Insomnia!

I guess this is my newest side effect for this round. I haven't slept in 3 days! I thought for sure I would sleep good tonight, but I gave up after tossing in bed for 2.5 hours WIDE awake so here I am at 3:30AM blogging. I tried counting sheeps to no avail, I figured it only works if you're sleepy to start with. I'm exhausted, but not sleepy. Tomorrow should be fun ;)

Yesterday, I turned 34! I had a great birthday. I finished chemo the day before, how couldn't it have been a great birthday. My mom (who has been such a blessing, flying here to help out with each treatment) cooked me a yummy meal that I was able to enjoy and the boys made me a birthday cake. They iced it and decorated it themselves while I was in chemo on Monday, and took great pleasure in hiding it in the house to surprise me. They're sweet boys. I also received TONS of birthday cards through the chemo angels organization. At first, I wasn't sure how I was feeling about having my last treatment the day before my birthday, I thought for sure it would ruin my birthday. I am now seeing it with different eyes, it couldn't have been a best time to finish treatment! My Mother-in-law also threw me a pajama party for my birthday. She had a great idea to host it before my chemo so that I would fully enjoy myself, which I did. She also had a lady come over and give me a wonderful facial, it was so nice to be able to relax. So, what do you all think? Aren't I a pretty girl ;)

Otherwise, so far so good. I'm dealing with my usual fatigue but not much else. Some back pain. Now if I could only sleep. How can one be so exhausted and no sleep...

Done With Chemo :)

Today is a great day, I'm officially done with chemo :) Now if I could only feel it! For some reasons, I've been coming out of the past few chemos feeling drugged up, so being a little blah right now, it's difficult to get excited over this. I still have to deal with the side effects for the next week, but at least NO MORE needles. I have an extreme fear of needles, for some reasons, my body seems to like having issues that requires LOTS of them, so I'm quite glad this is over. And my taste buds... I've given up on them. They're not so bad (I shouldn't talk so quickly, I did just have a treatment!) but some buds are still completely missing in action.

The next few weeks will be busy. Next Monday, I meet with my radiation oncologist to discuss radiation treatment and I need a CT Scan to check where my organs are (heart, liver & such) to make sure that they do not get hit by the radiation. I also will be getting tattoos, who would have thought that one day I would be bald with tattoos! They will be tiny tattoos that should (if they do them right) look like beauty marks, again, for them to know where to aim the radiation every time I go in.

Then, April 13th, I'm finally getting my port-a-cath out. I can't wait to get it out! Besides being an eye sore when I wear half the clothing I own, it does hurt when it accidentally gets banged by a sweet child that is only trying to hug his mommy. Although, I'm quite panicked over the removal part of the process, no anesthesia! I will be wide awake with a little bit of numbing agent. I'm really hoping for a strong sedative, or at least the permission to take a Xanax before the procedure. I just don't do well being awake doing any procedure.

Then... after my port-a-cath removal on the 13th, I should be heading out to my first radiation treatment. We should have the exact date I start radiation next week, but I was told 3 weeks after last chemo.

I was planning on taking a picture during my first chemo, but I was way to panicked and angry to even want to do it at the time. We did take a picture of my last one though, so here's what I looked like for 3 hours every 3 weeks! Glad it's done :)

Feeling Better

We're finally feeling better in our house. I still have a nasty cough from the bronchitis but it really isn't that bad. Jerome on the other hand got the weirdest side effect from his infection. He woke with cramps in both calf after his Sunday afternoon nap. The poor child couldn't walk, he was in so much pain. Yesterday, since he started walking again, we skipped the doctors. He walked all afternoon at Longwood Gardens, the we hopped in the car and by the time we got home, it had started again. I finally took him in this morning only to find out that this weird thing happens, rarely did the doctor say, that during an viral infection, muscles cramp and make it almost impossible to walk. He says that he's seen much worse cases than Jerome's, still should be between 4 to 7 days before he fully recovers and can start walking again. The poor child can barely walk without making faces or at least walking real funny! I feel bad for him, but I was sure glad to find out it wasn't anything serious. Never seen anything like this before!

These are our newest family pictures. We were overdue, it had been more than two years since our last ones.

Rough Week

Right after skipping the Neulasta shot, I started getting sick. Low grade fever and small cough. Then the kids started getting sick as well. I spent all week on the couch, the extreme fatigue of the chemo topped with a nasty cold & fever was just not going to get me up for any reason. Well, Jerome got a 104F fever last night, still high in the morning so we took him to the clinic. Since we were going to wait for him, I thought, I might as well get Felix and myself checked. Turns out Jerome has an ear infection, Felix has strep and I have an ear infection topped with a bronchitis and pharyngitis. Fun! So we're all on antibiotics and I still have 2 weeks to get better before next round. I wish we could have all enjoyed the nice day today.

No Shot Today :)

I can skip the Neulasta shot! WOOHOO!!!!

I just called my oncologist office to check if I can redo my blood work today, but because I did chemo yesterday, she said no, too late, my blood count is already out of whack! But she re-checked my counts, talked to a few people and she said I'm OK to skip, my counts are OK, there was some kind of mix up. I haven't needed it so far and blood work was done 4 days prior to chemo. She said we'll try it this time and next round, I'll get my lab done on that Monday morning. I'm so glad since it looks like this round will be a rougher one. Woke up to nausea this morning and some other intestinal problems :( Trying the nausea pills right now, I'm not sure it's doing much.

With that said, I'm not quite sure how low my counts are so I still need to be extremely careful about getting any types of infection. While my counts are normal, I believe they're on the low end of normal. We're still in full blown FLU Season!

Snow Day :)

We woke up to 6 inches of snow this morning. The kids were thrilled and couldn't wait to head outside. We ate breakfast, dressed them warm, grabbed our crazy carpets and headed out to have some Winter fun sledding. We came back in for some hot cocoa then rushed out to chemo. Hot cocoa was nicer ;)

It's quite empty in here today, they're still open but lots of cancellation. I'm going to quit complaining, we just found out that the man sitting across from me is in for 10 months of chemo! Plus he has to take it home for 5 days after each rounds. Yeah, I'm done complaining!

Only 1 round to go! There IS a light at the end of the tunnel. Although the bad news is that I will need to come back tomorrow to take the Neulasta shot. My White Blood Count didn't come back to high, high enough for chemo but without the shot, I might land myself in the ER if I get an infection. I'm not too happy about it, had I done my blood work today instead of Thursday, I might have been able to do without. I'm in for some severe joint & bone pains over the next few days. Oh well....