice. That sucks. Hot tea for a bit I guess. 😳

Backs feeling better!!!

That moment when you're walking to your bedroom and you notice your backs not killing you. In fact you were sitting quite comfortably there watching TV without having to shift multiple times.

Nice!! And scary as typically pain in an area indicated cancer cells are being attacked. Makes you wonder what's going on at that battle front, eh? Me too. Kill'em all!!!

Yay - baby steps

So what is so exciting about this?  There is no more glaring white "dot" of a bandaid left on my neck - ya!!!!

Cancer life is less obvious without the white bandage in plain sight.  I know it's silly, but it's nice to NOT have outward signs of stuff going wrong.  I hope folks are honest with me about the bag not being that noticeable when I'm not wearing the binder because that thing is super uncomfortable.  It's not that squishy, it's just hard to go potty.  Weird, eh?  but it I wear it above the undies, but under the pants so it doesn't hang out the bottom of my shirts.  This is great, but in a matter of urgency one needs to be able to get shirt up, pants down, binder up, undies down.  Yeah so not worth it to a procrastinator like me! :)

All of me wants to be normal.  I want to go to work and complain about having to go to work again.... well, I do that still complain about having to work, but it's just that I work from home now and fight sitting all day.  My back hurts so badly most days... I have to shift positions all the stinkin' time.  It's better than it was last week, but it's still there, it's still aching.  It's going to be "sorta" OK by the time I go back for treatment #2.  I have to remind myself I chose this.  I could have backed out... but honestly know it's probably the best thing I can do to head off a recurrence - or head off any spreading.  Hopefully.

Yesterday I went into my closet to try on my jeans to see which ones of the snug ones would fit me for New York.  Yeah, none of them fit...they all have a huge gap - they would fall off... maybe I should just invest in a belt?  Hum.. there's a thought.  Shirts are fitting OK still - mostly - some are a bit baggy, but I like baggy.  Part of me is happy about the weight loss, part of me is sad to not have anything to wear.  I think about thrift stores, but they won't have tall pants.  Guess it's time to head out and see if I can buy two pair of pants for the trip - the rest can be slacks that are baggy.

Weekend update

Hair loss last week after a brush clean out so it's JUST what I brushed out before and after the shower.
Hair loss this week. Same drill.
MAY look a bit like it's more due to me having balled it up a bit more to dispose of it. Hard to tell. I was told that hair loss would/could start and hit the high at about the third treatment. Nutrition is a bit worse now that I'm not getting specific ones through shakes but my output is MUCH more tolerable as it's not liquid anymore. That's a plus!!
And this is what the port sight looks like now. Not too shabby and the bruise is really only noticeable to me when I'm bright sunlight.

I've been cutting back the bandages slowly as they peel up to avoid pulling them on anything. So far so good they are coming off slowly. It's just under two weeks and I know from the belly it takes a while for surgical glue come off very slowly on me!!

Weight forefront in comfortable saying I have lost 53lbs now. It's holding steady and losing SLOWLY. The perils of adding real food to the mix. I'm thinking I should join up with weight watchers and see if I can't make healthier choices in the future. We shall see. I would like to get down about 40 more.

Part of me wonders if I should just hang onto the Optifast as it constipated me and use it during transition as I'm afraid of losing control on that forefront. Decisions decisions.

But if I really AM lactose intolerant then I probably shouldn't 😜