Cancer Holidays - Week 7 - Blowing my way through cancer!

This is my new mantra - I cannot take credit for it, it came from my nephew Devin who wrote it in the birthday card that he made for me. 

As you can see, Cancer is really getting it from the giant robot (Devin is a big fan of Pacific Rim). This card now sits on my bathroom mirror so I can see it every morning and every night. 

Thursday last week I had my usual appointments. At my PICC cleaning the nurse pointed out that PICC was now at 5 cm. If you recall a few weeks ago, I had my PICC checked for the length because somehow it had come out of my arm 2 cm. It was sticking out of my arm  2 cm when I first had it installed and a few weeks ago the chemo nurses noticed it was at 4 cm. So, its come out another 1 cm and not that I'm blaming anyone but its the nurses who change the dressing every week that are pulling this out. When I say dressing it sounds gross - like there's gauze and maybe even some puss or something gross like that but there isn't either. Its actually just a clear bandage that goes over top of this tiny line that sticks out of my arm (there's a bit more to that so if you are curious I'll show you next time I see you, just ask). Anyway, its not that gross and I don't think its rocket science not to pull on the darn thing when you are taking the bandage off but I guess I'm wrong. So I left the clinic with the instruction from the nurse to call the Cancer Centre and let them know. 

On Friday I wasn't feeling great but that seems to be something that happens to me a week after chemo - I don't feel great. I called the Cancer Centre about my PICC and turns out I'm not supposed to call them - the nurse who cleans (and pulls on my PICC) is supposed to put in some type of request for the PICC people to pull my x-ray and check if its okay at 5 cm. So, I had to call the nurse clinic and explain the situation - which I did and they said they'd take care of it. 

On Saturday I was also not feeling great so I had a nap (while Dom cleaned the house and raked) until Narissa and Drew arrived. I got a lot of great gifts for my birthday - fun socks from my friend Amy, a bit of spending money from Grandma, a knitted toque from Nan (with matching gloves on the way), a great gift basket from Narissa and Drew filled with a tonne of natural bath products, a Pandora bracelet from my Dad and Linda and the highlight being two jewellery boxes decorated by my nephews Sam and Devin.

The one with all the bling is made by Sam and the other one is from Devin. I'm now using the "bling" one to store my baby legwarmers and the one from Devin I am using to hold all of my fashion toques (my collection is growing).

On Saturday night, we went to the Keg for my birthday dinner and it was delicious. The Keg is an easy place for me to eat because the no dairy, no carbs, no sugar thing is pretty easy at a steakhouse where you can eat meat and veggies. Dinner was great and for dessert, I told Dom that he had to order Billy Miner Pie (a Keg specialty with mocha ice cream, oreo cookie crust and drizzled with caramel and chocolate) so that I could have one bite since it was my birthday. 

I ate half of it. I couldn't help myself and it was my birthday after all! Shit, Joan Lunden is going to kill me when she hears about this... 

Afterwards, we looked up the nutritional information and found out that I ate more sugar and carbs that I normally do in a week. Oh well, did I mention that it was my birthday!?! So, I guess it was also my tumour's birthday - it was probably doing cartwheels eating up that sugar and carbs in that Billy Miner Pie (the reasoning for the no carbs and no sugar part of the diet is to stress out the cancer cells - if you are interested, google cancer, IGF-1 and insulin and you'll get the full explanation). 


Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes, emails and text messages!




Oh, and my Aunt Renee who used to live in Missourri and still has many friends there were participating in an annual breast cancer walk on Saturday. This year they walked in my honour - which is a pretty cool birthday present - and super cool that people all the way in Missourri, who have never met me before were walking in my honour! Here's a photo of two of them - see the photo of me on their shirts. 

I woke up early on Sunday morning - around 2:00 am and had to finally take a gravol at 4:00 am to go back to sleep. I blame the Billy Miner Pie. On Sunday morning Drew helped Dom changed a light fixture (that we had bought at Ikea) and they left around 10:00 am. Sunday afternoon was the last home game for the Ottawa Fury (we have season tickets). It was freezing but also fun because we got to out on the field after the game. The Fury lost (again).

On Monday morning I went to see Tran. I was really not feeling well in the morning - a bit of a sinus headache so after my acupuncture appointment I came home and went back to bed and Dom set up the Halloween decorations (pictures to come in the next blog post). Tran fixed my dry mouth (one of the many side effects from chemo) and really helped with my energy level. By Monday afternoon I was feeling much better and got ready to go to Laurel and Andrew's for dinner and to watch the municipal election. For some of you reading this, you'll think that we are super geeky making a night of watching the election, for others, you did the same thing and completely understand. Dinner was great as usual (Laurel is a great cook) - tilapia with veggies. Dom's band played at Zaphod's Monday night but I couldn't go because they didn't play until 10:30 pm (way past Tran's assigned bedtime). The band dressed up for Halloween - Dom was some sort of bearded lady. Weird.

Tuesday was my usual appointment with my oncologist Dr. Dent except she wasn't there and instead I met with Dr. Kehoe who is a family doctor that works at the Cancer Centre. I don't mind seeing these family doctors because Dr. Dent isn't exactly Miss Chatty or has a great bedside manner. Dom and I joke that she has aspergers because she's so stone faced every time we see her - and when I tell her things like symptoms that I have, I usually get zero response from her - as if I never said anything. We also joke that I too have aspergers for many reasons - I took an online quiz to confirm my suspicions years ago (I know, I know an online quiz). If you are interested, take the quiz and see what your score is here is the link http://rdos.net/eng/Aspie-quiz.php my score is 145/200. Dom scored something llike 12/200 - we figure that's why we are so compatible because we are so different (which basically means Dom is very easy going). I bet Dr. Dent would score super high on this quiz if she took it. Also just to note, she's got a great sense of style - everytime I see her, she's dressed really well and never wearing one of those long white coats. Come to think of it I don't even think I've ever seen her carry a stethescope or any type of doctor-like accessories. Don't get me wrong, I don't think Dr. Dent is bad or anything - she doesn't have a high score on ratemymd.ca but neither did Dr. Moulton my neurosurgeon - he also has a similar personality to Dr. Dent - all business and no chit chat - but he's a great neurosurgeon so who cares? I don't. Dr. Dent is good at the cancer thing and that's all I care about - I've got lots of people to be nice to me at my bedside.

