August 2015 Chemo Group
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Happy Thanksgiving birthday, great ladies, notdoneyet and gooseberry (may the fever settle...)
Today I have had a "light breakfast" and am off for my implant on left and nip&tuck on right.
Kate, I'm on Herceptin only, having it as subcut injections, no blood tests at all.
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Happy birthday, notdoneyet and gooseberry!
Love and gratitude to all.
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Happy Birthday Notdoneyet and Gooseberry(I hope your temp comes down)Happy Thanksgiving to all of you fine ladies in the USA.
It is just another cold and snowy day here in Canada. It is -20C(-4F) and I am trying to convince my bald head that we should go to the gym. I am finding it very cold when I leave the house. I have such terrible hot flashes and if I am wearing my wig I get sweated up. Then heading outside it is very cold.
Had an appt with my MO yesterday. Well I survived night 1 on Tamoxifen. The hot flashes weren't any different than any other night. I was still a sweaty hot mess. He will see me again in a few months and if I am doing good on Tamoxifen he will set me free. I asked about having an oophorectomy. I have not had a period since my first chemo infusion. He said if it returns then we will do the surgery. I think my ovaries want to come back to life as I have had cramping for the last week. I know my estrogen is in the tank because my hot flashes have not subsided at all. I don't care for my MO. In hindsight I should have gone to someone else. I just figured it was only 4 treatments and I would be done with him.
Kate I am glad you have been cleared for surgery. You will feel better once it is all behind you. I wish you a quick recovery. Congrats on your last TCP. From what I hear my friend said Herceptin was a breeze compared to the TCP. My MO said my muscle weakness(which is very evident in the gym) is due to the Dexamethasone. He said things should get better. I hope so, I can't believe how much strength I have lost in the last few months
Good luck MSBrompton on your surgery. I won't have my exchange surgery until Feb. I wish it could be done sooner.
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omg thank you for all the birthday wishes (and that cake!!!!) THAT CAKE!!!
I had a pretty good day, taking it easy and letting other people be in charge. Thanksgiving was nice, I did none of the cooking and a good amount of eating
Ok, semi embarrassing topic: despite my daily use of miralax that I thought was sufficient, I am now dealing with hemherroids? I have never experienced this before and it's really no fun! I have preparation H and witch hazel, any other suggestions? How long will it take to resolve? Do they go away??? Ugh!
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Thanks all for the wishes as well! Cake is awesome! Fever went away. Now my temp is 98.7 (its usually 97.7) so not a fever... I feel flushed though so maybe thats causing it. I feel fine otherwise! Had a pretty good bday! Still want to be done with this last one though so I can get to feeling normal!!! Thanks again hope everyone had an awesome holiday or day!
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YEAY! New silicone boobies :-). Hope they look OK when the dressings come off. That's me DONE except for 12 more shots of Herceptin.
Best bit was when I was lying in bed as you see me now, and the guy came in without knocking to give me the lunch menu. I think he nearly had a heart attack but it's his stupid fault for not knocking.
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MsBrompton-Congrats on your new boobies. I can't wait to have my exchange done. I am tired of these rock hard expanders. My grapefruit boobs sticking out of my chest.
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I wish I found this group when I was going through chemo! Last one was 10/5 and now doing rads. My hair is growing back and it does feel like a baby duck. I kinda like rubbing my head
Notdoneyet: The miralax did its job but all during chemo my rear was inflamed and the roids took forever to shrink! My nurse friend said hydrocortisone creme/gel to shrink them. It took a week before I noticed relief but I wore pads to keep it from oozing on my panties and kept reapplying throughout the day and extra heavy apication at night. Recticare is the only product that actually numbed the area (has lidocaine). Now that I'm done with chemo I've had no issues! I'm wondering if the chemo caused the inflammation.
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Looking good MsBrompton, glad you are nearly done with all of this crap.
OBB: Thanks for the tip, I will try hydrocortisone cream, and glad to hear it went away! I am sure it is just another SE, of many I get to experience (the bag never seems to be empty, I am constantly saying "what now, really?")...
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MsBrompton, congrats! Yay!
Notdoneyet, yes. It's embarrassing, but yes. I'm told that any OTC 'roid treatment can work--I might try the cortisone thing, myself. . . . Mine wax and wane. Here's hoping the waning continues! I've taken to calling chemo "the gift that keeps on giving." At least I haven't lost my sense of irony.
DeeRatz, I KNEW dexamethasone was the devil. Seriously. I took my last one last night and would have done a happy dance if I hadn't been 1) stuffed to the gills with Thanksgiving food, and 2) exhausted.
I've got some weird staining on my teeth, now, that my research says is also probably from the dex. Let's hope the dentist can do something about it. . . . UGH.
