October 20

Tomorrow is the big day. Thank goodness. A) I've once again been feeling like I'm treading water in this whole fighting cancer business so it will feel good to move forward again. B) I can't wait for radiation to start making my saliva glands not work again. Yeah, it feels weird to be saying that but I'm over this whole washcloth in the mouth thing. Plus, I think it's starting to throw my bite off! C) The tumor on my neck is still growing. Dr. M said a few weeks ago that he's hoping radiation will take care of it. I'm hoping so too and hopefully it hasn't spread too very far in the meantime. This particular strain of cancer that I have seems to be SUPER aggressive. Grows like a weed and starts spreading its nastiness quickly. I can only hope that it hasn't already started creeping up to my brain or something. <sigh> I'm kind of wondering how fast radiation should work on it and how it will manifest. Will I be able to see this tumor visibly shrinking? I'm going to have to ask Dr. S about it. Not sure if I get to see him tomorrow or not but I think that I will for sure get to see him every Friday just like I did with Dr. A the last time I went through radiation.

So on Wednesday I had my new MIC-KEY (low profile) PEG (feeding tube) put in. Oh man, I LOVE this thing! No more getting it snagged on my clothes when I'm dressing or undressing, no more unsightly bump under all my clothing, no more boo boos from where the other one was hanging down and rubbing, this thing rocks! It came with two adapter tubes. A skinny one for my gravity feeds and a fat one for anything I need to take by syringe. Unfortunately, I think the skinny one is even skinnier that the original PEG because it simply takes FOREVER to do a feeding. If I lay down while I 'eat', I can finish in a little less than an hour. If I'm up trying to get other stuff done while I'm 'eating' it takes over 2 hours to finish. Talk about a pain in the ass. That's a huge chunk of time! Think about it. I have to be at the hospital at 9:00 tomorrow morning which means Jer will be swinging by to pick me up at 8:15 (Kunkel is going to come get me in the afternoon around 4:30 - 5:00). I need an hour to feed, 20 minutes to take care of pets, and an hour to prep myself (and that's without taking a shower!). This means I have to get up at like 6:00 every morning to make my 9:00 radiation appointments all week. Bleah. I should have gone with the other time slot they offered me which was at 2:30. I don't know WHAT I was thinking!

Anyway, had an awesome 'lunch' break with Kunkel on Wednesday. I keep forgetting that I just had a birthday. She brought me some awesome prezzies! A birthday package from Andy and Kim arrived this past week too with some more awesome prezzies! I'm so spoiled. :-)

Had my hearing test Thursday morning. My hearing is outstanding. The chick that administered the test also assured me that the likelihood of chemo affecting my hearing is extremely low. She said she's been in audiology for 30+ years and it's usually kids or older adults who already have a hearing problem that get affected by chemo. She said that she would be good money that I don't get affected at all. That was a relief to hear!

I left the hospital at 11:15 which was just in the nick of time because Jer, H, and Ray B were coming over to play cards at lunch. I got home and became a little whirlwind in the kitchen. They ended up eating spinach/artichoke dip to start, beef teriyaki stir fry as a main meal, and brownies still warm from the over for dessert. Jer was flabbergasted. He doesn't understand how I pulled all that together when I couldn't have been home more than 15 minutes before they showed up. What can I say, I'm just that good. Ha! I was spoiled on this day as well because I received a dozen roses and a really cool seasonal wreath for my front door. :-)

Later that afternoon the furnace dude came. He spent 45 minutes checking and cleaning my furnace. He says it's in wonderful shape so I'm good to go for the winter. This is good because my furnace started kicking on this week. I'm happy to say my new whole house humidifier seems to be working well too!

Friday morning I was up early to see my PCP, Dr. K. She said that my thyroid is now way overactive due to the meds. She's surprised I haven't been seeing any of the usual side effects from that. Feeling exhausted but unable to sleep, constipation, nervous twitchy energy, weight loss. Anyway, she lowered the dose from 200 mg to 175mg. I go back on 12/3 so that she can check it again. She said we're just going to incrementally back it off until we find the sweet spot.

Speaking of weight loss, I was bummed when I hopped on the scale this morning. I'm down to 108. My new all time low. No clue why it's going down. I'm eating 7, sometimes 7.5 cans of Jevity a day plus I'm supplementing here and there with CBD's and milkshakes. I can only assume it's the large knob on the side of my neck. My poor, little body is fighting that damn thing furiously. I've been super low on energy the past week or so too as you might have gleaned from my lack of blogging. I'm having a hard time getting excited about much of anything. I apologize now to those of you who aren't getting a lot from me in response to e-mails, texts, and FB posts.

Bright spot, I've finally calmed down with the pain meds. For the most part I'm only taking them every 6-8 hours now. I'm guessing that will change again once the chemo and radiation treatments start taking effect but I've been a good not-so-addicted girl this past week. :-)


Yesterday my buddy Alex from NYC popped over to visit for about an hour (with flowers in hand, I so love my flowers!). I was e-mailing him on Friday night and he said that he could only see me from 2-3 and then had a plane to catch so I couldn't feed him dinner. Little did he know that still didn't stop me from cooking. During his hour visit I had him taste test three new dessert recipes for me. Chocolate pots, pecan pie bars, and peanut butter bars. He and baby doll said all three were a success. The recipes are going in the book and the leftovers are going to the peeps at QED tomorrow. This week, if I actually have any energy to cook, I'm trying out a bourbon-mango pulled pork recipe and a chicken mole recipe. Yum! Man, I really do miss eating sometimes.

I think that's all the excitement that I have to report. I'm heading back to bed to continue being a lump. I see a lot of that in my future. Thank goodness I finally bucked up and bought that new mattress a few months back. That thing is like laying on a cloud! I love it!