Okay getting back to my appointment, I asked Dr. Kehoe a lot of questions - all of which she answered very comprehensively as I would expect from a family doctor. She even broke out a small measuring tape (sort of like the ones they give out for free at Ikea) and measured my tumour - and joked about the fact that Dr. Dent never carries around a tape measure (see? I'm not the only one). For people who are interested, my tumour hasn't really shrunk that much but it has gotten a lot softer which Dr. Kehoe said is a good sign and the new regimen of chemo (I'll get to that) that I start on Friday will hopefully result in the tumour shrinking. I did mention my PICC line being at 5 cm and Dr. Kehoe sent me straight to the x-ray department to get an x-ray to see if its in the right spot (I never did hear back from the nurse clinic or the PICC clinic after Friday). Anyway, after about an hour I had had a chest x-ray, had it reviewed by the PICC clinic nurse and confirmed that it was a-okay. That's efficiency. 

So on Friday, I start a new regimen of chemo - its called Taxol. Dr. Kehoe said I must be looking forward to not feeling sick because Taxol doesn't really have much of a nausea side effect. In fact, my anti-nausea meds after chemo are reduced from 4 different pills to 1 so that's good. The negative part is that my chemo treatments increase from 1 hour to 5 hours - yep, that's right - 5 hours of sitting at the Cancer Centre getting chemo. Apparently, the reason for this is that allergic reactions are very common and so they give you the chemo very slowly and also hop you up on anti-histamine so for most of it I'll be pretty drowsy. The most common side effect of Taxol is aches and pains - sort of like the flu - but I can take Tylenol for the pain and Tran also said that acupuncture can help with that too. So we'll see how it goes on Friday. Oh and turns out I miss counted my chemo (I'm not good with numbers, that's why I'm a planner) and I am done chemo on December 12, not December 26 as I had originally thought which is great news as this means that I should be feeling pretty good at Christmas. We won't be going anywhere but my Dad and Linda may come up and my sister's family may come up for New Years which is great.

My mom is coming up on Saturday to stay for a week and we are getting our furnace converted over from oil to gas next week - so with that and Halloween on Friday there will be a lot to cover off in the next post! 

Just before I end, a little note about all of the different types of treatments that I get - I have a great group of people but I wouldn't exactly call them a "team".  I discovered the Ottawa Integrative Cancer Centre (OICC) about a week after I got my diagnosis - I was at an architect's office and just happened to look out the window and saw the OICC sign across the street (can we say fate?). I went home and googled it. So, the OICC is where I see Dr. Craig (naturopathic doctor - ND) and Tran - they also have a nutritionist, other ND's, a family doctor, relexologist, counsellors etc. The Cancer Centre is great too - oncologists, nurses designated to each patient, chemo nurses, physiotherapists, nutritionists etc. The thing is, is that there is no real bridge between the two right now. My ND would be more than willing to speak with my oncologist but when I mentioned that I have one I was met with blank stares - and no, not from Dr. Dent - from my patient designated nurse and another family doctor at the Cancer Centre so I sort of gave up talking about it with them. I think over time this will change but for now this is the reality and it doesn't bother me. One of the most popular recommendations from the many books I've read (and also from Joan Lunden) is that you have to take control of your health care - that means going to people you are comfortable with and that you have confidence in - and doing as much and knowing as much as you can about your treatment, so that's what I've done. For me, information is power. Hiding my head in the sand or just doing chemo without exploring other treatments isn't good enough for me, I need to do everything that I can to keep blowing my way through cancer! 

Cancer Holidays - Week 6 - Its my birthday!

Well its not technically my birthday today but it is my birthday on Saturday and I am one of those people who likes to draw it out as long as possible. I'm pretty sure when my sister Narissa turned 37, I made sure to point out to her that she had officially rounded the corner to 40 - yep, I know I did because I did the same thing with Courtney and Becky when they turned 37 this year. This is one of the benefits of having friends that are older than me. I don't have this advantage with most of my Ottawa friends so I have to rub it in when I get the chance! Now that I find myself in the same position, I find it hard to believe that I will be officially rounding the corner to 40. I think we all get to a certain age - and frame of mind - where we don't really think of ourselves as much older. I know for me, its around age 25ish - I don't really feel like I've changed much since then...that might make me immature...

Every birthday I do always take some time to think about what has gone on in the past year and I always wonder where I will be next year. Let's start with reflections of the past year - last year Dom and I bought our house and we moved at the end of September. It was a great time in our lives, we love our house, our neighbourhood and we soon settled into a very easy going life. For my birthday last year, I can't actually remember what we did - Dom and I just searched Facebook in an attempt to remember what we did...but alas, we cannot figure it out - is this a sign that we are old?? I'm sure we probably went out for dinner with Dom's parents because we do that for all of our birthdays. All I know is that this is what I posted on Facebook on my birthday.

 
We spent the Fall getting settled in the new house - we were the hit of the street with our Hallowe'en decorations. We had over 400 trick or treaters.

 Dom also dressed up as Magnum P.I. for work: 

I also remember coming home one really cold winter night to find Dom freezing his arse off trying to hang up Christmas lights across the front of the house to only plug them in and have only 1/4 of them work (can you say Griswalds?). 
 
In January, we had a disastrous holiday in Cuba - it ended up being a long weekend in Cuba (instead of a week) with me getting food poisoning (or something equally awful) and Dom having severe allergic reactions before and after the trip from his immunizations. Doesn't it look nice? Yeah, it was a disaster.

