Lumpectomy Lounge....let's talk!
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KarenC1744 - I too went in for the treatment with a couple bags filled with stuff. I was hoping to work on Christmas cards....which didn't happen. Oh well, I have the weekend to work on them. I had a little bit of a rough start, but it got better. When they started the IV drip of Taxotere, I started have shortness of breath after about 5 minutes. This of course freaked me out, so I started getting really anxious and crying. The nurses were great though. They came right over and stopped the drip. They took my BP, pulse ox and gave me some oxygen. After consulting with the MO's assistant, they started it back up after about 15 minutes at a slower rate. After that I had no other issues. What is magic mouthwash? Is that water mixed with baking soda & salt?
Caligirl55 - Yes there really is no good time to start chemo. I waited until after Thanksgiving, so I did get that holiday.
queenmomcat - thanks for your support. I love you catchy description of this "bleeped firestorm of emotion"! I'm going to have to use that one. I certainly did melt down a couple more times today...especially when they had to stop the IV drip because I had shortness of breath.
Nash54 - that news is the best possible Christmas gift! Congrats!!
Dizzybee - that's great news that rads are almost over for you!
Molly50 - hope there are no issues once you see your dermatologist.
PontiacPeggy - thanks for always supporting everyone in this forum!
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ILSunrise, what a relief to get that first infusion behind you. Even though you had problems, it sounds like they were quickly resolved. Now you know what to expect. It's so hard when you can't imagine what's going to happen.
Dizzy, YEAH for being almost done with rads. Sounds like you're doing great!
HUGS!!
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Sunrise,
I have to make the decision to have chemo....I am surprised you had rads first. They said I couldn't do that.
My mammaprint was 20% considered high risk for recurrence
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Sunrise, magic mouthwash is a prescription mouthwash (you actually swallow it after you swish it around in your mouth). It numbs your mouth so you can eat. I always seemed to get a sore way at the back of my throat so I would gargle with it a bit. Works wonders if you need it at all. Lots of people don't get the sores but I did even though I use drugs the salt water mixture. I'm glad to hear you made it through okay. I would have been scared as well with what you went through today. At least they know to do it slower now.
I think mentally I was better when I was in treatment. Today I randomly cried to someone I only met once before at a totally unrelated appointment. I just feel "different" then I was before and am trying to adjust to the new me. Work is tough too. I love my job but the back pain is tough. People also forget that your not 100 percent yet. I think I have some mild side effects from the Herceptin. I'll be on a beach in 4 weeks, sure hope that helps me. Don't have a lot of Christmas spirit. Saturday will be my 1 year since my surgery. Can't believe so much has happened!
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Positive2strong - I haven't had rads yet. I'll start that in March of next year after I finish chemo. I had to decide whether or not to do the chemo. My Oncotype DX score was a 23 which is in the middle. But I had IDC with lympho vascular invasion present plus a higher KI67 %. So, in the end, I figured, if chemo reduces my chance of recurrence by a small percentage it is worth it to me. I'd hate to kick myself later because I chose not to have it.
KarenInCanada - thanks for the information about magic mouthwash. If I get the mouth sores, I'll ask my MO if they can prescribe it.
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Nash, congrats! So happy you got good news!
ILsunrise, glad you made it through your first treatment. It's always scary beginning the unknown. Hope your next tx go smoothly.
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Nash, congrats!
Sunrise, one down now. I always got some mouth sores as well as thrush from the chemo. There are prescription mouth washes for both. (Just be prepared, for me they tasted so bad I kept gagging. Maybe there are different combos that taste better.
Well, hit #28 rads today and got my pictures and marks for my 8 boosts which will start Monday. Good thing as skin under breast is so blistered, I'll be glad it can start to heal. The Silvadene cream works great, just hard when you have to still radiate it every day. My two techs are just so great though that I really enjoy seeing them every day. I'm glad I get to see the same ones. One today took lots of time to explain the differences with the types of radiation and why electron rads depth can be stopped.
Hope those of you in the middle of the country are surviving the cold and snow! Boy the blizzard conditions look terrible. Be safe!
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ILSunrise....One down..yay.. I had a reaction like yours on my second infusion ..scary but the nurses were fantastic. They all seemed to come out if the woodwork to care for me and my reaction.
queenmomcat...I had my bleeping firestorm of emotion yesterday as I laid on the radiation table & the young guy was marking my chest and going over everything. Just hit me and couldn't stop it if I wanted to. My arms were over my head grabbing the handles.
