Friday 02 December 2011

I’m recovering nicely from my “minor” surgery of having the port-a-cath implanted into my body. The part that bothers me the most so far is where the actual catheter part goes into the vein.it itches like the dickens but I'm trying really hard NOT to scratch it. the tightness in my neck has let up I still feel the weight of my breast pulling on it when I bend over---hopefully that'll let up here soon We will start the new chemotherapy drug around the end of the year as my primary oncologist is off to Argentina for the holidays. Yeah I get to enjoy Christmas dinner, like I did Thanksgiving dinner. Merry Christmas to me, Merry Christmas to me

Tuesday 29 November 2011

Home again. Surgery went well, and so far little to no side effects from the anesthesia, like I've had in the past.

Monday 28 November 2011

Wow I can’t believe that it’s been over a month since I wrote on my blog.

I hope that you all had a good Thanksgiving.

On 10 November I saw the surgeon about having a port implanted so that I can start some harsher Chemotherapy treatments. (Oh joy---can’t you tell I’m thrilled?) So that was scheduled to take place on Tuesday 29 November 2011 (oh that’s tomorrow) hopefully in the morning hours. Won’t know time till the day before, the unknown......drives me nuts.

Fast forward to today and about noon they finally called to tell me that I have a 7:00AM date with them. With surgery to be about 9:00 AM which should last about an hour with an hour in recovery, so they think I should be home by noon. They don’t know me-----so we’ll see I promise I’ll try hard to be good.

I don’t know how soon we start the new Chemotherapy drug, I’ll try to keep you updated as I know.

Quote of the week: It is impossible to feel grateful and depressed in the same moment.~~Naomi Williams, Body, Mind and Spirit

Thursday 20 October 2011

Nothing much to report here on the Cancer/chemo front.

Went to the doctor finally about my right wrist The good/bad news that he tells me, is that its most likely torn ligaments, to wear the brace/splint for a couple of weeks and if it's not better to come back and see him again.

The other day the dogs were racing to the back door to see who could get there first. Keep-Her tried to take a short cut----she and I collided and well now I have a broken pinky toe. Trust me this is worse that a "sore thumb" as it catches on EVERY thing.
Today cause I felt like it was time to do something different, I went and had my hair styled again. Yes at the moment I have hair again. Wonder how long that will last. Quote of the week: Expecting life to treat you well because you are a good person is like expecting an angry bull not to charge because you are a vegetarian.-- Shari R. Barr

Cycle Ten ---- Not Happening

Thursday 06 October 2011

Saw Dr R today and the news was not good. But then I already knew what he was going to say as I can SEE the tumor under my arm and watching it grow was not a good sign. It has made a lot of progress in the last 3.5 years in shrinking. It was to the point where the goose egg was down to about the size of a humming bird egg. In other words I could not longer see it and had to actually feel for it. But it has now grown to the size of a large hen egg and I can see it quite easily-----don’t have to feel around for it. The one in my breast is also more readily felt again also. He kept saying “but the bone scan was good it showed nothing new so that’s good news.”

So in order to start chemotherapy drug #5 I have to have a Portacath put in, as we are getting into so heavy duty drugs that can do more damage to the skin if the drug were to come into contact with it. Oh yeah!!! I am not looking forward to having another huge lump on my body. This portacath is surgically implanted into my chest wall and inserted directly into the subclavian vein. The one that the surgeon showed me is about the size of a quarter in diameter and about the height of a stack of about a $1.00 worth.

Nothing has been scheduled yet so who know when we start all this fun stuff.

So that’s the news on the home front here.

Amber and I are getting settled into our new home slowly but surely. The unpacking seems to take a lot longer than the original packing up of stuff. We are enjoying our new house and the neighbourhood. We have a park (Risley Park) that is about ¼ mile away and it has a ¼ mile walking path on it. The dogs love it. They (city/county) are putting in a walking trail (called trolley trail) that is about two blocks from here and it will go for several miles. I believe that it will eventually connect to the “spring water” trail and to the walking path that goes along side of the I-205 freeway.

Quote of the week

Never take life seriously. Nobody gets out alive anyways. -- Anonymous

Cycle Nine Weeks One and Two 08 Sept thru 22 Sept 2011

I've been remiss in keeping this updated. I hang my head in shame.

Saw Dr. R two weeks ago, he’s gave the go ahead for Cycle nine. So after an extra week off of Chemotherapy I am back on it again. I've been having a lot of leg, hip and arm pain. The pain in the leg and hips is so bad at times that I can hardly walk, and it has caused me to fall a couple of times even with the aid of my walker.

The bone scan came back “No new findings” (which I was sure that is what it was going to say), However the bone scan did show that I have DJD (degenerative joint disease) also known as Osteoarthritis (OA). He said to keep doing what I've been doing, and that he'd see me in 4 weeks again.

Last Sunday 18 September 2011 was the Annual Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in downtown Portland. My Daughter Roxanne did the 5K timed run in 32 min. besting her own time, then she, her husband and their two daughters, Amber, My sister-in-law Michelle, our friend Susan, Kasen (2 year old Amber was watching for the weekend) Keep-Her and I and 50,000 other close friends and relative walked the 5K walk. I pushed my wheelchair but I did manage to walk the whole way. The last mile was a killed but my stubborn streak kicked in about then and by hook or by crook I was going to finish walking again this year.

So here it is almost a week later and my feet are finally rebelling. I've been trying to walk around 15,000 steps a day getting ready for the walk and also trying to keep it up, but now last night my feet said that they've had enough for a while and that I need to take a bit of a break. So I'll sit back and try to relax for a day or two.