We spent the majority of our time in the Winter hunkering down in the basement with the woodstove, keeping warm (and trying to save money on our oil bills), watching hockey games and hanging out with friends. Dom spent a lot of time shovelling snow which allowed him the opportunity to get to know our neighbour Frank too. 

Remember this? 

 We also got our custom order couch for the basement!

Spring came very slowly...

The Summer was a whirlwind with lots of fun, a visit from my cousins Liz and Johnny from the UK, a stellar birthday/drunken hot mess with Courtney in May (think the Hangover), a get together the next day with my University girls - which meant that I showed up late and only with a half drank Tim Horton's smoothie as my contributing appetizer... 

We also had many trips to the cottage with Drew and Narissa, Devin, Sam, Dad, Linda, Mom and Bill, Uncle Terry and Aunt Ellen. In fact, we had the best summer vacation that we have had in years at the cottage with family and my good friends Laurel and Brian; Trevor and Leanna and their girls Della and Maisie. 

We then came home to find out that I have breast cancer! But when you see what a good year it was, the breast cancer is a blip in this year - there were so many good things about this year that outweigh the breast cancer diagnosis I have to say it hasn't been a complete bust!


I can say with certainty that never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd be sitting on the couch with hardly any hair, in the middle of chemo treatments writing a blog about having breast cancer with my 37th birthday around the corner. This is the way life works though, we cannot predict what will happen to us, we can only accept it, deal with it and keep putting one foot in front of the other! 

Now getting down to the details of this past week - I had acupuncture a week ago on Wednesday - this time it was a bit different, Tran did the usual pins and needles on my arms and legs but added one right in between my eyes - that's right - in between my eyebrows. It didn't feel bad at all surprisingly. Tran also decided that he wants to try to improve my lack of feeling in my hands from my previous spinal cord problems - I told him if he can do anything it'd be a miracle. He asked me if I wanted to bet! I said yeah although we didn't actually wager anything. Anyway, this meant getting the pins and needles up and down my back - it was pretty cool although so far, I haven't yet to feel any different. We also talked about my swellling lymph nodes - he calls it "visitor pain" and said that it is the Chi (energy) getting stuck in certain spots in my body but that acupuncture will help with this - so far it has.

Thursday was the usual standing appointments of massage and PICC cleaning (gross) but my energy level was good and I was up early doing yoga again. Fasting was more difficult this time as my appetite was really good - when I went to acupuncture I told Tran about my fasting and asked him to not make me hungry. He said he wouldn't but I guess maybe its because acupuncture just makes you feel better overall, your appetite is better. 

On Friday I had chemo. My friend Ann offered to take me again so I took her up on the offer. I went to the hospital to get my chemo entry exam (blood test) then headed to pick up Ann and return for chemo. This was probably the best chemo in terms of lack of side effects. We were home mid-afternoon and as long as I kept up on the gravol I was okay. I also had to cheat a bit on the fasting with soda crackers and that also kept me feeling good. On Saturday I was up really early - like 5:00 am - I blame the steroids I have to take for three days (starting chemo day and two days afterwards) - they keep me hopping. So, I got up and watched TV and read all day. Even though I felt fine, I always take it easy the day after chemo so that I don't wear myself out - my appetite was good too which was nice so I started right back to eating after fasting was over. 

Sunday was a repeat of Saturday - up early and not tired. Our friends Andrew and Laurel invited us to go to a pumpkin patch on Sunday afternoon and since I was feeling good we went. It was freezing though - seriously, I think it was maybe 5 degrees and super windy. Needless to say, we didn't stay long but we did get a few pumpkins for the front porch and the required picture in a pumpkin patch:

Here's Andrew and Laurel with baby Jonah:

Can you tell we are all freezing!?!

We also met friends of Andrew and Laurel who live just one street from us and we all ended the day in a warm pub enjoying a late lunch - I cheated on my diet and had breaded fish (the cheating is the batter) so shhh don't tell Joan Lunden, she'll be disappointed again. It turned out to be a great day!

Monday was a quiet day for me but I was up and at 'em again early so I did some yoga and then read for a bit. I had that really bad taste in my mouth from chemo again so I called and managed to get in to see Tran on Monday morning. I had acupuncture again although Tran did warn me that the bad taste in my mouth won't disappear as quickly as before *sigh* but I was still glad that I got in to see him. Tuesday seems to be the day that I crash after chemo - most likely because the steroids I take seem to keep me hopped up and so when I stop taking them my body just deflates - at least thats what it feels like. So Tuesday was a couch potato day - I had a great visit from Cheryl, Rose and Selma from work at noon which was the perfect break to an otherwise quiet day. Rose brought food and a nice care package from Guylaine at work - thank you both!

Wednesday I felt better, I took both dogs for a walk and tried to do a few things off of the 'to-do' list while of course watching what was going on downtown Ottawa - okay, I was glued to the TV. I woke up Wednesday morning just before 10:00 am and was sort of slowly waking up to hearing a newscast about a shooting at the War Memorial and I kept thinking they must mean some other War Memorial. I got up and turned on the TV and immediately texted Dom - he was at the dentist so I didn't hear back from him for a while so I remained in front of the TV. Dom ended up being in lockdown for the day and I did take breaks (dog walks) from the constant TV watching. 

I don't have much to say about it that's probably different than what everyone else is thinking and feeling. I feel terrible about it, I shed a few tears throughout the day watching the coverage...Unfortunately, we never know what the day is going to bring, we can only cherish the moments we have and the people we are with. I think its easy to get distracted and forget about how great life really is - it happens to everyone - even me, even now - but I have less of those moments now for the obvious reasons. For me, everyday is not a bad day but a good day - sure I have a lot to tackle but life is a bit sweeter for me - listening to Dom ramble on about some kind of new beer or new album is somewhat more interesting - chatting with my parents, hanging with my family and friends, thinking about what I am going to do next year on my 38th birthday is so much sweeter than it ever was before. This weekend Narissa, Drew and Lindsay will be up for a visit and I already know its going to be a great time. 

