Skip to main content

Poster Child for chemo and freak of nature

I made the comment to my oncologist last week, during my chemo infusion, that I could be a poster child for chemo. 
"You pretty much are," she said.

I have thus far been sailing through chemo, albeit like a sailboat stuck out in the middle of Lake Michigan when the winds die and it's not moving for three to four days. Because my primary side effect has been extreme fatigue for 3-4 days post chemo. Last Saturday, 2 days post chemo, I took my shower and got dressed and announced to John that I now needed a nap - that kind of fatigue. 

 And being a woman who has dealt with the fatigue of MS, I thought this chemo kind would be familiar and similar to the exhaustion I feel on a hot summer day where retrieving the mail (our mailbox is at the end of our driveway) while riding my scooter to get it feels like I've run a 5K. That kind of fatigue. This is the kind that makes it difficult to even get up, needing a nap after getting out of bed. Well that might be a little dramatic, even for me, but you get my drift. Movement equals a nap.

 But that's doable. I have arranged my schedule to hold those days sacred to care for myself and rest. My work schedule consists of two days and four WW Workshops,prep and paperwork in small manageable intervals.

 I have no nausea. And that could be because I'm taking the meds to prevent it as my Nurse Cratchit (John Piggins) keeps me on schedule!

 ******

 Now, here's an embarrassing tidbit. I still have some hair.

 "Why," you query would that be an embarrassment?

 Because, in getting prepared for what I was assured to be a given side-effect of one of my nastier chemo drugs, I had John shave my head. And I'm wearing scarves and hats when out and about, but I still have patches of hair!! There are bald spots, but I'm not (as I was told to expect) a cue ball after three infusions.

 When I shared this with the Nurse Practitioner at the high risk breast cancer center, she said (rather animatedly) "WHAT????" To which I responded, that's weird right and she agreed saying that she wasn't quite sure she had ever had a patient not lose their hair after this form of chemo.

 "I'm just a freak of nature, I guess," I said.
She laughed and said, "you are indeed!" 

 I'm hoping that's a good kind of freak of nature!



Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

It's not a popularity contest, but ...

Fairy Tales

What do London Bridge, Humpty Dumpty, The Three Little Pigs and Kathleen Piggins have in common? They all fall down!  Well with the Three Little Pigs it's not the pigs that fall but the house but I have three not-so-little Piggins and it just seemed appropos to include that fairy tale here! Because this is a tale about falling down. But it's also about getting back up! At last night's Douglas Social  my friend Kris and I meandered through the crowd greeting and often hugging friends along the way to the beer/wine tent - I spotted a friend that recently moved to the area and went to give her a big hug. and after proceeded to fall flat on my arse. Time seemed to stop and it felt that the all eyes in the crowd were on me as I landed and then proceeded to get back up with the help of friends. One of the saddest part of the fall, was that I had just gotten my first glass of wine and it was now all over me.  I thought "Thank goodness I was drinking white". And t...
1 comment
Read more

Rolling, Rolling, Rolling

I put my pride aside and got my ass off the grass and into the wheelchair. {I spent a couple minutes deciding whether to put an exclamation mark after that declaration or to put the period after that statement. I think the period better suits my mood about getting said ass into the wheelchair!} On July 4, Saugatuck has a wonderfully unique parade that includes quirky participants like the artsy-fartsy campers at OxBow art colony and the LGBT members of a local foundation along with the more traditional participants like Girl Scouts, fire trucks, and local politicians. It had been a couple years since I had been to the parade, this year, though, my Mom and sister were in town and I wanted to take them. So we loaded up in the van, including Kerri's wheelchair and my own. Once we parked, John asked if I wanted to use my chair and I initially balked but then remembered that it can be a long, hot parade and it might be better to have a place to sit. So, I acquiesced and took the cha...
2 comments
Read more
My aunt recently commented about my blog that I do a  "great job of sharing things very personal without them being morbid, too dramatic, TOO personal". I am about to let her down . . . It's been a tough week.  We learned that a man we knew from treatment at UofM, with a similar cancer, passed away on Tuesday. We knew that just after the treatment at UofM concluded, that his cancer had meta-sized to his lungs and other treatments (including one at John's Hopkins) did not help. John Cleasby was only 57. In my mind, I can see his face in the chemo infusion room at UofM - coping as all the patients were. He was a quiet and gentle man - who happened to be married to a former co-worker of mine. While sitting next to each other in the infusion area, it seemed a blessing that I found a long-lost friend in the chaos that was the UofM Cancer Center and hospital. Bonnie Cleasby and I shared so much and had such similar outlooks. "We are going to beat this thing", ...
1 comment
Read more