Welcome to Monday

I kind of, sort of, intentionally skipped yesterday. Well, I made the decision earlier in the day based on the belief that I would have more to tell today. The balance of the day Sunday re-enforced that decision.

Saturday night was another long, goopy night. Waking up covered in sticky goo after being awake a dozen times is not all that pleasant. And being tired does not lend itself to being really emotionally stable.

I'm guessing most people, whether they are willing to admit it or not, have had those days when the slightest little thing sets them off. Sunday was one of those days for me. Where you can take something simple and fairly meaningless and spin it into an entire meltdown. Lucky Kelly.

While trying to pull myself from the emotional cliff, I had a realization. I don't know how not to care. It has been said of me that I have two speeds, balls out and full stop. Apparently this applies to caring as well. As hard as I try to say, "Not my circus, not my monkeys," I can't stop caring. Be it the rainforest, GMOs, the local school district, or a dozen other causes big or small, I cannot just let it go. Because if I stop caring about some of it, I stop caring about everything. Then I give up. That is bad.

As it is want to do, the emotional ick spun into a physical ick, with the help of me neglecting to eat for far too long. Then I finally did eat. [Aside: rare meat turns a somewhat creepy color when blended.] Then I broke the Laguna Rule, and I paid for it.

What is the Laguna Rule you ask? It is one of our house rules. Kelly and I went to Laguna Beach on a get away early in our relationship. We had a lovely room with an ocean view and in room hot tub. We had an amazing day exploring shops and had an over the top dinner. Appetizers (my very first artichoke), giant entrees, and a mythic dessert to which all others would be compared (Tollhouse Pie). Probably 30,000 calories at least.

We rolled out of there and headed back to our beautiful room, deluding ourselves that all the walking we had done would offset the obscene amount of food we ate. When we got back to the room, we headed right to the hot tub, romantic champagne glasses in hand.

When you see people do this in a movie, it is all lovey-dovey, nary a hitch. However, despite our best efforts to hide it, we finally had to both admit we horribly nauseous. We crawled out of the hot tub and collapsed in misery in the bed, fearing what was going to come next.

What came next was... we felt fine. After another attempt on an empty stomach, we figured out that full stomach + really hot water = sick stomach. Hence the Laguna Rule.

Last night I was emotional, achy, slightly grossed out by the pinkish dinner I had consumed, and basically a mess. Kelly gave me some Motrin and I decided to go crawl in the tub. On a full stomach. Broken rules have consequences...

I filled the bathtub with nice hot water and a healthy dose of Epsom salts. I crawled in. It felt fantastic, for about a second and half. And then my stomach started rocking and rolling. I should have crawled out immediately, but I thought it would get better. It didn't.

I started banging, banging, banging. Unfortunately, Kelly was outside taking recycling out, so there was no one to hear my banging. When he came in, I had worked myself up into full panic mode. He extracted me from the tub, got me dried off and I collapsed into bed. Still, the damage was done and I needed a dose of Reglan to settle my stomach. Motrin, Flexeril and Reglan is the triple threat. It is miraculous I managed to stay away long enough to put pajamas on.

Based on the fact that I have been increasingly goopy at night, we decided to try a night without the humidifier, too.

Monday dawned... who am I kidding... Monday 10 am-ed doesn't have the same ring, though. I got up less goop covered than I have in days. I felt better than I have in several days.  I managed eat and get dressed and be functional by the crack of 1 pm. Go me!

Kelly had already done riding detail this morning. We headed out on our next appointed rounds. First stop, Dancer's Closet for new ballet slippers. If there were ever two people who felt less at home in Dancer's Closet they would probably be mountain men or nuns. I feel like an oaf just walking in there. I already learned that my inability to speak unnerves them a little bit, so Kelly did all the talking, which is somehow even weirder. But we got the slippers and a back up pair of tights and were on our way.