Try to remember that feeling when you're rushing around, stressed about some work thing or just having a bad day - there is sweetness in life everyday, we just have to make sure we don't forget to taste it!

 

Cancer Holidays - Week 5 - What are you thankful for?

As usual, I will start out with a few shout outs - I got a great gift from my friend Erika, something to hang up and remind me every time that I read it that I've got tonnes of friends near and far no matter how often I see them. 

My Dad and Linda came up this past weekend and brought me lots of gifts - a cozy blanket from my Nan's living room - it's my favourite one from my Nan's house - I have spent many, many hours napping with this blanket on the couch at Nan's place. Actually, its on my lap right now as I write this. I also got a wee hat for my wee head from my Irish Gran and a magazine and a beautiful chunk scarf from Jean (made by Jean). Dad and Linda gave me a great care package of teas, hand creams, slippers, lip balm, a wrap and dark chocolate. 

Uncle Rick and Sharon sent me some great pj's and a MAC lipstick (perfect colour, Sharon) as well as a People magazine about Joan Lunden (I'll get to that later).

I got a great tea package from David's Tea from the Mapping Gang at the City of Ottawa - it was great - loads of tea and tea paraphernalia. I've decided that my favourite tea of all time is a creamy earl grey tea that was included in this package. I've never had it before but it's delicious. 

Dom's parents also gave me some green tea and some dark chocolate (yummy). 

We also got a few meal deliveries this week - from Lesley, Kersten and Marc as well as Sue. Prescott also dropped off a Costco size bag of dark chocolates. 

If there is a zombie apocalypse in the next six months come to my house for a cup of tea and a piece of dark chocolate, I'll have enough for everyone.  

So, on Monday last week I had a check up appointment with my naturopathic doctor - Dr. Craig. Dr. Craig was really impressed with how I was doing - most impressed that I still have a bit of my hair (he thought it was a wig poking out of the bottom of my fashion toque). We went over my blood tests (the ones I get done before every chemo appointment) and he did say my white blood cell count was a bit high so I must be fighting off something, maybe a cold - also my magnesium levels are low so he added magnesium as a supplement for me to take. He also told me that I didn't need to take some of the supplements that he originally prescribed because my blood work was so good. We discussed how I was doing with everything - the diet, chemo, fasting. I told him that the worst side effect so far is a bad taste in my mouth - well sort of more like a no taste in my mouth - which makes it hard to eat and drink - even drinking water tastes bad. But really, if that's the only side effect that I am complaining about, its not that bad right? He was impressed that I was doing okay with the fasting - I told him I cheat and eat two soda crackers each day that I fast and that gets me through - he was still impressed. 

He also gave me this chart to rate my different side effects from chemo so that we can track it and see how I am doing. We chatted a lot about the lack of nutrition advice that you get at the Cancer Centre and the advice that Dom and I have read/seen so far is not really anything that I would do - before my first visit with Dr. Craig, I looked up some smoothie recipes on the Cancer Centre's website and honestly, I wouldn't drink those smoothies when I am healthy, let alone sick.  When we went for our chemo training they didn't really say anything about nutrition other than there's a Tim Horton's in the hospital. We also talked about the acupuncture magic and how awesome it was last week. He said when he sees people like me, he thinks that chemo isn't so bad but then someone comes to him for the first time who is at the end of their chemo treatments and he remembers that chemo is really hard on people's bodies. He also asked me I was also getting Taxol - which is an additional medication to the chemo  - and I told him that I didn't think so but that I'd ask the next time I was at the Cancer Centre (I'll get to that later). So overall, it was a very positive appointment and I left feeling good - both mentally and physically. 

I woke up on Tuesday feeling pretty tired so I didn't do much - part of this is that bad taste in my mouth - sort of like meh, I don't really want to eat or drink anything. The result is that I was getting dehydrated - don't worry, not crazy bad dehydrated, just not as hydrated as I usually am. I am the type of person that drinks a lot of water everyday - forget the 8 cups, I probably drink twice that easily, maybe even more. Gum made it better so I chewed on some gum and I spent most of the day on the couch watching TV - we just signed up for HBO so hunkered down and watched half of Season 3 of Girls - that show always makes me feel better about myself because the characters are all a hot mess. If you watch Girls, you know what I mean. If you are not a twenty or thirty-something female reading this, don't bother watching Girls, you probably won't like it and think its crazy. 

On Tuesday night I had the Look Good, Feel Better program. This is the one where they give you make up tips and hair tips - as well as a whack of free stuff. I ended up being paired up with a volunteer that had ten years of experience with the program and she was awesome (they are all professionals in the field but Sue was probably the best one there from what I could tell). The organizer asked at the beginning of the session if anyone wanted to learn anything specific so I shot my hand up and said that I wanted to learn how to draw on eyebrows (yes, they are continuing to thin out). I was surprised that no one said anything else - actually the group was a bit dull...anyway, I Iearned a lot and Sue was great with applying my makeup - she read me well and I was pleased that at the end of it I looked like Melanie with a nice touch of colour, not Melanie the prostitute. Also, all of the makeup is MAC - score! - eye shadow, blush, foundation, powder, mascara, lip pencil, two lipsticks, eyebrow pencil (score) and much more including creams, makeup remover etc. I still wasn't feeling great but I persevered through to the end. Overall it was good but I did learn one thing, I'm not a fan of hanging out with other cancer patients - I don't mean to offend people with cancer when I say this but its just that cancer doesn't discriminate and just because you have cancer doesn't mean that you have anything else in common with them. Plus, I know that I am extremely lucky that I have such a fantastic group of family, friends and co-workers for support so I don't necessarily need to reach out others folks with cancer for support. And...I like hanging out with people who are healthy, it makes me feel normal and healthy because other than the side effects of chemo, I don't feel sick - mentally or physically. 

