a few days of catch up posts

August, 20
I just woke up NOT feeling good at all. I wish I could just puke and get it over with. I just woke up and took my nausea meds and went back to sleep. I slept all day until Nate got home and we had to get ready to go to my sister in laws for Her boyfriends and our niece's double birthday party.
Nate and the boys were hungery so we stopped at Jack in the box. I eneded up eating to. Probley shouldn't have. I just had the breckfast bowl not sure if it was that or just the car ride but I didn't feel so good on the car ride up to Longview. I just closed my eyes and tried to sleep.
We arrive at the aprty and the lighter fluid and the smell of the food and dips made my tummy turn so I just hung out on the couch until Nate and the boys were ready to leave. Everyone understood thank God cos I felt so rude but I couldn't do it.I was up all night not feeling well at all and really regreted going to Longview thinking that made it worse.

August, 21
I once again didnt sleep well last night if I slept at all. I woke up feeling so GROSSSSSS! I can only explain it as almost feeling hung over. YOur head doesn't feel right, like it's kind of foggy and slow to catch up to reality. My tummy just wish I'd puke it is so confused on what it wants to do. Only could eat instant mashed potatoes and feel like that was ok to eat. my poor nose is so dry and hurts from the soars in there. just took nausea meds and tried to sleep.

August, 22
OMG I'm so over feeling like I could puke any minute.
The nose issue WOW REALLY HUGE SCABS.
SO you constantly feel like you have HUGE crusty boogies. You blow your nose and you know that was a mistake cos now it will just have to scab over again. It's a never ending battle.
OH something things I havent mentioned yet is every day about mid day threw the night I get SHARP STABBING pains in my knees, ankles, and toes. Yes each toe hurts so bad too. and my mouth feels like I have a plastic coating in it it's so gross... No matter how much I brush my teeth it don't go away.
The back aches from sitting and laying around.
I wish it all would go away !

August, 23rd
TODAY I WOKE UP NOT FEELING LIKE I COULD PUKE !!!!!!!!! finally, hope it lasts
this issue with my nose is really on my last nerve. I'm actually craving food. But not getting what I want so I feel like the pregnancy cravings are hitting me lol. I'm so sick and tired of being sick and tired! My back is totally killin me today. My knees, ankles, and toes are starting to really hurt for the day uugh ... Hoping I am on the way to feeling better .

Please understand I'm not blogging to whine I am blogging as people are askin me how I am feeling and if you ask I will tell. I do feel very lucky this is all I have had happen to me so far. However, I do have huge emotional break downs and I don't tell ALL but I am very fortunate to just to have what I have.

08/19/2011

day after first treatment
Today I woke up with a weird tummy ache feeling, tight and flipping kind of. Took a quick shower. Dail came over to visit at 10 till 12:30pm. We had a great time chillaxin on the recliners watchin practice and qulifying for Nascar and shooting the breeze.
After he left I went back to bed slept from 1:45 -3:30pm Nate woke me up when he got home. Tummy still hurts, leg cramps never went away but now my knees are hurting too.
Mom was upstaris makin Chicken strips and fries and the house reeked for the deep fryer so I had to close the bedroom door and put a towel under the door then light my scentsy. There really isn't much here to eat either need to go shopping for food I can eat.
I am very emotionial. I'm already tired of this and it's my first treatment. I don't like to feel weak and having to rely on others.

fisrt day of chemo

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09/18/2011
First day of chemo
8:ooam I am slightly nervous when Cher Schmidt pulls into the driveway to pick me up and take me to my first treatment. We make a quick Start bucks run. Nothing like a toasted Chonga bagel with cream cheese and a, Venti Frap. Green Tea with extra raspberry shots to get ur day going. WE then arrive 30 minutes early even with traffic. I get checked in and they take me back into a room and I meet with Chris Kostel one of the clinical research nurses. We spent 30 minutes going over paperwork and the dos and don’ts in the infusion room guidelines. Then a nurse practionier comes in and does a quick head to toe body check and clears me for my chemo treatment. I normally would see my oncology Dr. but he was booked so I saw her.
Then they take us back out to the waiting room where I now have to resign in and pay to go into the infusion room. Nerves are really flippin pout now as I know what is coming. They call my name and here we go. We walk into the infusion room and it’s a long room but not set up the way I expected it to be. Its set in to like a bunch of quad areas in a long row with a big nurses station at the end of the room. We turn at the nurse’s station and enter another room of quads and another nurse’s station.
..... This is my area

..... This is the counter you can't touch
do to the chemo bags are set here.

this counter divides my area from the next persons area. there is a small walk way inbetween and then another set of these to form a quad. There was 4 quads in the room I was in and one nurses station. I had the choice of 3 chairs to sit in my quad. One with the window to my side, 2 facing the windows of intersate. I chose the one in the back with the chair facing the room not the window. Hellooooooooooooo people watcher here. My nurse came over to get my IV set up in my port on my chest.
....

