Saturday, February 3 – My house smells like weed…

Friday was grocery shopping day and house cleaning. We did the grocery shopping, and the last stop was at the local “pot” shop so I could pick up more of the 10:1 CBD oil so I will have enough to get me through the next few weeks. We went to Herbal Solutions, which is the first place we went to when I got my medical marijuana card, so I could purchase CBD oil on my own. We arrived there Friday morning and they were out of the 10:1 CBD oil, so we went to the shop where my “son from another mother” shops. Since I was new there I had to register with them, and since I had not been there before they gave me a “new patient” card and let me go back to the “shop”.

It was very busy in their shop and I had to wait a little bit for a sales person to assist me. I gave her the new patient card and told her I needed a bottle of the 10:1 CBD oil. She said it would be a moment when I pulled out my money to pay, she needed to bag it up and she disappeared in the back, so I sat back down on the bench. She came back a few minutes later with my new patient “gift” bag, which now included my bottle of CBD oil.

When we got home I opened the bag to find it contained not only my CBD oil, but a hemp wick, two blunts, a glass pipe, a bud, a lighter, a separating dish, and a bud stripping tool. And the whole bag smelled of weed! Now my house smells like weed. The rules when the kids were growing up were, you bring drugs into the house, you have to move out. Hubby keeps telling me I need to move out now since I am bringing “drugs” into the house! LOL!!! We laughed so hard most of Friday with my new “drug” paraphernalia.

After we finished putting away the groceries we ate some lunch and started cleaning the house, specifically in preparation for Deda’s arrival. I managed to clean the kitchen before the neuropathy in my hands and feet kicked into high gear. I had almost two full days with no neuropathy symptoms. I knew they would return with the most recent infusion, I just was not expecting them to be so intense. This time pressure on my fingers hurt and my feet are not just slightly numb, they are tingly numb. The neuropathy I experience in my upper lip now extends up my cheeks to my cheek bones.

I finally had to give up helping cleaning the rest of the house and let Hubby handle it. I ended up taking a two and half hour nap instead. I feel so bad that Hubby had to clean the rest of the house by himself. The nap was nice, and I was ready to go back to bed just a couple hours later. Yeah, I am still tired.

Deda arrived bright and early this morning, and we have spent a lazy day talking, and watching TV on the sofa. We talked about how I happen to have the least survivable breast cancer, (72%-77% 5 year survival rate vs. 92% – 98% 5 year survival rate of other breast cancers, depending on which study you read), and my chances for recurrence. The good news is my aunt who had this same cancer made it past the 5 year mark, which seems to be the main goal line to long term survival. I could not remember the percentages of recurrence, so we looked that up again and found the chance of recurrence is 34%+ by 2 1/2 years. It drops considerably at 5 years and trails down to almost nothing after that. We talked about my chemo and what answer do I want after next week’s treatment. I think I am ready for chemo to end. As much as it scares me to end chemo, I think next week should be my last one. I am tired of not feeling well, I am tired of the neuropathy, and I am tired of all the puffiness. I’m tired of not being able to taste most foods, and having anything dairy taste absolutely awful right now. I am tired of being tired. I am tired of my digestive tract not working correctly, and I am tired of being afraid to leave the house lest I pick up a bug somewhere and make myself really sick.

This scares me too, as I don’t know how to fight cancer without taking something to kill the cancer. How do I transition from chemo to faith that surgery and radiation will be the end of this? There is a class that is offered through the Cancer Support Community for those who have finished all treatment and are ready to transition to survivor from patient. I need this class. I am already having anxiety about stopping chemo, which I know in the long run is going to be better for my body overall with all the side effects I am experiencing now. If I was only tired and dealing with the easy side effects like the taste, and digestion, I wouldn’t think about stopping at 10 treatments in phase 2. The Neuropathy returning worse after infusion kind of scares me more than stopping chemo. The neuropathy could become permanent.

Deda listened to my concerns and agreed with me that taking the class to transition to survivor would probably be a great idea. She asked me since I had been going for so long now, was I one of the most senior in the group. I had to tell her no, there are still more people there that have gone through all of this already. Most people continue to attend the support group until 15 to 18 months after the end of treatment. That is the end of all treatment, whether it’s chemo, surgery or radiation, any or all of these.

We went to dinner early, since I am still dealing with the major effects to my digestive system after chemo infusion. The first few days are the worst as food just doesn’t go down normally.  It takes a long time for my food to digest the first few days so I suffer from GERD even worse than I normally experience.  It makes it hard to get to sleep when your food keeps coming up and you choke on it.

It may be another early night, as I only had about a 30 minute nap today.

Life is starting to think about transitions