On Wednesday I went to acupuncture - to be honest, I felt a bit like a drug addict because I was not feeling well Tuesday and still not feeling great Wednesday and I was counting down the hours before my appointment with great anticipation. Tran (my acupuncturist) and I met for a bit and discussed the effects of my previous acupuncture appointment - I told him about my blast of energy that I had, feeling great and getting up early in the morning and sleeping only about 6 hours a night. Tran told me that they have a saying, it goes "take it easy tiger" (I think this is funny because of course, I've heard of that saying) so he said that this treatment would regulate my energy a bit more because he doesn't want me to burn out. I also told him about the chronic bad taste in my mouth and he said that he'd work on that too. We also talked about my efforts to go to bed early and he asked me if I was just being polite saying 'yes' - I told him no, its just that going to bed early has been tough for me. So, I had the treatment and to my untrained eye, he didn't put the needles in different spots and I still laid there for 45 minutes so don't ask me how he regulated my energy any differently. I felt much better and by the time I picked up Dom from work after my treatment but before we got home the bad taste in my mouth was gone and I was so thirsty I couldn't wait to get home and chug some water. Chinese magic. 

I woke up on Thursday feeling tired and I noticed that my lymph node in my right armpit and right groin was swollen and sore. The one in my groin wasn't that bad, it sort of felt like a bruise but the one in my armpit was noticeably swollen and was very sore. This sort of freaked me out because my tumour is also on the right side, very close to my lymph node and we already know that the cancer has spread to that lymph node. I went to my massage on Thursday morning and my massage therapist Meagan confirmed that she could feel my lymph node in my groin was inflamed. Meagan suggested that perhaps I was fighting off something - perhaps a cold - which is the same thing Dr. Craig told me on Monday. I went home and googled a few things (always a bad idea) then called my oncologist's office. The beauty of their system is that when you call this special number, you speak to a nurse right away and if there isn't one free, one calls you back - the nurses have direct access to my oncologist Dr. Dent, so they asked me a bunch of questions then told me that they'd talk to Dr. Dent and get back to me. They called me back and said Dr. Dent would see me at 9:00 am Friday morning. 

My friend Sue then came over and dropped off shepherd's pie especially for Dom and stayed for a while for a a visit. We had a great chat and then Prescott came by with his Costco sized bag of dark chocolate - delicious. I took it easy for the rest of Thursday night - still googling stuff - did I say how that's a bad idea? Dom went to jam and I headed for bed early in anticipation of my appointment. Oh and for me to try to get into the "Tran recommended bedtime" I've set my alarm on my phone to go off at 9:00 pm so that I start my bedtime ritual - bath, news watching, reading - and start to get to bed by 10:00 pm. 

Friday morning we dragged ourselves out of bed to be at the hospital for 9:00 am. Despite that I went to bed early I was still tired and as luck would have it all of the swelling and soreness that I was experiencing the day before was (of course) gone. Isn't it always that way!?! Dr. Dent examined me - palpated all of my lymph nodes then said that she wasn't worried, she said that its normal for my lymph system to fluctuate and that because the tumour is basically draining into the lymph node in my armpit (I never thought of it this way but it makes sense if you read up on what the lymph system does) that its normal for it to fluctuate in size. Phew. The bonus of this was that I had a pre-chemo appointment on Tuesday after Thanksgiving and she said we could cancel it since she saw me that day. I wished her a Happy Thanksgiving and we went home. 

Friday was Dom's compressed work week day off so we had planned on hanging out for the day - well we had a lazy day and did nothing but watch episodes of The Knick (if you have HBO or download shows, I highly recommend this show, its excellent). We took the dogs to the dog park and then Dom headed to his friend's birthday dinner - I wasn't feeling up to it and it was a Brazilian restaurant where it was all you can eat so it really wasn't worth me going. Perhaps Dr. Craig and Meagan were right and I was fighting something off...(that is supposed to be sarcastic). Of course they were right!

On Saturday, I woke up and was still not feeling great so I (stupidly) took two gravol - well I put myself into a gravol coma and didn't wake up until 3:00 pm, an hour before my Dad and Linda arrived for the weekend. We had a great Thanksgiving weekend - we went out for dinner with Dom's parents on Saturday night for Thai food (one of the easiest places for me to eat with my strict diet because the base of most of the sauces are coconut milk and no trace of dairy, I just can't eat the rice - boo). On Sunday my cousin Keary came by for a visit as he was in Ottawa at his in-laws for the weekend. It was great to see him and he brought a few get well cards from his kids as well as the gift from Uncle Rick and Sharon.

  
Okay so one of the things Keary brought was the People magazine with Joan Lunden on the front cover. Having not being a regular watcher of mainstream TV, I didn't know about her story until Sharon told me last week - anyway, if you are interested read her story - but you'll be bored because its pretty much a mirror image of my story. She had triple negative breast cancer, went on a diet of no sugar, dairy or carbs to keep her blood sugar low to stress out the cancer cells as much as possible. The only thing that is different is that she had 12 rounds of chemo each week and got blood transfusions. I'm glad I'm not her, that sounds like a lot to handle. And she did do way more than me while getting chemo - like she still did a bunch of TV interviews - although to be fair, I'm not a morning show host and haven't yet been offered the opportunity for a TV interview but if I was I'd totally do it - chemo or no chemo. Anyway me and Joan Lunden are like this now. 





After Keary left we made a quick trip to the ByWard Market where Dom and I bought an area rug for our living room. It was so nice outside so we had to have a quick drink on a patio before heading home. Sunday night we went to the Pelican Grill for dinner which was delicious and the trout special was as if they made it especially for me - it was trout, quinoa, almonds, autumn vegetables and brussel sprouts. I forgot to tell the server 'no dairy' so the trout came pan fried in butter but oh well - I ate it anyway. That was my first lick of butter for about a month and a half. It was delicious, I cannot deny it and anyway it was Thanksgiving. Don't tell Joan Lunden, she'll be really disappointed.