I hope you're all having a great weekend.
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Notdoneyet and gooseberry - HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
Deeratz - re: waiting on the period, isn't there a blood test that can be done to determine if you're in permanent menopause? I seem to recall that being the case...but I'm not confident of my memory. I hope my chemopause is permanent so I can avoid the oophorectomy.
Ruska - love the reminder to stay strong!
Kate - I agree that having the surgery now will give you much-needed peace of mind. Plus, think of how nice your summer will be!
Question...you mentioned starting Tamoxifen soon. I was thinking that hormonal therapies begin after Herceptin ends. Or is it different, do you think, with Femara (aromatase inhibitor)?MsBrompton - you look great!
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Kate, I too have stained teeth (well, GRAY teeth!). So it's the dex is it? Let me know if you find a cure. I was just going to go for those whitening toothpastes.
Love the hot flashes cartoon, DeeRatz!
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Yeah, the teeth thing is a real bummer. It's like a line of gray right at the gums. No one else can see it (I've asked my partner and close friends), but I'm NOT happy about it. Again: hoping the dentist can do something when I see him in February.
JenPam, my MO is having me wait until January to start Tamox--this is another reason to do the surgery now, I suppose. I'll still be on Herceptin (until next August); they typically do them together because of the ER+/HER2 crosstalk. There are some studies here and there that I've read; I guess Herceptin and Tamox (or AIs) play well together. You might ask your MO what the plan is!
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OK people I am feeling pretty good now after the side effects from that last chemo have gone but I am so LAZY. Like seriously, I just want to sit in a chair and read a book. And maybe eat some cake. This is so not the old me. I keep thinking about how much muscle I am losing and how it is being replaced by fat and I need to get moving but gaaaaaaah, here I sit. Ugh. I neeeeeeeed motivation (I am not depressed, just LAZY).
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Notdoneyet Just wanted to pop in and post that I have a different Chemo regiment but was just wiped for awhile after finishing. My counts were low both WBC and RBC. Hopefully by next week I will start to feel human again. Hope the same for you. Oh and about the other thing. I am so tired of the smell of preparation H but it does help a lot. I too hope The Hems clear up yet one more glorious gift.
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Notdoneyet, I hear you about being lazy. Same thing with me. I used to go Gym 3-4 times a week and used to work 12 hours a day. Full of energy. All I do now.... Watching movies. When I talked about this situation to my MO she said - do whatever makes you happy and comfortable . She said don't worry about muscles and extra weight right now. So I guess after I'm done with chemo and radiation I'll start to exercise again. Anyway I hope I will get my energy back once this horror story is over
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LAZY! That's me right now. But when they checked my blood for the surgery, my Hb had not come back to normal yet after the chemo. So I'm only on 80% of my red blood cells. Apparently it takes 3 months or more (some say a year).
Next week, HOLIDAY! Going to a fancy seaside hotel in Suffolk, with beach walks and (some say) the best fish and chips in UK. This is called convalescence ladies, we should take it seriously. It is NOT lazy really :-).
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I am all for convalescence! Just think, while you're sitting on the beach, watching a movie, reading a book, waiting in line at the grocery store, you are fighting cancer! We're not lazy, we're freaking superheroes. I think of it like the six weeks of bed rest I was on with my first pregnancy. I had to lie on my left side 23 hours a day. To look at me, I was lazy. I watched the entire Dawson's Creek series in three days. But I was growing a person! (Who coincidentally, turns 11 today.) And this cancer/chemo thing is way harder. Be gentle with yourselves. And binge watch some tv you would never let yourself watch otherwise!
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We can call it "lazy," or we can call it "self-care." I like the latter, especially given what we've been doing for the past few months!
I confess to having the same thoughts. . . I want to go back to the gym, I'm so lazy, etc. But then I realized that I have about 75% of my regular red blood cell volume, so it's okay to be a slug. Seriously. Being a slug, in this case, is considered a good thing. We have to rest and get strong!
BlueFrog, all of Dawson's Creek in three days is IMPRESSIVE. I don't call that lazy at all!
MsBrompton, I've craved fish n chips for months. Too bad I can't get to the UK to get the real thing. . . . I have to settle. But settle I will, especially now that you've reintroduced the notion! Enjoy your trip; it sounds lovely!
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MsBrompton-Your exchange surgery must have went well if you are going on vacation. Good to hear, enjoy every minute of it.
Notdoneyet, Exerciseguru, KateB-I have completed a full week of gym workouts. My entire body is sore, in a good way. My muscles don't know what hit them. I am only doing about 65% of what I was doing before chemo. My heart literally feels like it is pounding out of my chest at times. I know my body is still recovering so I do not push it. I tell myself that chemo has killed pretty much everything and now my body has to relearn everything. I just tell myself that I am trying and it will slowly get better. I am not in a race and my body has been through incredible trauma. I still spend quite a bit of time doing nothing. It helps that it is cold and snowy out. I don't feel very motivated to leave the house if I don't have to.
