Illinois ladies facing bc

Checking in after a few weeks.  Lot has been going on.  I don't know if I told you all but about 3 weeks ago I had been having alot of fainting spells.  One morning I fell on the bathroom floor and ended up with a huge black eye.  Called my onc and they had be come in.  I had a cat scan and everything was fine as far as my brain. It ended up that all my fainting spells were from the Cymbalta anti-depressant I was taking.  I don't take that anymore.  I actually don't take any type of anti-depressant.

I had last week off and we went to St. Augustine in Florida. We had a great time and I actually fellt good for a few days.  We then took a drive from St. Augustine to Downtown Disney and then back to Jacksonville.  We got home on Friday.  We all had a great time.  Then on Saturday my youngest was playing with his skateboard and it flew up and hit him in the forehead.  Off to the emergency room for stitiches.

My hair fallling out again.  I had it shaved off on Tuesday.  It sure is getting old.  I have 2 more treatments then I will have a pet scan to see how everything is doing.  The onc says it sees to be pretty aggressive but we will be poitive that everything will turn out okay.

Weather has been great.  Mostly sunny with the highs in the high 70's low 80's.

Thats about it for now..

Ginny

Hi Ginny:

You sound very good and very happy!  I am glad you found out the reasons for the fainting spells.  Everything, just everything is alarming when you have BC.  You really sound great thought and I am hoping it stays that way.

 I think about you every day!

Susan

I just realized  I need my annual mri!  I am so phobic about it, but will take a tranquilizer this time.  The last time I went, I went without meds and the technicians advised me NOT TO COME BACK WITHOUT MEDS.  They were not being mean, they just said it was so silly for me to endure my anxiety like that when there is no reason to do so. I wish I did not make this so big in my head.  I have another month of freedom from it, but I am due.

 Okay, let's talk about something else.  English Major, let us know the date of your surgery so we can keep you in mind.  You seem so cool and calm about it all.  I was an English major too and loved everything about it except Chaucer and Beowulf.

Wendy, are you trying books on tape?  Paul "reads" everything that way.  I am into vintage books now and I am sure they are not on tape.  I am now on The Awakening of Helena Richie by Margaret Deland.  I found it in  an antique store in Wisconsin and paid $1.00 for it.  Just searched rare books on the interenet  and this edition (published in l906) was  selling for $40.00.  The only probelm is that I am the only one who wants it.

Took care of the grandchildren today!  I sing to them at the park and the 3-year old asked me to stop singing.  I guess I was embarrassing her. As soon as we got home, she begged me to sing to her!

Rita, hope the knee and foot is better.  Laura, hope the arm is great and Buddy, just hoping all is happy for you.  Marina, I got that meat today from Sunset Foods.  They have a whole section featuring that meat from the organic farms.  Quite costly, but I do want to try it. You have treatments in Highland Park and there is a Sunset there.  I will tell you how this turns out.

Have fun!

Susan

Just a quick update.. Tried massaging her with Lavender last night.. she did sleep until 3.. woke once to eat.. and back to bed until 6:45.. so not bad.. don't know what worked...

Stress is really high at work.. and my tumors hurt.. I will wait until my scans on 4/28 and decide what to do.. if not enough progress may need to figure things out...

Hope everyone enjoyed the day...

Marina

I'm on countdown to surgery........starting to get phone calls and paperwork is all in order with work and ins comp.  Nerves are ok, butterflies are still flittering around my stomach..... received a packet of information from my doctor today....don't really want to go to work tomorrow, but oh well.....One day down 5 more to go....Carolyn

If you realized how powerful your thoughts are, you would never think a negative thought. -Peace Pilgrim

Wendrew - Good think you don't have any pets...poor little things would get vacuumed up! Hope your eye continued to mend.  

Susan - Thanks! I'll be starting my new gig in about a week. It's just part-time which is great for the summer!  

Ginny - Glad you got some answers. It's great that you went to FL...lots of fun! Hoping you are feeling okay...sorry about the hair. That just sucks! Fingers crossed for the PET scan. Hang in there, Ginny.  

BINNEY - Thanks so much for the info! I am sooooooooooooo happy to read about that. Past and present Illinois girls are always welcome here! lol Pop in anytime! And thanks again for looking out for us LE girls! I have shared your web addy with my P-Therapist and several of my friends.  