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The Iv is set up then she tells me she will let pharmacy know I am hooked up to IV, and that the pharmacist will be in to talk to me.
So the pharmisist and a student in traning come over and discuss akk my currant meds and my migrains. Well some of the meds can cause migraines so we really talked about that a lot. What we will do incase i do get one. We then went over all the meds i will be talkin when I get home. They leave and about 10 minutes later my nurse comes back with a mini IV bag of steroids. They explain this will be to calm the body down before the chemo. Now my nurse comes back with this chemical labled bag labled number 1
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I tried to turn these picts multi times and it wont so deal with it lol



this is my first bag of chemo.... My nurse comes back preps the ag then comes over kneels besides me and reads me the bag you know my name , DOB, health record number, name of meds, doseage. then hangs it after I ok it. She said they would slow drip this med for 30 minutes check my heart rate ect then turn it up if not reactions.My nurse came back to check on me and Well this started to cause a headache. I wasn't sure if this was due to not really eating, nerves or the meds. So Cher went down to the mini cafiteria and got me some cheese meat and chips. This was just what I wanted too. The nurse gave my two tylonel. Maybe the both kind of helped but I still had it after the first bag. So here came the second back of chemo.
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oops upside down it wont let me change these ( very frustrating sorry guys )

So this second bag of chemo made my nose burn liek right after sneezing you might get the pressure and burnning feeling. Well I had that for about 30 minutes till they got me 2 sutifed and it kind of took away the burn but not the pressure.
Well once the chemo bags are emptied they took out the port line. cleaned up the area and then sent me to the pharmacy top pick up all my home meds.

This is where I have to give koodos to a great frined for takin time out of her family, and work, schedule to come from Seattle to just sit there with me durring this boring time. What a great friend. Thanks Cher Schmidt!
I was hungery when we left so we stopped at Muchas Gracias got a qusadillia then we stopped at Utopia so she can talk to Danika. When we made it home it was 3:45pm just after Nate got home and We said our good byes to Cher and I went straight down peed and then changed right in to pj's and went straight to bed. But I had to get paper work in order and all but then laid down even though I couldn't sleep. ( that damn steroids) My tummy don't know what it wants to do. I have been sneezing a lot now though I noticed. I am just week, calves are starting to cramp, can't sleep.

Colton came down curled up in bed with me then I had to have nate wke him up and go eat dinner come to find out he had a tummy ache and didnt feel good ( great this may not be good )

08/15/11 Ok so yesterday I had a Muga heart scan The MUGA scan (Multiple Gated Acquisition scan) is a noninvasive test that produces a moving image of the heart. From this image, the health of the heart’s major pumping chamber (the left ventricle) can be assessed. A MUGA scan is performed by attaching a radioactive substance, Technetium 99, to red blood cells, then injecting the red blood cells into the patient’s bloodstream. (The level of radiation to which a patient is exposed during this test is considered minimal.) The patient is then placed under a special camera (a gamma camera), and with some fancy computer manipulation, a “movie” of the beating heart is made. From this moving image, the MUGA scan gives an accurate and reproducible way to measure the ejection fraction of the left ventricle. The left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) is an excellent measure of overall cardiac function. The ejection fraction is simply the proportion of blood that is expelled from the ventricle with each heart beat. So, for instance, if the left ventricle ejects 60% of its blood volume with each beat, the LVEF is 0.6. (A normal LVEF is 0.5 or greater.) So Kris Gray went with me and we go back to the area where they are going to draw blood the first lady couldn't get the needle in the vein correctly even after blowing a vein on a second attempt and heating my hand with a warming bag. ..... .... this is the lady Kris and I didn't care for she was kind of grumpy and she blew my vein damn it ! the phone rings a lady in back calls out it's for her. The lady drawing my blood or attempting to draw my blood says it's actually for me and so she had to stop and let me up to go answer the phone. It was Marg from the Chemo Drug Study. Tellin me that they will do my EKG in between the Muga blood draw and the test and that she also got my blood work back good news! I'm premenopausal.... No shit really, I'm thinkin'. So, she tells me that I am acceptable for another part of the drug study which is just more blood draws. ok cool whatever, I get off the phone and start the blood draws again. ..... .... This time the second lady finds a good vein and we get the what she explained the glue like substance put into the blood stream. I had to wait 20 minutes before I got the radiation put into the blood stream, so I went and got my EKG done. I come back and they take me and Kris back to where they did the scan. So she tells me to lay flat on the table and I had to stay still for 10 minutes. HELLO, that's like tellin a infant to sit still. Come on now, it's me. OMG I had every itch and twitch once she told me she started uuugh so frustrating. but we got the testing done. THANK GOD! I'm hoping this third picture will work I took it as a video maybe it will come out here as a video but hoping for at least a picture, or both lol. Fingers crossed.





So Marg called me today and told me she got the EKG and MUGA results and everything is fine.
then she explained she randomized me to the Drug Study Computer and i will only recieve basic Chemo and I will get 6 rounds. Once, every 3 weeks. I'm not sure If I'm happy frustrated or sad aboutt his. When she called I cried cause it wasn't what the Dr. and I discussed as I remembered. I already feel I have lost control of what my choices are. i think I have just hit a over whelming wall and just began the frustration part. what kind of freaks me out is I haven't even started chemo yet.

