Girl on the Loose

Clean up issue

Published on February 4, 2010 in OK. 0 Comments

Every once and a while, I write a post to clean up some crap swirling in my head. Welcome to that post.

1) Welcome Susan. Stick around, it’s not all doom and gloom cancer here. In the spring it will transition to all about motorscootering!!

2) Sally, I haven’t worked on my Single Girl video yet. I’ve made some notes, but when put together, it makes me look greedy. I need to work on that.

(I told Sally I want to make my own “dating on demand” like video with a little about me, and what I’m looking for in a man. The fact I don’t clean and want a house husband could be a deal breaker….)

3) Jenn, you had excellent training to be the meanest mommy on the block. Just don’t stay that way.

4) I keep telling PBJ it would be so cool if someone came up with a machine to recycle all that cement and rebar in Haiti to build new homes and offices. Think of that machine that sucks up the top layer of asphalt road, processes it, and spits it out the ass end a new road. Build a machine that ate cement slabs, processed it, and spit it out the ass end as new cement. Really, what are they going to do with all that messed up cement anyway?

5) Ever since Domino’s changed its recipe, I’ve been searching for new local pizza. I tried a small cheese from Pizza Prima last night. It was gummy crust, not evenly distributed cheese, but the sauce was good. Overall failure though. So I’m still searching…

6) I’ve tested the Zi8 again. Took it outside in the woods while walking Mr Diez. Actually, he walked himself because I don’t like holding the leash when he wants to stop and go in the woods. The audio sounded good a full four minutes into the 6 minute clip. I think that’s good.

7) The walk in the woods was outstanding. Sure it was cold, and the light coating of snow on the ground made Diezel bounding behind me completely muffled (he almost knocked me over several times because I didn’t step to the side), but being outside in the fresh air and sunshine hit the spot.

Let’s just drop 19

Published on February 3, 2010 in Driving, Pets and cancer. 2 Comments

Way, WAY, WAYYYYYYY too early I drove in the snow to Beanville. I get there 20 minutes late. I hate being late. I hate making people wait for me. I hate waiting for other people. Waiting is just not me.

I am sent back to my area after being banded, and get to pick my blue chair because it’s the start of the day and the place is wide open.

I can hear my nurse on the phone talking about maybe not giving someone chemo. I figure it’s me because I drove up in the snow and that would just figure.

After about 30 minutes of sitting in my chair (I’m in the little two chair section by the scale, less commotion to stress me) the nurse comes over and says that my platelets are good enough to get chemo.

We all cheer because it was a sucky drive in the snow.

I keep waiting when the nurse comes back. Dr P has asked for updated blood counts before I’m given the higher “Ha-ha, you don’t want pre-meds” dosage. I figure it’s got to be okay. Right? It’s either the same or it’s gone up.

The lavender topped vial is whisked off and Ellen comes on TV.

(Note: if anyone is ever wanting to donate money to Dana Farber, could you please put it towards a larger selection of TV channels? Four sports channels does not make a happy chemo patient. I’ve never seen ANY chemo patient watching any of the four sports channels! Something like the Comedy Network would be nice.)

A few minutes later, the nurse is back and she doesn’t have any chemo with her. Bad news (how can this be!?!?), my platelets have dropped down to 70. It’s just too low to risk even a low dosage of Gemcitabine.

I was unplugged and sent home.

Now this would be great, in the big scheme of things, but I really wanted a nap. I had done my best to sleep the night before, but I was tired. I just needed to make it home and I could cat nap for 30 to 45 minutes before the afternoon project.

On the way home I got a text message. I didn’t read it because I was driving. I don’t text and drive. I try not to even talk and drive because people always want to give me notes and I can’t drive, talk and write at the same time.

The text was my afternoon project asking me to come in early.

Ugh.

