October 7

Okay, I have 20 minutes to kill before Kit arrives to take me to appointment number one today. This morning I won't be fully knocked out but will be drugged enough to be in the "twilight" is how VNS Stephanie put it,  and they will be implanting the port in my right shoulder for the chemo treatments. Stephanie also warned me that I was going to be very sore and will likely have a difficult time lifting that arm for the next week. Yeah great, just in time for my vacation which starts tomorrow. Figures.

At 2:30 today I have an appointment to get fitted for my new radiation mask. I'm not happy having another appointment after an appointment where they will be partially knocking me out. All I really wanted, was to come home after that one and sleep it off so that I'd be raring to go at 8:00 tomorrow morning. Tomorrow's plan is to spend the day shopping at the Niagara Falls Outlet Mall. I'm gonna need some energy for that major of a retail therapy outing!! But whatever, radiation doc didn't want to wait until next week to do the fitting. Now that Dr. M said all systems 'go', everyone is in a huge ass hurry to get things underway.

At least I had a peaceful weekend. Especially after those 5 doctor's appointments in 2 days. That was rough! But I am fully recharged. For now.

My extra cans of feed were delivered over the weekend so I am now 'eating' 7 cans a day. Plus I'm back to making peanut butter and banana smoothies although those things are seriously hard to inject into my PEG!! I added a ton of extra milk to thin it down and it's still really hard. At least it's going in though. I've started weighing myself every morning again because my weight is suddenly dropping like a stone. I have no idea why. I haven't changed anything. I was back down to 109 yesterday which is the lowest my weight has gotten, I don't want to see the scale say 108 so I'm eating like every 3 hours. Unfortunately today messes that up because I'm not allowed any food or drink 6 hours before this procedure. I'm gonna be starving by the time I get home which I'm guessing will be around 10:30.

I was doing a little internet shopping yesterday on a medical website. I wanted to order a second one of those hard plastic shower shields and I had a 10% off coupon so I figured I would browse around and see what else I could find. They had my sucker sponges and they were $5 cheaper for the 250 ct. case than Amazon! I also found the tinkertoy that Dr. L added to the end of my PEG. That stupid, clumsy valve sells for $199!! Can you believe that?? Meanwhile, that thing was driving me nuts. It's so big I can't comfortably tuck it into my pants, and it makes my shirts tent out huge. So, I had babydoll help me remove it again. The tab on my stopper hasn't totally ripped off, it just started to rip so I decided that I'll use it until it totally rips and is unusable. At that point I'll put the huge ass tinkertoy back on and deal with it. Of course now that I know how much it costs, I'm treating that baby like it's made out of gold!

I beefed up my lary bag a little more. I have now added powdered milk and a quart size drinking bottle for mixing. That way when I'm out and about and absolutely starving, Kit just needs to find some water instead of actual milk. :-) Here's an inventory list of everything that is now kept in my 'go' bag. You can imagine how much this darned bag weighs.

Lary Bag
	Paper
	Pen
	Deck of cards
	Protein packets
	CBD's
	Washcloths
	Tissues
	Sucker sponges
	Syringe
	Bottled water
	Hydrogen Peroxide
	Tupperware containers
	Scissors
	Gauze
	Tape
	Q-tips
	Polysporin
	Posey Holder
	Saline bullets
	Cleaning Brush
	Assorted bandages
	Soaking tupperware
	iPad
	Keyboard
	Speaker stand
	Charger cord
	Extra OSL tube
	Powdered milk
	Quart size bottle

I was e-mailing with my friend Renee over the weekend. She was telling me some of the side effects that she experienced during her chemo treatments. Hair loss was definitely one of them. And not just on her head. She said she lost her eyebrows, pubic hair, and underarm hair as well. I won't be sad to see the underarm hair go. I have lost so much weight that my armpits are too concave for my razor to get into and shave. You'd laugh if you could see the contortions I put myself through in the shower trying to make a flatter surface in my armpits so that shaving is effective. It's ridiculous!

Okay, Kit should be here any second. I gotta fly. Tomorrow my man and I are leaving the country so I don't know how much blogging will get done while I'm away. If I don't talk to any of you, have a fantastic week! Enjoy the color of the leaves, the crisp air, apple picking, pumpkin carving, woodsmoke............this is my fave season!!