1 down, 32 to go!

A lot happened over the past few days! On Easter morning, I decided to give myself a quick buzz. My hair were falling again and it was starting to look quite bad. The quick buzz made for a much cleaner look for Easter. My hair also became so brittle, that it started poking my head when it was trying to sleep and it became so uncomfortable that I ended shaving it completely again yesterday morning. My eyebrows are now thinner than they ever were, and my eyelashes, well, they're really going. I'm not quite sure what happened. Well, I know, I've been on chemo, but it is just so odd since it was growing and growing. This has been quite upsetting, I think I've embraced being bald long enough, I was ready for my hair to grow, it was almost 1/4" long! And sure enough, it's already growing back!

Other than that, I had my port removed yesterday morning. I am so thankful for the makers of Xanax, or that procedure would have been quite horrible. It was done under local anesthesia only so I was wide awake (well, not quite because of the help of Xanax!) thought the entire procedure. First, my surgeon injected the local anesthesia all around the port. Let me say that she injected A LOT to make sure I was completely numb. Well, all that liquid had to go somewhere. When she cut my skin open, it squirted all over my face! Thankfully, my eyes were closed since Xanax was working it's wonders and I was quite relaxed, almost falling asleep. Then, as the nurses are wiping my face, she proceeded to reassure me that "Don't worry, it's not blood!" Now, the problem with ports, is that they get comfortable in your body so the tissues starts growing around it, she had to cut around, pull and twist, cut some more, pull, twist, pull, twist, then it finally came out. As she was doing all this, she was talking with the nurses saying that mine was one of those that doesn't want to come out! I didn't feel anything, but all this pushing, pulling, twisting was quite uncomfortable. She stitched everything back and I was done. I no longer have a HUGE bump sticking out of my chest, I now have a small dent left by the port. I'm sure it will look normal again at some point. And Jerome was quite happy to see it gone.

I was supposed to go for my 3-month follow-up this Thursday, instead she did the follow-up after the procedure to save me a trip to the office. Everything still looks normal. Next follow-up with her is in 6 month when I will be due back for another mammogram.

After getting the port out, I went for my simulation for the radiation. Pretty much, I layed on the table, they set-up the equipment and took a bunch of picture to make sure that the radiation were going to hit the right areas. It was very quick and thankfully, the technicians seems very nice. It was a long day, we got home and slept for 3-hours!

I started my actual radiation this morning. I brought the boys over to Steve's work with a lunch, they were thrilled to hangout with daddy. Then headed over for my radiation, which was very quick and went back to pick them up and we still had a few minutes before Steve had to go back in. This schedule looks like it will work. On our way back home, I asked the kids if they had a good time and if they wanted to eat lunch with their dad every day for the next 2 months and I got a very cheerful "YES". This should definitely be easier on them. So, 1 down, 32 to go...