I get home and Mr Diez has been sick. This makes me feel horribly guilty. I can envision him panicking, pacing, wanting to get outside, but no one was there to open the door. He knows he has to go outside to puke, so he puked in front of the door that no one was home to open.

This is what first greets me when I arrive home after practically falling asleep at the wheel. Mr Diez is upset and sulks in the bedroom. I don’t get mad at him because there was nothing he could do to help himself.

After I clean up the puke, I reassure Mr Diez he’s a good boy, and then let him outside to potty. I fix his lunch, complete with a spoonful of wet food.

I still think I can sneak in my cat nap. This time the phone rings. Afternoon project wants to know when I’ll be in.

For crying freakin out loud!!

89

Published on February 2, 2010 in cancer. 2 Comments

My platelets are at 89. I haven’t been told not to go to Beanville tomorrow, so I guess it’s a go.

I met with a plastic surgeon this afternoon. First I had to find the Plastic office. The Brigham is frick’n huge, so I kept getting spun around and having to ask directions.

I wasn’t optimistic. I mean, it’s a plastic surgeon. After waiting, and then waiting more while sitting in a johnny, it actually turned out to have potential.

First, I learned that there is nothing I can do about the smell. Yes, I smell. Not because I’m dirty, but because the naturally occurring bacteria on my skin (and yours too) is going pig wild munching on the crap covering my tumors.

Second, there isn’t anything the plastic surgeon can do himself, but he was determined to help me. I mentioned ablation because it’s like glorified cauterization. He looked at my tumors thoughtfully and said he was going to see if a dermatologist could burn them with a laser.

Whoa.

I can’t count on this as being a possibility. The PS may contact a dermo who laughs at him. But at least someone outside the oncology world is thinking about my stinky skin.

I’m pretty exhausted, so I’m going to crash out early to prep myself for an early morning in Beanville. No fasting necessary, so yummys will be consumed on the drive up.

Hello Monday

Published on February 1, 2010 in Health, Scootering and Today. 2 Comments

I have a bunch of partially written posts that end mid-sentence. I’m not sure what I was going to say in the second half of the sentence. It’s like stories with no endings.

Strange.

So let me do some quick recapping. There was a day last week when the sun came out, the temp was above freezing… and I went out for a scooter ride. Okay, it wasn’t far, just to the boat ramp and back. It made me so happy. I was in this little happy bubble the rest of the day. An impermeable bubble that no one could pop.

It was a great day.

Saturday I did my taxes. Let me vent (do you know anyone who is happy about taxes?). I claim zero at both my projects. I don’t want surprises, or to owe any money I don’t have. Part way through my federal tax form there was a thing about pay to work and getting an extra $400 rebate. I thought I had scored when Turbo Tax said I qualified. I get to the end and the computer spits out my refund: $13

WTF???

So claiming zero, qualifying for the $400 pay to work rebate, and I get $13 back. If I hadn’t qualified for the pay to work, I’d owe $387 even though I claimed zero. Now I need to redo all my W-4’s so that next year, when the pay to work thing is gone (like all good rebates do), I won’t be left owing $387.

All the stress of taxes probably put me over the breathing edge. By the time I was headed to bed, I was having some extreme breathing issues. I kept coughing, my nose kept clogging and bleeding, and I was afraid I would stop breathing in my sleep.

I eventually did go to bed, breathing through my mouth, and didn’t wake up until 7am. Of course after taking care of Mr Diez, it was back to bed until 9:30.

Sunday my breathing was better, but I had picked up a headache. It was a weird headache. When I coughed, it felt like my brain was rattling around inside my skull. I tried holding my head to see if I could get the rattling feeling to stop, but it didn’t. I tried hydrating, thinking my brain had shrunk. It didn’t feel any better.

Sunday night I watched the Hallmark Hall of Fame movie (the miracles of ordinary days). It was a sweet movie. I especially liked all the Hallmark card commercials. I really should ask my dad if the Hallmark channel shows all the Hallmark card commercials. I might just have to request a cable channel upgrade if so.