Linda remembered to bring me the picture that Maisie had made me in the summer in anticipation of their trip to the cottage with us. Who wouldn't want this on their fridge to see everyday:

Look at those hearts and smiling faces! Wonderful!


My Dad and Linda left on Monday and Dom and I had another lazy day of TV watching and hanging out. After my parents left, I was a bit bummed out - not just because they were leaving but I sort of realized that the one thing this cancer thing has done is taken away a bit of my freedom. As many of you know, Dom and I are frequently taking road trips home, to the cottage (in fact we went to the cottage three days after my first chemo session), to my sister's, my Dad's, my Mom's - all mostly to hang out with my family. Well we aren't going anywhere now until at least the new year since chemo is making me more tired, I'm a bit paranoid about germs and I have so many appointments during the week there isn't any opportunity. 

We will miss Christmas with my family and we've missed my Aunt Pat's birthday party and a typical Thanksgiving would have been us driving around Southern Ontario visiting family and some close friends. Its not that I'm not having enough social time, don't get me wrong - I've had lots of visitors and offers for visits from friends out of town, and my sister is coming in two weeks (maybe some cousins too), my Mom after that, my university friends after that...its just that I'm not going anywhere - its just something that I have to get used to...I know I should be cherishing this - at least the savings we are getting on gas! But as Courtney has always described me, I'm like a butterfly and you can't cut my wings! I guess I just need to learn how to spread my wings in different ways. This is me, in my Thanksgiving wings:

On Tuesday I went to pick up my wigs - big day! I just love the wig specialist Helen - she is so great. The last time I went, I confirmed the order - one bob and one long. I tried on the wigs - confirmed that I liked them and then she set me up with wig shampoo and conditioner and gave me a tutorial on how to care for them. She also gave me shampoo and conditioner for my balding head - which is great because I was asking Dom a few weeks ago - I wonder what you use to wash your bald head? No need to wonder anymore. They have shampoo and conditioner especially for thinning hair. Helen was impressed that my hair was still hanging on - we talked about shaving it - but I said no. She agreed that it was a good idea - if there are miracles in this world and my hair doesn't completely fall out I'll be way ahead of the game with hair re-growth. So here they are:

 

Seriously, the second one (long one) is bang on what my hair used to look like a few months ago and the bob isn't bad - I had a bob a few years ago. I figure that the bob will come in handy in the summer when its hot. 

So that's it - other than to answer my question - what are you thankful for? Well, there's a long list but here are the first things that come to mind:

  

Dom - the best guy in the world (almost always looking like this).

My parents (all four of them), family and friends - the best and most supportive people ever (this is just a sampling).

Fat May and Lola - because they are my daily companions. 

 

That I don't have Ebola (this is no joke) or some other disease that has way less hope of surviving like ALS - when the ALS campaign was at its highest, Courtney and I had a conversation that getting this breast cancer thing could be way worse - I could have ALS that doesn't have a lot of hope of surviving (Courtney's cousin passed away from ALS). Did you know one in nine women get breast cancer? But did you know the survival rate is in the 80% range? With those odds, I'm a betting woman. 

Also, years ago when I was getting a bunch of tests done for my spinal cord problems the first suspicion was that I had MS - again another thing to be thankful for - that I don't have MS and after two successful surgeries I'm a-okay. I could compare myself to others - friends who are healthy with a few kids but what's the point? That's not my life. This is my life, so this is what I'm thankful for. I'm glad that when I found out I had breast cancer I was healthy (minus the cancer of course) and continue to be healthy, I worked at a place where I have great benefits (Dom's too) so that I don't have to pay more than $2.00 everytime I pick up my prescriptions, my wigs are covered by benefits, that I can go on sick leave with unconditional support from my managers (and not worry about money), that I have so many people supporting me, visiting, sending me text messages, emails and phone calls that never a day goes by that I feel alone. So all in all, I'm thankful for many things and you should too - no matter what life throws at you. Count your eggs in your basket, you probably have more than you think you do.

Cancer Holidays - Week 4 "Smelling Like Roses"

What a busy week! 

I'm saving the best for last - the CIBC Run - so you have to read all through this before you get to that (or you can just skip over this but don't! Its interesting stuff, I promise).

First, my shout outs - Pete and Jean sent me a card and selection of loose leaf herbal teas - I tried one today and its very good. Sometimes I find that herbal teas have an after taste but these ones do not and to be honest, they are a nice break from the massive quantities of green tea that I've been drinking. This is the funniest picture I have of Pete from when we were in Ireland a few years ago and I can't resist posting it:

I also received a nice, long letter from my brother Phil - with some reflections from when we were growing up and some really good inspirational words - telling me that after I beat breast cancer I will come out of it Smelling Like Roses - which in his view is how I've lived my life and you know, he's right. I do come out of things smelling like roses! - my outlook on life has always been "It always works out in the end" and it always does! Needless to say, this letter was just the kind of thing I needed to read. 

I also got two great bouquets of flowers this week - one from my Dad's cousins in England, Liz and Johnny - they came to Ottawa this summer and stayed with us for a few fun-filled days and another bouquet from my Dad and Linda. Both are fall colour flowers and look great in the house. You can't go wrong with fresh flowers! 

At the beginning of last week, I was still suffering from over doing it on the weekend. I was really not feeling well, I was nauseous with chronic headaches for a number of days so I was taking advil and gravol on regular basis which made me feel pretty tired. 

I had my pre-chemo appointment with my oncologist - nothing to report there, its a 15 minute check up to see how I am doing with the chemo. I told her that I fasted on the advice of my naturopath and I thought that improved my side effects but got no reaction to that information - good or bad.

My friend Sally and her husband came by on Tuesday for a quick visit and to drop off food so that brightened up my day! My friend Laurel dropped off food on Thursday - food for Dom - pasta and cookies - lucky guy!

