Some time during the late afternoon Friday and Saturday morning I arrived home. My brother shipped the six foot cut out of me to me! I also forgot to mention that Deda brought me gifts from Chicago, a nice Chicago T-Shirt, a small jar to hold my “stash” already labeled “Chicago Stash”, a small zippered bag to use for what nots, and another T-Shirt that said “Rooting for the Commercials”.
Sunday Deda and I smoked part of one of the blunts included in my gift bag. Now I was never one to get stoned on a regular basis. I tried it a few times as a teen but the appeal never really held, I can count on one hand the number of times I smoked weed, the last time I was 16. As I took my first hit on the blunt, I proceeded to cough and hack, my eyes watered and snot ran out my nose. As Deda noted, she saw fluid pouring from every orifice of my head as I tried to recover from that first hit. Second toke went a little better, tasted like crap. Guess you cannot expect free weed to be good weed. That was basically what Deda said, my response, “if they want me to come back they should give me a sample of the good stuff, not the bad stuff!”
After we did our token toke, we came back inside and we were sitting on the sofa. Hubby came out of his office and wondered why the back door was open. Deda laughed and I swear she said “don’t answer that!” I told him what we did. I couldn’t tell if he was astonished or wanted to laugh and was holding it back. He did ask me if I felt any different. Not really, but I no longer cared that my feet were tingly from the neuropathy. So there was that. No munchies, no nap, just didn’t care that my feet were numb and tingly anymore.
The darling daughter came over and Hubby, Daughter and I headed up the street to the “other parents” house so we could see the new baby by their daughter. We only stayed a little bit as my feet were still having issues. I did get to hold the new baby and congratulated the grandparents and parents. They don’t get the same baby time we had with our grandson, as their daughter lives in Washington, so they have to travel there or daughter and son in law have to travel here. I made a jumper for the new boy, but he needs to grow into it. Darling daughter left shortly after that, as she started to not feel well and didn’t want to possibly infect me. Today both she and the Grandson are home with fevers. Flu has officially hit their house. I am worried about them, and I cannot go help them at all.
We watched the Super Bowl until it was time for Deda to head to the airport. Deda remembered the other me and opened up the package so I could pose with
myself. The Middle Son was here by that time so we both posed with the other me. Nothing like posing with yourself to see the differences chemo has made. I can see why I don’t recognize myself when I first wake up in the morning and see my reflection in the mirror. I am puffy all over the place. I sure will be glad when chemo is over. I am really ready for it to be over. It’s like I’ve hit a wall on the chemo. I could continue until the end of my scheduled doses, and when they removed the Carboplatin, it was even easier for me to see completing all 12 infusions of phase 2. Now, I am really hoping we stop at 10. I am ready to be done and move on to the next phase of my treatment. Find out next week.
This morning was the first meeting with my new surgeon, Dr. Ali-Jones. She is adorable and provided us with more details as to what will happen when we do the surgery. She wants to target 3 to 4 weeks after the end of chemo, but we also have to coordinate with the plastic surgeon. She doesn’t want Dr. Goldberg to do surgery to make my right breast look normal and do the reduction on my left breast until a week to two weeks after we have confirmed clean margins on my oncology surgery. That makes much more sense to me than doing it all at one time as we do not know if clean margins have been obtained at the time of surgery. That doesn’t happen for 3 to 4 days after the tissue has been removed.
As for the oncology surgery, first I will go to the Breast Diagnostic Center and they will numb my breast and insert a wire into my breast that goes to the clip that was left behind when they did my biopsy. They will also inject a radioactive dye under my nipple for the sentinel node mapping. About 40 minutes after that I will be shuttled over to the hospital to start the surgery portion. Dr. Ali-Jones will remove an area around the clip that measures slightly larger than my tumor so they can try to insure clean margins obtained in one surgery. They do this as even though we can no longer see or feel my tumor, the cancer cells due one of two things during chemo, they collapse in on themselves and die or they break up into small clusters that are no longer palpable or visible. I think the second version is what happened with my aunt since she ended up with a complete mastectomy.
Dr. Ali-Jones has no problem with requesting my surgery be an overnight hospital stay so we can exercise the option on my insurance that kicks in only if overnight hospitalization happens. This will help me keep the costs down as it kicks in to cover the deductible for the surgery.
I should have an answer tomorrow what our target surgery date will be, they still have to coordinate with Dr. Goldberg for possible dates.
Tomorrow we only have to go to the lab for my weekly blood draw.
Life is waiting for the numbness and tingling to stop
You and Deda must have had quite a time of it with your weed. Sure wish I could have been there to see that little adventure. The one and only time I tried it, I didn’t get high, or hungry, or horny, just sleepy. Since I’ve never had trouble sleeping, I decided it wasn’t worth it and never took another hit of the stuff. I agree that they should have given you better stuff if they want you back as a regular customer but I hope when this cancer business is all over, you won’t be interested in it anymore. I still have mixed emotions about you going the distance with your chemo treatments or stopping short by two treatments. On one hand, I would like you to not be suffering the side effects anymore. On the other hand, I want to make sure the cancer has been totally poisoned into oblivion. I guess I just have to trust that your Oncologist knows better than you or I do about whether or not it is a good idea. I’m keeping my fingers crossed but I’m not sure what for exactly. I know that my prayers are all directed at a complete healing and a normal life for another 50 years or so for you. I suppose that’s what I’m crossing my fingers for as well. In any case, LYTTMAB!