Funny enough, today (Monday) I’ve had no headache, haven’t coughed too much, and my brain feels like it’s fitting in my skull correctly. My nose is still bleeding, but that’s the chemo. I love having something to blame for all my problems.

Years of operating… systems

Published on January 29, 2010 in Home improvement. 0 Comments

My afternoon project ‘upgraded’ my computer to Windoze 7. Let me just say ugh.

Now, for those geeks out there, you may want to know why I say ugh. Well, first off, being in a corporate environment, the computer is sort of locked down. I can’t make it comfortable, make it feel like my computer home (no, not messy… I can here you thinking that PBJ).

And the new computer has a speaker. I’m tempted to shut the damn thing off because the sounds with win 7 aren’t consist in volume, and sound totally stupid.

Okay, as if that wasn’t enough, I still have a second computer at the afternoon project running XP. It’s all locked down too, but after almost a year, I’ve almost gotten used to it. Well, not really.

At the morning project it’s a mixed environment of XP, Vista, Server, and all the corresponding versions of Office. And I’m the quick & dirty tech support person. So I have to know all three to some extent, while my primary computer is XP.

Wait, it gets better!

At home not only do I have XP, but a Mac running Tiger on a PPC (no cool upgrades because it’s almost 5 years old and doesn’t run on an Intel chip).

When Google talks about having an OS or a cloud, that sort of makes me happy. I wouldn’t have to remember how to change the desktop picture on so many different OS’s.

He got it!

Published on January 28, 2010 in Mobile. 3 Comments

All he needs is a smoking jacket and a ‘bitch’ to share the bed with.

New Bed

Published on January 28, 2010 in Mobile. 0 Comments

Jenn sent Mr Diez a new bed. He’s still figuring it out.

What a Gem!

Published on January 28, 2010 in cancer. 0 Comments

I am the happy new member of the Gemcitabine & Herceptin chemo club!

It’s too early to know if it’s working. So far, the only side effect I’ve had is a little upset tummy at 2am. That could have also been from my pure junk food intake yesterday.

Yesterday was a series of little victories for me. I was able to say no to the trial, and it turned out to be pretty easy. My liver is coming back to normal, but my platelets are slightly low. I was at 112, regular is 155 and up. For chemo people, anything above 100 is good.

Oh, and banana cream cheese cake will increase your potassium just enough to make the doctors happy.

When I asked about pre-meds for Gemcitabine, the computer system spit out that Zofram was recommended for anti-nausea. The computer is full of drug templates, but I’m not a template. I argued I didn’t want any pre-meds. Dr P and NP A discussed a low dose of Zofram, but with the pharmacy closed, options were limited. I told them I had chewable pepto and I was fine with that. Dr P said “if you get sick, don’t blame me”.

Even though the TDM1 trail had a base drug of Herceptin, it didn’t count as Herceptin. When a new treatment of Herceptin is started, a loading dose is required. The 30 minute infusion is spread out over 90 minutes to watch for allergic reactions.

So at 5:45pm I finally make it to Dana 10 for my infusions. I know I have 2 hours of chemo, and that Dana 10 technically closes at 8pm. I tried to rush everyone along, offered to do my own cross-check of the chemo, and let the nurses know when the last drops were coming through the infusion pump so they could be standing by.

Once the problem with my mix was sorted out, I was able to finish up my chemo by 8:15pm.

By the time I made it home and unwound, it was pretty late. I’m still tired, and doing my best to re-hydrate.

This weekend will be the true test of the side effects. I’ve been warned about achy joints (take ibuprofen) and maybe more nausea. NP A said I’d find the side effects to be a lot like the Navelbine I took back in 2007. I didn’t have too many problems until the end, and it was only a touch of nausea and some thinning hair.

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The Zi8 is back from the repair shop. I’m going to spend some time this weekend testing the audio. I’ll keep you posted.