Then on Wednesday afternoon, my week did a complete turn around. I went to my first acupuncture appointment - it was at the Ottawa Integrative Cancer Centre - which is the same office as my naturopath. My naturopath recommended that I get acupuncture to help with the chemo side effects and just general well-being so I figured it was worth a try. 

Tran (my acupuncturist) and I had a long chat about every facet of my life - diet, activities, sleeping habits, cancer, lifestyle - and he had a lot of suggestions that I have started to follow - like not eating cold foods as its a waste of energy for my body to heat up the food in my stomach (makes sense). He also strongly suggested that I change my sleeping habits - go to bed at 9:00 pm (that's kind of early in my books but I'm transitioning to that) and get up around 6:00 am - but he said that it won't be hard to get up at 6:00 am if I go to bed at 9:00 pm. Hmmm...for those of you who know me well, I am typically not an early to bed, early to rise kinda gal so this will be the most difficult lifestyle change out of all of things Tran recommended but I'm working on it. Oh and guess what? He also said that acupuncture will help with hair regrowth!! Yes!

So getting back to the actual acupuncture...I got acupuncture for 45 minutes. I got needles in my hands, elbows, knees, ankles, feet and even one in my stomach! (yikes) I lied there for 45 minutes with the needles stuck in me trying to relax. I have to admit it was a bit weird. I had acupuncture once before in my life when I sprained my ankle but I wasn't sure if it really did anything...anyway after the 45 minutes, Tran removed the needles and it was over. As I was paying for it, the admin assistant asked me if I felt any different - I thought for a few seconds and said no, not really just a bit of a body buzz. 

Then I got in the car and started driving - I noticed that everything seemed clearer as I was driving, colours were more vivid. By the time I got home, I was feeling like a million bucks - it was amazing. No more headache or nausea and so much energy that I went outside and did two hours of gardening then took Fat May and Lola for walks. I felt like a million bucks. Unfortunately, Wednesday afternoon was the also the beginning of my fasting before chemo so even though I felt better, I couldn't eat anything solid but I was so glad that I was feeling so good that I didn't really care. The effects of the acupuncture lasted the rest of the week. I know my two friends at work Randolph and John Wu are reading this paragraph and smiling!

On Thursday morning, I woke up at 5:30 am - just like that - boing! My eyes opened and I was awake. We have a timer on in the light in the living room that goes on at 6:00 am so I waited until that light came on and got up, fed the dogs and did yoga for 45 minutes. Dom got up at 7:00 am and was surprised to see me up - that's probably the first time ever that I have been up before Dom. 

Thursday was a busy day with an appointment to have my PICC dressing changed (yuck) - the reason I think this is the worst thing than anything is that they have to flush it which means they stick in a syringe of saline solution and it results in vapours coming out of my mouth which tastes bad. Just thinking about it makes me a bit queasy so I'll move on. 

Right after that appointment I went to see my massage therapist because I stumbled across an article in a medical journal that did a study on pediatric cancer patients and how they benefit from massage before and after chemo treatments to help reduce side effects. Interestingly, during my massage when Meagan was working on my neck, the spots where I got acupuncture on my arm sort of "lit up" - Meagan said that was a good sign. 

Friday was the busiest day of all, I had to be at the hospital at 8:45 am for my chemo entry blood test but it wasn't hard to get up because the effects of the acupuncture held on and I was up again doing yoga at 6:00 am. This time I made the appointment with the nurse so that they could draw the blood from my PICC line instead of getting another poke with a needle. Caution, if you are a bit queasy about needles and stuff like this, skip the rest of this paragraph, it may gross you out. The nurse asked me if my PICC line was still in the right spot - what she means by this is that there's a certain amount of line sticking out of my skin and there are little dots that measures the number of centimetres. After Thursday PICC cleaning I sort of thought that there were more dots on the line that I originally had thought - the nurse asked me for my PICC card which I didn't even remember getting but apparently I did. This card tells you the length of your PICC line. Turns out it was supposed to be at 2 cm but my PICC was actually at 4 cm - which means that probably while the nurses over the last few weeks had cleaned my PICC line it had been getting slowly pulled out. This meant that the PICC line might not be in the correct place so I had to wait until for a bit for the nurse to confirm the correct length of the PICC but my biggest worry was that it may affect whether or not I would get chemo - but the nurse assured me that even if it was too far out they would put an IV in for my chemo. Phew. 

I hopped back in the car and drove home - only to return for my genetic counselling/test to see if I have the breast cancer genes (yes, there are two genes). Earlier in the week I had a bit of a scare when I called the genetic office because I was getting worried that I hadn't heard from them knowing that my oncologist had referred me to them in August - I got a call back from them and was told that I was on year waiting list! I was like what?! That can't be right...but she assured me that I was in the same position as everyone else...

Let me back up here, the reason why I qualify for genetic testing is that I have Triple Negative Breast Cancer (TNBC) at such a young age. Its rare to see breast cancer in people my age and TNBC is even rarer. Its also the most aggressive breast cancer BUT it is the one breast cancer that responds the best to chemo BUT its also the one that has the highest risk of it re-occurring again in the first five years after remission BUT after that, if you make it to the five years, the risk drops down significantly to the same risk or even lower than the other kinds of breast cancers - so as you can see there are pluses and minuses to this.

Getting back to the year waiting list, this for me was really bad news because the results of the genetic test may affect what type of surgery I get and also affects my family if I do have one or both of the genes. If I do have the genes more of my family should get tested to figure out which side of the family it comes from and what their own risks might be. The first people would be my parents which is something I didn't really think of until my genetics appointment but it is the only way to determine which side of the family the gene comes from. Oh, the realities of breast cancer and genetics. I also learned that if you have TNBC you have a 50% chance of having the breast cancer genes - hmmm not so happy about those odds but that's the reality. 