Positive...still praying for your decision but know we will be here for you!
KarenInCanada... I understand these emotions just hit ...I am sure that young guy in radiation is thinking what have we got here and we have to put up with her for 33 treatments!!
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I had my NP appointment at the dermatologist today. She took a biopsy of the mole that is bothering me but she's certain it is benign. However, I have precancer on my face. So she wants me to decide cream I do at home or light therapy at her office. Any advice?
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Well, I'm happy to report that I had the first of three Euflexxa shots to my knees. My knees are bone on bone, very painful, and I need knee replacements. That was the plan for 2015, but then stupid cancer, you know... I have 4 weeks of vacation and no sick leave left until October. Hmmm, reconstruction or knee replacement, let me think....Recon, it is!
Unfortunately, cortisone injections are no longer working. Euflexxa is a lubricant similar to Orthovisc or Synvisc. I about scared myself out of it looking up stuff online. I should know better! I was fully expecting it to be a terrible experience but it wasn't really painful. Just a lot of pressure. I needed my cane afterward, but I came home and baked with DD until about 9pm, so it wasn't too bad. I'll go back the next two weeks for shots 2 & 3. Hoping they go as well. I can hardly believe that my knees have very little pain this morning. The joints feel like they're stuffed with cotton. Miracle stuff! I'm confident that this will help me be more active. It's hard to get motivated to move when every step you take is excrutiatingly painful.
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poodles Dr I work with does euflexxa you should be fine
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Caligirl and ILsunrise: you're welcome to the term! I only wish there was something more concrete I could do for the actual firestorm. I'm not saying you'll be a miserable puddle of tears the entire time, don't worry. Just that there will be more than a few moments where you burst into tears, and I won't say "for no reason". Rather, it's for a very good reason indeed! (I'm still getting nightmares a year and a half out from diagnosis.) And that the nurses and technicians have seen meltdowns before.
KareninCanada: it does take a few months to come back to something approximating your previous energy levels. My sympathies there.
Mustlovepoodles: glad the Euflexxa's working so far for you--it does make sense to put in a doctor-made lubricant where there's no more of the factory-original stuff in there.
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mustlovepoodles
I work for workers compensation insurance and my claimants have had great success with synvisc. It helps them return to work very quickly
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Poodles, I'd had the injections into the joint for my hip. It did help to buy some time before the complete replacement. My knee replacement was a Godsend. Certainly not as good as the original, but allows me to walk and pretty much do what I want without pain. I'm even able to knee down, although it does feel weird when I do.
Cali, you'll do just fine with rads. Most of my skin is only like a good sunburn. The only place that's bad is the underneath side of the breast, and that has only gotten bad this week (now done with #28 whole great.) Next week starts my 8 boosts.
Peggy are you guys underwater up there? They showed the northwest on the news last night and it seemed pretty bad.
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Dara, Thanks for asking but not underwater. I live on the far eastern side of Washington, right next to Idaho. We have 6-8" of snow on the ground and are very cold. Where it was bad was along the coast, on the Western side of the Cascade Mountains. We're cool here
HUGS!
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We're in the deep freeze, about to get a double dose of Snowmageddon & Chiberia. Will do all my Christmas shopping online—we'll be away in NYC for Christmas anyway (no plum pudding to steam or glogg to simmer, no kitties playing with gift wrap & ribbon). For our close friends, we'll give them their gifts on New Year's Eve, when I get back from DC. Bob wanted to do gift shopping on Michigan Ave., but I'm not budging—my hip is only a little better, we have to keep the cats safe & separated after Heidi's kidney stone surgery this morning, we're forecast to get 4-8" of snow by Sunday morning, flash-freezing on streets & roads tomorrow after 11pm (looks like we'll blow off a friend's party unless it's easy to call a cab or Uber) and a high of -1 (actual temp., not wind chill) Sunday. Oy.
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Brrrr, Sandy. I knew there was a reason I live in the Deep South. You and Peggy can keep your snow!
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Sandy, your weather sounds atrocious! DH's brother & wife live west of Green Bay and they were getting lots of snow and freezing rain today, too. Thankfully I'm just really cold here. Sun was out and felt good coming in the windows but didn't really warm things up. I hope you stayed in tonight and skipped the party. Have fun in NYC and DC.
Poodles, understand the sentiment!
HUGS!