Carolyn - Those butterflies will soon be replaced with sighs of relief, once you have the surgery and start the recovery process. Have some fun this weekend.  

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I am off and running too...have an Onc appt and then PT. The Onc appt should be interesting. At my last routine Onc check up, I told him I stopped taking Tamoxifen (was on it for 3.5 years). Stopped it because of the HORRIBLE/UNBEARABLE hot flashes. I told him I didn't want to take any of the AI's in place of it as I refuse to accept/deal with the inevitable s/e's. He told me to research it and come back so we can discuss it again...sooooooo that's why I'm going today. I still don't know WHAT THE FRICK TO DO! Although I do want him to tell me the survival percentages of taking hormone treatment versus not taking it. Yikes...I hate this. But we shall see...  

To date we have:  

One Eye Wendrew

One Knee Rita

One Arm Laura, One Arm Budder, One Arm Elf

One Boob Carolyn 

One Nostril Elf

One Ear Michele

One Chick Blackjack

Any other ONES out there?

I'm sitting her waiting for my daughter to wake up and call me so we can go to the jewelry/stuff trade show. Hopefully, I can try and catch up with everyone. 

Wendy - So sorry to hear about the eye.  It reminds of years ago when my son was hit in the eye and got a "hyphema."  He had to sit upright, in a recliner for 2 weeks so the blood wouldn't resorb on the lens of his eye.  Poor kid, he was like 8 years old then, but it finally all resorbed with no complications.  I know yours is a more serious situation, but I wonder if they talked to you about staying upright, or if that's even a factor your situation?

Laura - Why am I not surprised that you are beating  your LE back like a champ?  I don't think it ever had a chance.   The therapist I have for my stuck shoulder thing now also works with LE patients and convinced me to get a sleeve to wear for our transatlantic flight in September.  

Jackie - I have a friend who lives in Hawaii who does Reiki.  I wish she was around here because I'd definitely give it a try.  My mother is Buddhist (one form of it anyway) and prays for me all the time,  so maybe I have a bit of an "in" for it to work?  LOL!

Marina - I totally understand about wanting the brain scan.  Maybe it's because I work in diagnostics, but I am a fan of getting things checked and hearing they are negative, so I can move on and stop worrying about it.  As far as sleeping solutions for baby, I used to find that my kids tended to sleep better when I ran the humidifier in their room.  I think it was the white noise more than the humidity.  Some people sleep better with fans running, it's all about that constant, low white noise.  Personally, white noise, fans or otherwise, drive me NUTS.  LOL!  But I do think it helped my babies sleep more soundly.  

Susan - Welcome home!  I love to travel, but I always love coming home again.  I have come to know that when I have an MRI, it goes a lot more smoothly if I take a Xanax first, especially if they are scanning anything upper body.  

It's funny you should mention Sunset Foods in Highland Park.  I used to live right across the street from there, on Greenbay, for a year or so back in 1974.  We were just transferred here to Illinois and were waiting for housing on Ft. Sheridan.  My best friend's mother worked there for many years until she retired.  Such old memories of that area... 

Connie - Glad the Gaviscon and Prevacid are working for you.  My GI doc gave me an Rx for 30mg. Prilosec - basically double the strength of the same otc medication in Prevacid and Prilosec.  She told me that I needed to take it first thing in the morning, before anything else.  It did help when I was having stomach problems, but now I'm better so back to just taking otc on a PRN basis. 

We had the pharm rep for Reclast come to our office yesterday.  I talked to him about how I'd started the Zometa infusions.  For those who don't know, Reclast and Zometa are the same drug, but the dosing can be different, and Reclast is marketed for Osteopenia and Osteoporosis, whereas Zometa is dosed and marketed for cancer patients. The numbers for improvement in bone density after treatments really are impressive and it made me feel happier about having started it.  I can't wait to see what my next bone dexa scan shows.

Ginny - Sucks about your hair, but at least you know it WILL be back again.  Very glad to hear that your fainting spells were from your Cymbalta and you were able to remedy that situation. Fainting spells can be so scary. 

English Major and Carolyn -  Wishing you both the best in your surgeries.  The anticipation is always tough, but it's so great to get it behind you.  

