Sunday, August 12 – No rest for the weary

Let me start with Thursday… the ache of my breast continues to increase with each treatment, and I was taking Advil every four hours. Nurse Jackie made sure to catch me in the hall as I was leaving treatment Thursday afternoon and asked me how the pain was going. I told her I was now living on Advil and it was starting to wake me up again during the night, more frequently than I can take the Advil. She suggested that in addition to the Miaderm-L (which has 4% Lidocaine); I add an additional over the counter Lidocaine cream. She said I should be able to find some at any drug store.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert has been using Preparation H as he said he had a flare up of hemorrhoids earlier in the week. So me going into Rite Aid and asking the pharmacist to direct me to the Lidocaine creams and being directed to the aisle and location where the hemorrhoidal creams were stocked had me a little perplexed. I grabbed one that was 5% Lidocaine and didn’t seem to have any other ingredients, and took that back to the pharmacist to ask him if this is what he was directing me too. He confirmed that yes this was what I needed. I looked at him and told him this was to apply to my now red and irritated radiated breast, was he sure this is what I needed? He laughed and said yes, this was only a Lidocaine cream I could use on my now tender breast. So now both my husband and I are using hemorrhoidal creams, but on opposite ends!

Linda’s son sent her a comic strip we both loved! It was perfect. I think it should be our symbol. It should be the symbol of all cancer patients that go through radiation therapy.

 

 

 

 

Thursday night I met up with my friend Linda for dinner before the free concert on the Redondo Beach pier.  We had dinner at Kincaid’s, as I was craving fish. As we ate, the sky darkened and a ray of sun shone through the clouds onto the steel grey ocean lighting a red spot upon the slightly choppy waves. As the red spot on the ocean grew and dispersed it started to rain, then pour. We watched as people walked and trotted for cover and wondered if the concert would be rained out. It was, but we took our chairs out and sat on the pier talking until Linda had to leave. I didn’t get a picture of the sun lighting the ocean red but I was able to get a picture of the sun through the clouds as it was setting.

 

 

 

 

Friday and Saturday have definitely not gone as I had thought they would in my mind. Earlier in the week Robert has complained of some pain, like hemorrhoidal pain. He’s had this problem in the past so neither of us thought much of it. By Friday it was very bad. He was hobbling as walking hurt, sitting hurt, laying on his back hurt. Everything hurt. He started having problems with night sweats too. I had errands to run – drop my car off for service, get a leg and bikini wax, pick up prescriptions, vitamins, a new bath mat and shower curtain and so on. Get back home in time to eat some lunch before we had to leave for the hospital for my radiation treatment.

In the meantime Robert continued to suffer, mostly in silence. By the time I was done with radiation on Friday, I knew he should go see a doctor, but I couldn’t convince him to go to urgent care. This was something more than just some hemorrhoid pain. Something else was going on. I had convinced him to start taking Epsom Salt baths, and this was providing him some relief. He kept trying to convince himself and me that he just had a pulled muscle from moving nine bags of landscaping rock after he was already tired.

Friday night was miserable for both of us. Neither of us slept well, both of us dealing with heat, him from a low-grade fever, me from hot flashes. Then there was the pain we were both dealing with, his in the perineal area, mine in the right breast. I don’t know when he finally got some decent sleep, but mine didn’t come until about 4 AM. He was nice enough to allow me to sleep until 9 AM and when I awoke, he asked me to take him to urgent care. I figured it must be really bad if he’s finally asking me to take him. Seems the pain is now traveling along the nerves towards the front, not just the back… Yes, testicle pain, and I’ve noticed that men don’t take that kind of pain with a grain of salt like they do other pains.

We washed and dressed, grabbed a bite to eat and headed off to an urgent care that I know is in our HMO network. We arrived there and they said it would be about an hour. With only hard chairs in the waiting room, Robert tenderly sat down to wait for his name to be called. He needed a potty break and of course as soon as he locked the restroom door, a nurse opened the door from the back treatment areas to the waiting room and called Robert’s name. I advised the nurse that he just entered the restroom give us a minute. Robert exited the restroom and sure enough the nurse was back a moment later to call him back again. I assumed he wanted me to go back with him, and half way there I asked him if he really wanted me to go with him rather than assume. He confirmed he wanted me there.

The nurse took his vitals, noted the low-grade fever, a slightly elevated blood pressure, and his pain level. He told us to wait a moment for the doctor. We didn’t have to wait too long. The doctor came in and discussed the timing of the pain increase, the location of the pain, the fever and Robert’s history with small hemorrhoids. He said he would want a CBC to check Robert’s white cell count, as his suspicion is an abscess. He then wanted to examine Robert, gave him a gown and asked him to strip from the waist down. Doctor exited, Robert striped and the doctor returned. He had Robert lay on his right side on the exam table and he asked Robert to point to the location of his pain. Robert showed him the spot where the pain seemed to originate and the doctor started to poke and prod. The good news is no visible hemorrhoids and no indication of internal hemorrhoids AND his white cell count is not elevated, but the bad news is the doctor thinks he has an abscess at worst, an inflamed fissure at the least.

The doctor ordered an injection of antibiotics and a prescription of a different antibiotic. He also ordered imaging and a follow up with our primary care was scheduled for Tuesday. Robert will call the imaging center first thing Monday to try to get that done prior to his follow up with our primary care doctor on Tuesday. I am signed up for a lecture at the Cancer Support Community on Monday from 10:30 to 12:30, but if Robert is able to schedule imaging during that time I’ll forgo the lecture and accompany him to the imaging pavilion.

Today the pain is a little less, but he is still experiencing pain. I did note that he is moving easier now. He also said he feels like he is moving easier, even with the pain, so that indicates to both of us the pain is less and the antibiotics seem to be slowly working. The doctor did warn us that the antibiotic could cause joint pain. Robert did say that his normal aches and pains this morning were a little more achy this morning, but nothing more than his normal aches being a little more achy. We both were very hot last night despite my new “cooling” sheets. At first I thought it was the sheets, but on my several trips to the bathroom I noted the thermostat was registering temperatures higher than normal – 73 and 74 degrees instead of 71 or 72 degrees. I do know that when the temperature in the house is 73 or higher I am hot. So we’re reserving judgment on the new sheets. They are soft!

Instead of the relaxing weekend I have envisioned, I spent most of the day yesterday at urgent care and Costco waiting on the prescription for Robert, and today is a LOT of laundry. Between the two of us sweating up a storm last night and Robert’s night sweats the past few nights, not only did the new sheets need to be washed but the mattress pad as well. I have all the towels that need to be washed too, as this is what Robert has been using to wipe himself down with as he sweated through the night, and my normal load of clothes from the week. At least Robert seems to be in less pain and doesn’t want to head to the emergency room, which is where the doctor told us to go today if his symptoms didn’t ease, got worse, or his fever spiked. Knocking on wood that none of those three has happened.

Life is taking care of each other