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Molly50,
Hi, I just found out Wed I have precancer on my face too. I got zapped many times with her freezer gun! Nose, lips,cheeks, chest, back and temple. She said if I have any more peeling after a month to get back in to see her pronto. I am embarrassed to go out...just a mess of scabs! She also told me to get a moisturizing cream made by Neutrogena and to not go out without sunscreen. I live in Michigan but winter in Arizona and always wear sunscreen but it didn't work so well. I also had three precancerous polyps in my colon this past summer. I think my body is out to get me. I'm a nervous wreck every time I have a doctor appt. now.
Jo
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Jo ! Ouch ! I think I am going to do the light treatment . It means staying indoors for two days but I don't want to do two weeks of cream . Sorry about your polyps . When do you have to repeat the colonoscopy ?
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Molly, She never gave me the light treatment option. Let me know how that works, I would like to ask her about it. I have to do a repeat colonoscopy in three years.
Jo
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Finally got my Celexa so I can start my Tamoxifen tomorrow! Wish me luck
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Dara, they always show the western side of washington... the eastern side is drier, but we get the snow.. today is last 1 digit temp.. then it warms up for awhile, then back down again... supposed to get more snow in the next three days...
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Anyone here get a backache (not from mets, heaven forbid) that lasted more than two weeks? What seems to have helped you?
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Sandy, is the backache constant or does it come and go? My back, around my shoulder blades, seems to hurt off and on. I discussed with it with my MO and it is possible that it is from your surgery and how things got re-arranged or possibly LE. I think that things get unbalanced with a lumpectomy and pull differently. And my breast seems to need support at times - this has been a forever type of thing (as in decades). Strange. Only on my bad side. Any of this sound like you? Sometimes when I get in bed I have to move my back skin and muscles around so they don't pull. It's all very peculiar.
HUGS!
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Nope, Peggy—it is constant when I move, sharp and stiff especially when I get up after sitting. Walking for the first minute or so is absolutely brutal. It happens once every 2 or 3 years, and started happening back in 1979. I do get some sore dull achiness around my ribs on the left side; but this is the first time I had a spontaneous back spasm straight out of the blue, that hasn’t improved, and in fact has had more flareups since it came on Dec. 5—though (knock wood) not as immobilizingly painful as that onset. I felt the initial pain as a sudden stab in my right waist, then felt it ripple down to my upper butt cheek. Over the 13 days I’ve had it, sometimes it radiates to the groin and side of the thigh as well. X-ray ruled out compression fracture and didn’t see anything “light up,” but that doesn’t rule out spine mets. (I’d need CT or even PET scanning for that; and an MRI to see if it’s a strain or a sprain, which is an actual tear, suffered during one of the Bar Show dance numbers). It could be a worn facet joint slipping, bone spur pressing on a nerve, spinal stenosis from OA, spondylitis, herniated disk or even an aortic aneurysm leaking. Only imaging and diagnostic maneuvers can tell. The timing couldn’t be worse. (OK, it could have happened when I wasn’t on prednisone, which would have left me out of the Bar Show and canceled the number on which I sang lead, depriving everyone else in that scene of their spotlight).
I just heard scraping on my front porch—my snow guy decided that this was a good time to shovel, after the snow stopped and before the plunge into the deep freeze. At this hour, now that’s dedication. I’ll get his bill in the morning e-mail and PayPal him pronto.
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Sandy, I went to a young Chiropractor (he doesn't jerk you around to do adjustments) and then to a masseuse... If I remember correctly I went twice to each. I took Robax Platinum and used a heating pad on my back. This was for a really bad back spasm.
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Sandy, that's awful. And such wonderful options as to the cause - geez! Since it has been going for so long, I'm with you that it isn't mets or some of the awful things you mentioned. I'm glad that you are now able to move. All I can do is send you loads of gentle hugs and hope it goes away.
That IS a dedicated snow removal man. I just fired my crap service (2" of snow wasn't enough to bother with). They did my lawn and that's so over with, too. I have a guy who just wants me to donate to the local county sheriff's community program. I'll gladly do that.
HUGS!
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I am a fan of massage. I get one once a month, my last massage was Nov 29 and due to left mastectomy one week ago I wonder how long before I can go get another. Guess question for Surgeron tomorrow for post op and pathology.
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Peggy....I have similar symptoms as you on my LX side. I get a massage every 4 weeks and it seems to start bothering me on week 3. If I sleep on that side my arm/shoulder area aches. My massage therapist says its the scar tissue. She is really good at stretching that arm and I do get relief for at least 3 weeks. I need to get back to yoga as it keeps everything stretch out.
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