Next stop was the cancer center. I was supposed to have a blood draw, see Dr. B, and get a port flush. I had my blood draw and we waited, and waited, and waited. Finally Kelly went and asked. No. I'm not seeing the doctor. But we confirmed on Friday that we were seeing the doctor. No. Are you sure? Yes, but I'll send him a message and see. Of course we wouldn't have waited all this time when you just go straight back to the chemo room for a port flush.

But Karissa can't come to the chemo room, so she and Kelly hang out while I go back. It is packed. Anyone who thinks cancer isn't a booming business hasn't been to a cancer center. There are so many people that they have to bring me one of the staff's fancy rolling chairs to sit in while I wait. Fortunately it wasn't a huge wait. The were able to pull up blood on the first try (yay-- eeww...) and she flushed the Heprin through, stuck on a Tazmanian Devil band-aid and I was on my way,

When I get back to the waiting room, it turns out yes, I was supposed to see the doctor. It was a scheduler's error. Come back next Thursday. Oh and on Friday too to see the other oncologist. Fine.

I did have the presence of mind to ask for a copy of my blood work. Not that I have a clue what any of it means. Lots of normals and lows, and one high. I'm hoping Zachary can do some interpretation for us on Wednesday. I'm assuming if it was disastrous, someone would have said something or called. Unless the scheduler was supposed to do that...

From the cancer center we headed over to Ballet Fantastique. Despite all of the confusion and delay, we are still quite early for the 4 pm class. We corralled Karissa in the car as long as we could stand it and then Kelly took her down stairs. It did give him a chance to get all the questions answered. It is possible she may be moving up two classes, which is three days a week of ballet. But none of them are Talmud Torah days, so that would be good. Of course they wear a different colored leotard, and not something basic like black that I can get at Target. Oh well.

Kelly brought me home as I was pretty done in. It is amazing how exhausting sitting can be. My neck doesn't appreciate any one position for too long. I entertained myself with the newspaper and such. He made the trip back for pick up.

We had a very quiet evening until the bike crash. Karissa fell while riding her bike, the larger pink bike she has just grown into. There is quite a bit of road rash and a big bruise on her hip. One foot is really skinned up and she says it really hurts. Her first tearful question? Can I still go to ballet tomorrow? Yes you can unless you get up in the morning and can't walk. Hell or high water won't keep you from ballet.

Our next 'interruption' was far more pleasant. Alexis arrived on the scene, baring gifts, and stories and kindness. I have said before, some people just make me feel normal. Alexis is like that. Although I haven't seen her in ages, and I know I look a fright, it was as if nothing ever changed and me writing on a Magna Doodle is just what I do. She made me a lovely afghan. It is much finer work than I do and it didn't take her thirty years. It is a treasure.

We had a nice long visit and she and Karina staked out plans for an OSU run. She headed out for her hotel room and I took a shower. Whoo hoo. We are wild people...

To completely shift gears: when they tell you chemo makes your hair fall out, they mean ALL of your hair falls out. Eyebrows. Eye lashes. Arm hairs. You can work your way from there. At any rate, some of it you don't realize fell out, or maybe that you even had, until it starts to grow back in. New hair seems to get a lot of ingrown hairs. My eyebrows in particular, which far from fell out completely, are now growing back with a vengeance. I never in my life had unibrow, but now it is threatening. Unibrow and a collection of ingrown eyebrow hairs. I'm pretty sure there is no Revlon cure for this.

And that brings us back to nearly midnight again. My poor husband just headed to bed as he has to work tomorrow morning. It will be my first day of wrangling the human hurricane, unless of course she can't walk in the morning, in which case all bets are off. It should be fine. I only have to keep her busy until ballet... I wrangled classrooms full of children for years. One nine year old should not be that difficult. Except then I had a voice.

At any rate, that brings you up to speed. Perhaps tomorrow would be a good day for another installment of Who in their right mind? The fish hook story is waiting to be told.

Until tomorrow...

Love,
Kiara