Elfsong - Enjoy Naperville and your new home.  Naperville is a great suburb to raise kids in, or so I've heard. 

Okay, I think it's time to CALL the sleeping daughter and wake her up if we're going to go to this thing.  She can easily sleep until past noon!   I remember those days... 

Tomorrow, I might go to the c2e2 convention in Chicago with my son.  It's a big comics and entertainment convention, and yes, my son and I are both geeky enough to get a kick out of it!   We'll see how motivated I feel tomorrow morning.  That laundry still doesn't appear to want to wash and put away itself.  Stupid laundry.

Sorry if I missed anyone, and hope everyone is doing well!

I had such a great day today!!!!  When I got to work today my coworkers yelled surprise  - Happy Birthday - we're celebrating your birthday today!  It's a food day!  And we're all wearing pink for you!!!!!!  I was totally blown away!!!!  Got a pin that says "Fight like a girl" and has a pink ribbon.  Very little work was done today by me.  Got my desk cleaned up and everyone came over to wish me well and let me know they'd be praying for me.  Give me hugs.  I am so very lucky to have so many people care about me.  Being single I sometimes think that I am alone but I know in this fight that I am not alone. 

I hope that everyone has a wonderful evening!   

Good Morning Ladies!A drive by as i am goin to a all day Woman's conference in Palatine. Been very busy and wanted to drop a note to remind the southside ladies.. lunch is set for this Friday,April 23rd at 11:30 at PF Changs in Orland. ALL welcomed!! Have Navymom, Budders,Lisa Med, Elksong and Joann . Laura and jan Clare possible??

 Healthy Wishes,

Donna

Happy Saturday...I hope its warm emnough to get outside a bit.  I just had to tell you Carolyn..You sound like such an amazinf woman.  I am sure your coworkers are going to miss you.  It sounds like many people deeply care about you.

Donna..Thank you again so much for setting up our P.F. Changs Lunch date.  I cant wait too meet you all.  Love Buddy.  P.S.  No word on my X-rays.  I called the Docs office Friday and left a message,  they never returned my call.  I cant imagine what is taking so long.  They were just X-rays.  I had them done on Wednesday.  Oh well...

Good morning everyone....I think yesterday's rain is gone.  Sure hope so.  Carolyn, I am so happy that you enjoyed such a wonderful day yesterday.  You are a very important person though no one ever thinks of themselves that way.  You usually don't know when people think highly of you because in our everyday life it is not very common to say so.  Just know that you may be a huge inspiration to others who have much admiration for you and though you may never find this out -- I'd keep living my life with that hope.  I'm so glad  all your co-workers let you know they cared and wanted good things to happen for you.

Renee -- did you get to the jewelry show.  I remember "vaguely" the times I could roll back over and go right back to sleep -- and as is my usual for these types of recollections...did not appreciate it then.  Why is it, that if you truly want to appreciate something....it is far easier if you no longer have it????? Oh well, those were the good old days a hundred years ago.

Connie you are too funny.  Now is there any other way to say this about a sibling -- maybe something like -- my sister who was on scene 18 years before me, which of course makes her a wee bit older. 

Donna...you have true grit.  Getting up early on a Saturday to go to a woman's conference.  I'm so thrilled when Saturday gets here....and I did intend to stay in bed late...but the pups decided on an early morning potty romp out of doors.  There went my extra 40 winks...in the blink of an eye, punctuated with a cold nose on my face. 

Well onward for the day.  Work is on the agenda.  Just another normal Saturday.

Happy hugs, Jackie

Thank you so much Buddy and Rita.  I was going to go to the emergency vet place with her, but that is nearly $100 to just walk through the door.   She is acting okay, but I will watch for dehydration.  We are staying home tonight so I can monitor where she goes. I appreciate your suggestions.  I am just such a wimp when it comes to sick babies or animals as they cannot tell you what is wrong.

 I hope all had a great day.  Paul and I begin cleanup gardening tomorrow as our yard  is a sad mess.  I hear that it will be cool tomorrow, though!

 Laura, are you heading the Komen walk this year?  I love that event and would love to see Dave and Rita (if they are participating) as well as the other women who come.  It seems we always have delightful weather.  September, right? 

Take care!

Susan