A lot has happened

08/12/11
Ok so a lot has happened in 10 days where to begin.
Our 16th wedding anniversary was the 4th and we had decided the week prior that since I will have chemo we might as well take a quick mini vaca somewhere and so Nate, Cher & ! Discussed us coming to Seattle for a few days. So we are planning a trip 08/11 – 08/14 to just hang out with the Schmidt family.
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08/08/11 I went in and had a power port put into me so I won’t be as poked when they do chemo and less chances of collapsing a vein. SO to do this they have to this surgically. But they only make you doppy and not put you completely out. I didn’t like that part I was pretty far out in left field but I didn’t like that guy picking up the blue sheet asking me if I’m ok … I kept wondering where the hell I was and if I was seriously still alive. Since this is right under my left clavicle bone the draping was to close so I guess they just covered my head with it FREAK ME OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!! OMG
SO I make it back to recovery the sweet lady for my nurse stayed with me from the minute they wheeled me in till she wheeled me out to the car. This lady cracked me up she read in the charts I was start chemo soon so she hooked me up with a to go bag she said lol you know them big patient belonging bags well half full of stuff….. Barff bags she said good to keep in the car to and from chemo and beside the bed, 3 boxes of gauze 4 x 4 pads, and enough of the clear awesome tape they like to use when they cover the ports from moving and getting wet. She said these are to keep my port area cleaned so I can shower. Then she threw in 13 double packs of saltine crackers 15 double packs of graham crackers and 6 chocolate pudding snack packs 8 of the ice pack bags and 4 of the head ice pack bags. This lady was really generous and said she really wanted to make sure I had the hook up when I go home lol.
08/10/11
Today Kris gray went with me to my Oncology radiation consult appt. well this Dr was so awesome and sweet he said he had a conference call with all 3 of my Drs on the team and discussed with them their options, he did a chart review, and then looked me over. He said in his oppion I didn’t meet any of the requirements to have radiation and he wouldn’t want to put me threw it if I didn’t need it so I will not be having radiation done. WHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
i did go back over to my Chemo oncologist and signed paperwork to be in the drug study for chemo. I will start my chemo thursday August 18, 2011
I have the dates but not with my i will post them afgter I get back from my trip

08/11/11
Nate and I get up and head to Seattle. We are having a ball just hanging out being with their family got to love the Schmidt’s
Cher and I did figure out what she is doing for the table scape for Savor the Season’s table event
08/12/11
Today Cher and I dragged Nate around to good will and Value Village looking for things for the Savor the Season tables cape. Then we all caught up on Big Brother.
I have noticed I am really tired lately and emotionaly but it's to be expected oh well I'm breathing is what is more important!

Hey have you felt your boobies today......

08/02/11 Fill Up Appointment

08/02/11

Today I went to my plastics fill up extender appt. SO he goes in and give me a numbing shot Didn’t feel it anyways ha-ha. Then he added a needle with a port on it and from the port it had the IV tubing to a large syringe. But there was a second tube coming to the first tube. So the syringe had a valve that went to both IV tubes. The second tube went to the IV bag hanging behind the bed. It was really cool I can feel him push the fluid in WEIRD! Then he’d shut off the valve pull new fluid from the IV bag and open the port and push more in. I will try to get a picture at my next visit to show you all kind of weird but cool at the same time. However on my right boob (the bad one. When I say bad the one that had cancer in it and the one they had to take a lot off tissue out of and two of my nodes out ) he had poked me a few times before finding the correct area. The magnet didn’t work correctly go figure, my damn luck huh. So when he did stick me he had a hard time, I was stuck 2 times total. He noticed that I have a lot of fluid (swelling) still around the extender implant which he wasn’t expecting. After he found the correct area he tells me “ Well, I’m not going to lie about this but I am concerned that I might have poked and popped the extender” Geee thanks he didn’t lie about it but my damn luck…so what has he lied to me about I sat there wondering. How will I know if he popped the extender you’re wondering…. If I go flat or I notice I’m lookin flat. He never answered what if he did pop it he just avoided that. Well so once I’m filled with another 250 cc’s I’m taped with gauze and pushed out the door.

So now I have a total of 450cc’s in me and I feel the pressure. But I’m thinking and hoping that this will help from the funky feeling and pain I have been getting in my left implant area and armpit. Also hoping this will help from all the pain I get in the morning. I am always so tired and look forward to night time so I can sleep. Dr. said this is normal. But I know what is coming the very painful and pressure of the morning when I wake up. I have not been medicating when I know I’m just going to sit around the house, but it’s getting so bad I have to do something. The pressure and pain is getting to me. When I asked the Dr. if it’s normal I get a yup it’s common from him so I ask when does it quit. “As soon as you get your new implants” uuuuuuughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
I really don’t like this Doc he don’t really answer my questions he acts like he is always rushed grrrr.