I am starting to see some hair. My head doesn't look like white fluff anymore, it's more like a 5 o'clock shadow. It is starting to come in thicker. I am happy and excited at the prospect of having hair again. It will be awhile but at least it has started to come in darker and not all white. My brows have thinned some more and I have lost a few bottom lashes, but my top lashes have held on. I keep expecting them to fall out any day.
I spent the day yesterday decorating my house for Christmas. It is such a big job and makes such a mess I am glad it is done. We are having a FxxK Cancer party on Friday night. I needed to say thanks to all the friends who have supported me during surgery and chemo. I'm sure I will have a sore head on Saturday morning. Maybe I will actually sleep on Friday night. Chemopause/Tamoxifen are bitches who would rather have me sweating and then shivering rather than have a good sleep. I am going to make an appointment for Accupunture this week. I need to try something else.
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OK! Awesome perspective. THANK YOU. Not lazy: healing. And during a vicious cycle of poisonings... I will keep this in mind when I am looking at my exercise bike (from my recliner lol) feeling guilty.
Here's something cool: I am (AM, just on break) an avid bicyclist. This year, the week I started chemo, what I was supposed to be doing was riding my bike all the way across the state of Iowa (RAGBRAI) as I did last year. I have a group of cyclists I ride with locally but this year only rode a month or so with them before this shit storm started. So, next Sunday they are all going on a Christmas-themed ride with costumes and decorated bikes and the route goes RIGHT BY MY HOUSE and does a loop around my neighborhood! So, I am getting my bike out, putting lights on it, and I am going to do that lap around the neighborhood with the old gang. I am so excited!
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Notdoneyet- that sounds awesome. A little bit of normal life for you. It will feel awesome for you to be back with the old gang. That's how I feel when I am at the gym. Even if I can only do part of what I used to do, I am back with my friends and it feels great. Even with my ball cap covering my bald head. At least I am there. Enjoy your ride
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@DeeRatz - I also had a great support system when going through surgery and chemo. My friends gathered together and brought me meals while I recovered from my mastectomy. They were so awesome! I wrote them all thank you cards. Then they did the local breast cancer walk with me and got us all personalized t-shirts So much support and I am blessed. I got them all a mantra band that I am giving them at Christmas....they say "Celebrate Life".... They have all different sayings but that one just seemed to capture the way I felt.
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That's really cool Suzanne50, it's that kind of love and thoughtfulness that truly helps us heal and stay sane. Once and a while I'd bring the chemo room nurses and techs bags of fresh bagels or treats. A little thing, but it would perk them up and make them feel appreciated.
Onc. delayed my last chemo for a week to let blood counts recover to a more satisfactory level. It worked, but now I have painfully inflamed underarm nodes on cancer side. (It's not cancer since I was tested the day before the nodes began swelling. Tumors are now deflated, inactive husks alteady.) It's likely a response to a cold?/flu? the dead tumor cells? Every damn person in my area seems to have a cold. After over a week of this, there still hasn't been any real fever. Just swelling and the associated pain. Ibuprofen helps. Supposed to receive chemo tomorrow so I'll talk to the medical folks about it. This is a new thing and the pain is the worst I'd experienced since diagnosis. Very wierd:-(
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This forum is getting exciting! Holidays, gym, bike rides, f**k cancer parties...
I've booked on this http://www.actionforcharity.co.uk/eventdetailsnew2...
Onward we go!
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Birdysmom, I have been having the same thing - swollen nodes on cancer side - also I have a stuffed up head/runny nose like everyone else on earth it seems BUT I still am somewhat freaked out by the painfull underarm. I think every pain is a sign that the chemo isn't working! I drive myself crazy checking and convincing myself that the tumor is bigger, not smaller (which my MO disagrees with, btw)... It's so hard to just take an ibuprofin and go on about the day.
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I am going on an Alaskan cruise in July for my 51st birthday since my 50th was clouded with cancer. One thing cancer has taught me is to enjoy the moments - let go of the stupid stuff....none of that matters. Just live life and do what brings you joy! Just got back from a beautiful walk in our local park with my hubby and dog. No Black Friday shopping for me this week. No stores period. Just enjoyed my family and this beautiful weather we are having in NY.
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Am sorry you have it too, Notdoneyet. If I find out anything useful from the medical people, I'll post it. This past weekend, always at night, I have a low grade fever with it. My nose's runny-ness comes and goes too, but chemo side effects were doing the drippy nose thing so hard to tell. Hooray for ibuprofen!
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