Next Phase

Tomorrow I will go up to the Raleigh-Durham area for my first chemo treatment. I met with the homeopathic oncologist today, and I'll write more about that in another post, but it was a good meeting. My mom flies in from Chicago, and my Dad and stepmom will all join me.  We'll drive down to Cary, NC tomorrow afternoon to stay with my Dad's cousin and wife.  We'll all go out to dinner with my Dad's brother and wife, and another cousin in the area.  It'll be really nice to see everyone, and I'm so thankful to have family in the area during this.

Our appointment on Thursday is at 8:50am.  1st appt - Labwork - get my blood drawn out of my fancy new portacath - yay!  9:20am - 2nd appt - Doctor's visit - I have no idea if this will be a long appointment or not.  Will we get the results from my bloodwork that quickly?  What else is there to discuss for the 1st appt?  Who knows.  12:45pm - 3rd appt - chemo clinic.  Hook me up to the chemo IV and let it go.  I hear that this should take an hour, but they could administer it slowly, so again, who knows how long this will take.  I'll have pills to also take for two weeks, and then I'll have one week off.  Rinse, repeat.

We're supposed to do this for 3 months, so I think that's about 5 sessions.  Since the IV treatment is usually every two weeks, there's a possibility that the side effects of it will be less intense, since I'll have more recovery time in between.  The IV treatment is the one that will cause me to lose feeling in my hands and feet, and be extremely sensitive to cold temperatures.  And BTW, I'm already quite cold.  I've noticed how much the weight that I lost kept me warm.  I lost 30 lbs in a year (20 of which we because of my effort in exercise and better diet).  Why is there a downside of losing weight?  Not cool.

I will get better at blogging because I think it's the best bet for me to chronicle my symptoms and side effects.  Hopefully I can follow through on this, so feel free to nudge me for some motivation :)  Because my whole body is going to change, nothing will be normal anymore, so I won't know if a side effect is normal.  And apparently I need to note these changes.  So, I will try.

More soon,
Sarah xoxo

PS - I have a binder full of women.