So, after hearing I was on the year waiting list I put a call into my doctor and low and behold the genetics office called me Thursday to say that I had an appointment on Friday at 11:00 am - yes! I'm not sure how that happened because I never heard back from my doctor - I was just happy I had the appointment. I met with the genetics counsellor who gave me a refresher on genetics (I'm glad I took Genetics 101 in University - it made it a quicker overview) and then she mapped out my family history and was pleasantly surprised that my family has such a good health history with no real history of breast cancer except my Aunt Sandra who is successfully in remission! She also pointed out that the women in our family have good longevity - my Nan is 94 and my Grandma...around 88ish...As soon as she said this I thought of the joke that I always make with Courtney and Becky - that in 50 years the three of us are going to be living together, hanging out on the front porch watching the young men go by! This will be us:

Courtney is the one suggesting the beer.

The genetics counsellor and I talked a little longer and she said that if I wanted to get the test that day I could, or I could go home and I think about it - I told her I've been waiting (and sort of stressing) about wanting this test and I wanted the test today for sure. For me, through this whole process information is power - I've done a lot of reading on cancer and cancer survival and one of the most important elements is taking charge of your own health. Lucky for me, being in control comes naturally (yes, I know, I can be bossy). The test is a simple blood test so I got it done before I left the hospital. I should get the results back in about four weeks so we will get a call to go in for another appointment in the beginning of November to find out the results - they make you go in regardless if the test is negative or positive. 

I headed back home after the blood test to meet my friend Ann at my house. I asked Ann to take me to chemo because Dom had a fun work function (bowling) Friday afternoon and was heading to Oktoberfest later on that afternoon. Ann and I headed to chemo - back with the same nurses that I had in the morning and they told me my PICC was fine which is good news because if it wasn't I'd have to have the whole thing pulled out and reinserted (gross). Chemo went fine - we got back home around 5:00 pm and I felt fine for the first few hours. I started getting a bit queasy around 9:00 pm so I took my meds including just regular gravol and fell in a nice gravol coma until...you guessed it! 5:30 am on Saturday morning! I decided not to do yoga because I wasn't sure how I would feel that day so I stayed in bed and watched my new favourite British drama Hinterland - Coronation Street is in a bit of a lull right now (Dana will be laughing that I just wrote this because he thinks its hilarious that Coronation Street is one of my favourite shows). But turns out, I was good - I didn't feel like eating a turkey dinner but my energy level was up and I didn't feel sick. I was still fasting until the afternoon and Dom was very hungover from his very fun night at Oktoberfest so we hung out watching TV for most of the morning. Needless to say after chemo #3 this is definitely the best that I've felt so I think the diet, fasting, acupuncture and massage are all working (and the meds, of course). 

At 2:00 pm I made my way over to the wig salon to re-try my wigs on and confirm the order. I put the order in and should be getting my new do's this week - exciting! I don't know if I'll do the whole head shaving yet since the hair at the back is still holding on and I can still get away with my fashion toques. This is Lesley and I on Sunday at the CIBC run:

I didn't do much Saturday night - Dom had another night at Oktoberfest but this time only drank three beers the whole night (still suffering from his indulgence the night before) and was home pretty early. We went to bed early to get a good rest before the big run...

And here it is, race time!

Lesley picked me up and drove me to the race to meet up with Team Knight before it began. Take a look at these awesome people:

A huge thanks goes out to the entire team especially to Kim Baldwin who organized the team and Dan who was the one who came up with the idea of the swords and shields and made all of the shields for the entire team with the help of my other friend at work Sheila. This was the youngest member of Team Knight, this is Olivia (my friends Rob and Mary Ellen's daughter):

I couldn't decide which picture was cuter so I put in both!

I also had other friends that took time out of their busy day and came to cheer on the runners: Erin and her kids, Mary and her kids, Sean's wife Melanie and daughter, Krista's husband Bruce and their two kids, Jordan, Dave, Lesley, Andrew and Hieu (sorry if I missed someone). 

I also made my own sign because the night before I realized that the runners get t-shirts and the survivors of cancers get special t-shirts but it doesn't seem that the people who actually have cancer at the race get anything special so I made up a sign that says "Survivor in Training" - that's me in the middle:

I want to send out a huge thank you to everyone who donated and has been calling, texting and emailing wondering how the run went. Your donations were greatly appreciated. We almost quadrupled our donation target finishing around $5500.00 and Dom managed to raise more than $1000.00 as a member of the team. I know that everyone has their own charities that you donate to and I really, really appreciate the donations to Team Knight - it showed me and the Team how much people are really behind me. Words can't really express my appreciation so I'm going to stop trying to...
 
I did tell Dom that because he raised the most money on the team that he had to come in first place amongst the team members but Dan and Robin outran Dom and Robin got her best time ever for a 5K run!! Good job Robin! Of course Dom spent most of his time running and chatting (no surprise there) and didn't really start to "compete" with Sean until the end of the race so Dom came in third - or maybe fourth if you ask Sean - but that's okay, he did have a weekend of beer sampling so I guess we can give him a break. Here are some other fun photos of the race:

  
Also, my cousin Keary ran in the same run in Toronto - thank you Keary! That's two people in his family who have ran just for me - Keary's son Bradley was in the Terry Fox Run and I posted a picture of him in my last blog post: 

What a great way to end a weekend! All of my friends here in Ottawa are so great - they are like my second family - them and my friends and family standing behind me every step of the way has been so wonderful. 

I'm going to end it there - this is a long one, I hope you didn't find it too boring. This week I have a check up with the naturopath Monday afternoon and I'm going to the Look Good, Feel Better session on Tuesday night to learn how to draw on my eyebrows - yes they are falling out *sigh*. I think I have a few people visiting me this week so that will be good. Oh and Dad and Linda are coming up for Thanksgiving weekend - I'm really looking forward to that!

Have a good week everyone - keep smiling, I am!