Shots, shot and more shots

Hi Y'all. ;P

On Monday (October 26th) I went in to get my blood cell counts checked. I took Little Boy and Little Girl in with me after the two Big Kids got off to school. I kept them entertained by looking for pictures of kittens and babies and such in the magazines from the waiting room. In a "Readers Digest" we found a cartoon of a lady stuck in a clamp next to an article about stress. Little Boy kept going back to look at the picture and asking why she was getting squished. I told him someone just drew the picture that way. A few minutes later, he said he would GET the man who was squishing that lady. He's a cutie. Little Girl wanted to see the baby and animal pictures. She likes to coo and pet the pictures. They kept me and the other patients who were waiting quite entertained.

Anyways, simple finger prick to get a little blood that the Nurse (Jennifer) collects in a little tube then holds it up to a metal tube that comes down out of a big machine on the counter, which sucks it up. It whirrs and then prints out a paper with my blood counts on them. The White Blood cell count was a little low, so she went to show the Doctor. When she came back she said the doctor wanted me to have an immune boosting shot that day and Tuesday, and then would check my levels again on Wednesday morning. The shot just goes in my upper arm. It stings a little, but not for long, like a tetanus shot would. Shoot, when was the last time I got one of those? Oh, well… no more immunizations for me for a while…

The shot stimulates my bone marrow to produce more white blood cells. The main side effect is that it makes my bones ache. The first night it wasn’t so bad, but Tuesday I had a hard time falling asleep. And sometimes in the morning, or when I got up from laying down, my lower back would kind of give me a quick jolt of pain, but just a quick thing, and then it would calm down.

When I went back in on Wednesday, my white blood cell count was up, but where I have kids with runny noses already, they wanted to continue the shots through Thursday, and then check again on Friday.

The nurse was always way nice with the kids, the first day when we had to wait longer, she gave them each a package of fruit snacks. The other days they could get a sucker out of the basket they kept by the door. On Friday we had a longer wait in the waiting area, and the desk next door had a basket of candy out for Halloween. So they each got one of those, and our front desk ladies had a coloring book and crayons they could use. Little boy can really get into coloring, and loves it when I will sit and color with him (which I did). Little Girl would color, or wander or try and get in his way. She is a sister, after all. ;) When Nurse Jennifer called me back to check my count, Little Girl saw a couple of little Halloween bag on the counter. Nurse Jennifer had put together a goodie bag for each of them! The kids were so excited. And was excited because the doctors said my white blood cell count was high enough I didn’t have to get another shot! Whew!

Oh, yeah...

My tongue is feeling/acting/tasting pretty much back to normal. Woohoo! Just in time for Halloween Candy!

Update

Hello all!
I went in for my blood cell count this morning.  (thanks to Wonderful Hubby for calling to remind me about it!!!) It was kinda low, which is to be expected with the Chemo. The nurse didn't seem too concerned. She showed the doctor the printout, and he had her give me an immune boosting shot, and then I'll get another one tomorrow, and then she will check my levels again on Wednesday. This will get my bone marrow working overtime, producing more white blood cells, and so on, thank goodness for modern science! She said I might be a little achy the next couple of days, but I can take tylenol and Ibuprofen for it. So that's good.
I took Little Boy and Little Girl with me, and they were so good. We looked at magazines, trying to find pictures of puppies, or anything interesting. While flipping through a Readers Digest we found a drawing/cartoon of a lady in a clamp, next to a picture about stress. Little Boy kept going back to that page to look at it. He said he was going to "get" that man that was squishing the lady. What a cute boy!

Funny Side Affects

So I am feeling pretty much back to normal, have been since Thursday. The one thing that isn't yet is my tongue. You know how when you fall asleep and breathe through your mouth, when you wake up your tongue feels funny? That's how my tongue feels. And some things don't taste the same anymore. Like I used to be just fine drinking tap water as long as it was cold. Not anymore, it tastes yikky. And so does the filtered stuff in the fridge. But bottled stuff is okay, and so is milk and apple juice.  The doctor (Dr H) warned us about this, and now I see what he was talking about. Not that it's horrible. I'll take this over puking any day.
And WonderfulHubby was so sweet, when I mentioned it the other day he said, "Well, you need to keep drinking, should we get you some water flavor packets." I love how supportive he is. And really, everyone is so nice. I have a wonderful family, and super great friends. Thank you all!!!

Chemo

It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. I was tired (took two naps on Friday, thanks mom for watching the kids), kind of groggy. My head felt pinched, I was kinda naseus. I felt flushed frequently. It was kind of a cross between being morning sick and right-after-baby-easily-overwhelmed-with-noise kind of feeling.
I just kept saying to myself as I went through my day, "So this is what it feels like to be poisoned..."

The game plan

So, while we were in getting ready to get the first chemo treatment, we met up with Dr. H, and here's the plan he gave us:
Chemo every three weeks.
Six sessions of Chemo
Chemo drugs are: Taxotere and Carboplatin
Also given: Herceptin for one full year (this is the drug that blocks the receptors on my cancer cells)
Then onto Masectomy (no word on wether it will just be the one side or a double) along with the lymoh node removal on the left side (need to ask if it will be ALL lymph nodes or just affected one(s)).
Then maybe more chemo.
Then Radiation.
Then boob job that may include tummy tuck, depending on where they take the tissue from. Here's to hoping!

Chemo Update

Well, here we are at 4 days after the first chemo session and everything is still going well. Over the weekend the symptoms could best be described (according to SweetWife) as mild morning-sickness and fatigue. Other side-effects have included some tension that has made it difficult to get to sleep at night.

We feel fortunate at this point that things have gone so well. We hope they will continue to progress in such a favorable manner.