When you prepare for the worst...

Again last night I worked myself into some sort of frenzy. I fell asleep just fine, but woke up at 2:30. I thought I would just go to the bathroom. Nope. Trach drama. Nausea drama. Anxiety. Coughing. Ugh. I think it lasted until almost 5 am. Poor Kelly. He tried everything. I was just too freaked.

Karissa got up and off to school. I crawled into some clothes while Kelly gathered all the "stuff"- trach care supplies, feeding supplies, notes from the port, other sundry medical supplies, the suction machine, and the crutial Little Red Heart from Karissa, my Wolfie, family picture and the Chant CD. Out the door we went.

Blood draw was quick and all my numbers were good. Weight was stable, blood pressure was excellent. Pulse flying. What's new?  I made it very clear to the CO that I was completely freaked out. He was very kind. We talked through some options, as well as pain options. Okay. lets go.

I opted for the freeze spray on my port. She warned me that the poke would hurt a lot for a second. No. It wasn't bad at all. First they ran tons of electrolytes. They are replacing the magnesium and potassium they are flushing out. Then they ran max doses of anti-nausea meds as well as some Ativan for the anxiety. Okay. At some point they switched over the first cancer drug. Not that I was paying attention. Frankly, I was asleep for the bulk of this. I did eat at some point and wished I had brought another meal as we ended up being there from 8:30 to 4:30.

At the end, they pushed a therapeutic dose of the 5FU (no, the name is not lost on me) and then hooked up the pack to my port. It pushes a tiny dose in every 90 seconds. I will go back on Wednesday to have it taken off.

While I would not say I feel great, I would say I feel far better than I dreamed I would. I feel much better than my fears had made me feel. I am certainly not saying everyone should run out and have some chemo, but this is far better than I had expected.

The downside to all the sitting and all the extra fluids is that my face is swelling again, particularly my left eye. However, the steroids they added in should help that, as should moving around. I'm hoping to maybe be functional enough to sneak into DMV yet.

The word on the street is that day three is the worst, when everything wears off. We shall see. I will have another treatment two weeks from today, and then two weeks after that. Assuming that I develop no complications, we will then switch to the same chemo, lower dose, weekly, coupled with radiation. I will likely need an new mask and a new map, perhaps even an updated PET scan first. Also I am assuming sometime Dr. A is going to want to take a peek at this trach.

If everything falls into place, I should finish treatment by the end of the school year, give or take. Then the healing and the hoping really begin.

There were beautiful cards in the mail from Marie, and Peggy and Crystal. Crystal described Prague as looking like Disneyland run by the mob. The pictures are beautiful, but it wasn't what I pictured in my head.
There was a big box of wonderful chicken stock from Malia and the boys on their way by. We, unfortunately, were still at the Cancer Center, so we missed them. Also, some boxes for my birthday. Wow. I feel spoiled.  Better than feeling rotten:)

Thanks to Deb for the beautiful dinner tonight and the nice little visit. I love to talk about normal life when I don't feel like crap.

Here's to hoping that I will sleep through the night tonight. If for no other reason than Kelly could desperately use the sleep.  Eileen is coming over to get the list. If you want me to give her your name/contact info, just let me know.

Until tomorrow...

Kiara