Saturday, August 02, 2008

Chemo update, cycle two...

Really, so far so good. I actually feel pretty good -- an occasional bit of nausea -- but not at all bad. I'm still kind of a picky eater, but mostly because my sense of smell and taste are more acute.

The best thing, I suppose, is that I survived Thursday night/Friday morning without a seizure/trip in the ambulance etc... like happened last time. I'm also much less groggy than the last time AND I have the ever so lovely CPAP machine.

I am noticing accelerated hair shedding -- so it could be the start of my hair loss... I have a lot of hair, so I can stand to lose some -- but this could only be the beginning.... in the next few days I could really look like a CANCER PATIENT.

I've also started to meet some pretty zippy women who are ahead of me on the breast cancer/chemo plan. I'd love to have us get our treatment times coordinated and have a book club. So far I've met three really neat women -- all who come on Thursdays. If we could all sit together, we'd have a hell of a conversation. One of the challenges is that we are all on different length cycles -- hmmmm....

Finally, I met with the nutritionist during my chemo infusion on Thursday. She had some interesting dos and don'ts. Sadly, my days of sushi are over until I'm done with treatment -- I'm ok with avoiding raw meat, red meat and deli sliced meat -- but I'll really miss sushi... sigh. Otherwise, I'm supposed to eat a lot of protein -- much more than I was already. I'm also supposed to drink a lot of water -- mostly to flush the chemo drugs out of my system more quickly. That is supposed to help significantly with the side effects, which seems to be working for me so far.

Assuming I feel well today, Mom and I will be going to Rochester to see my great aunt "PhilosopherP". She's newly moved into an assisted living place and is worried about me... sigh. She's one of my favorite people in the oldest generation of my family -- and when she sees me doing well, being my old sarcastic self etc -- she'll call the others and let them worry less.

Of course, she or the others in that generation would never call me -- or even Mom if they were worried -- they'd just call one another and worry on the phone. Mom's generation calls mom for updates, sends me stuff and worries -- but doesn't call. Of course, they are also in communication with my cousins -- most of whom are on facebook and send me e-mails, so they get updates as necessary :). Yea -- my family is weird.... but, probably not all that unusual.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

no sushi is the worst part of being pregnant, too. boo!

Andrea said...

Is it just the raw fish that you're not supposed to eat in sushi? We eat cucumber and avocado rolls and they are pretty tasty - and there are a lot of rolls with cooked shrimp and crab, too. I would miss sushi too!

Inside the Philosophy Factory said...

It is just the raw stuff -- if I get a real craving I could probably come up with some good veggie sushi -- but, it may be very tempting to get the raw stuff...

I'm allergic to shrimp and crab -- and cooked fish in sushi is pretty icky.

Maybe if I play the chemo card, I could get them to do some good stuff with avocado, cucumber and cream cheese... hmm.

~profgrrrrl~ said...

Ha! I was thinking the same as anastasia. It's like you're on the preggo diet. Makes sense, same concerns.

I am not craving sushi, for some reason (it was my fave) but I'd kill for some deli turkey (which I don't normally eat).

Anonymous said...

glad this cycle seams to be going better.