Targeted Therapy Infusions are DONE!

I'm On December 8th, I received my last infusion of herceptin. I had a shorter visit to the chemo lab for my last dose. They gave me a certificate and a blanket, then I hit the gong and hugged the nurses. It's been a long year and I was fighting back the tears. I don't know if it's that I'll miss the wonderful nurses or if it's the huge emotional sigh of relief at the end of it all. I feel like I held strong during all of it, like I just did what had to be done with the best attitude I could because there really wasn't an option. But now that it's over and I look back, it's a little sad. As pathetic as it sounds, I feel sad that I had to go through it. 

There are things that remind me of that time and of feeing sick. It's hard to face those things, kind of like the aversions from morning sickness. For example, my hats/scarves, I can't stand to look at them. But there's a pessimist hoarder in me that's worried I'll need them again one day and wish I had them. Sad, I know. There are foods and situations that remind me of chemo too. Like I hate the smell of the medicine cupboard. Reminds me of getting all my meds. 

I decided to end my clinical trial so that's why I'm done early. The Perjeta was causing such a horrible side effect with my skin. Some people have said it sounds like shingles, but it isn't shingles. My arms and neck itch and burn and sting and it's awful! The doctors don't have a lot of experience with this side effect from this drug, so they are trying everything they can think of to help my skin. Nothing's really worked. I can ice it to numb it, but now that there's snow outside icing makes me too cold! I can use lidocaine creams and patches too. I just hope it goes away soon!!

Oh and the port is out! That means it's really done. But oh how thankful I am for ports!!!! I can't imagine getting all of those infusions through my veins. I wouldn't have any usable veins left. 

I've got another outpatient surgery with my plastic surgeon next week and that should be it!! Now it's time to keep working out and attempting to eat better (exercise is much easier for me than eating right). I just need to get healthy and strong and get all of this behind me. 

Tamoxifen

I'm starting Tamoxifen today. I'm a little nervous about it, if I'm being honest. I know it's the regular standard of treatment. Most women do just fine on it. I hope I'm one of those women. I'll be on it for a minimum of 5 years, but most likely for 10 years. I should feel grateful that there's a medication that helps to make sure that cancer doesn't come back. I just wish that good medications didn't have side effects.

Radiation's Over!

These are my radiation techs, Dana and Katy. They were awesome! I'll miss chatting with them every day and the kids will miss cookie Thursday. But I'm so glad I'm done! I ended with the burn near my clavicle getting worse. I have to use silvadene cream on it. But it's quickly getting better. 

I was told it would be a couple of months before all of the effects from radiation have settled. Once that's resolved, I may look at additional reconstruction, fat grafting. We'll see. 

Radiation Burn

UPDATE: While talking with the radiation tech today, I was saying that I was so happy to only have one more treatment on this burn area. I was glad that it wasn't going to get worse. Well, I was WRONG! She said this burn is probably from radiation 10 days ago. She said that the damage today's radiation caused won't be seen for another 10-14 days!! That means this burn could get much, much worse. 😟 

This, my friends, is a radiation burn. So not fun. I have several creams, gels, ointments, essential oils (lavender and frankincense) and I use them all throughout the day. I hope they're working. Maybe this would be worse without them?? Let me just say that a seatbelt is a problem here. Rubbing against a burn/rash, not good. Two more treatments on this spot (lymph node involvement near my clavicle) and 5 more total!

Oh, and this is me getting used to seeing myself with super short hair. I hate it! It's SO not me. But I'm trying to be brave and go without the scarf. If I wait until it's at a length I could feel normal with, I'd be waiting another 9-12 months. 

First Post-Chemo Haircut

My first post-chemo haircut! It was a small, shaping haircut, but that means the hair is growing. The area around the ear really needed some help. We didn't touch the top, it's not growing as fast as the back and sides. I've been told that your hair can stay thin while getting Hercetin/Perjeta infusions, which I'll get until June 2016.

 I would NEVER go this short intentionally and I'm having to get used to seeing myself with super short hair, but hopefully I'll get used to it. I guess I'll try a few styles as it grows out. Thanks goes to my sister-in-law, Kristina 😊

Radiation Time

Here's my radiation machine. 

Here I am in the machine. It rotates around me to radiate from 3 different angles, They are targeting my chest wall and lymph nodes.

I started radiation on July 1st. The first couple of visits took a little longer while they did scans and put on my little dot tattoos. But a normal visit is very short. It takes longer to get me situated on the table than to do the actual radiation. They play an 80s alternative station for me to listen to while I'm in there. One day the song Take On Me by A-Ha started right when the radiation started and the song ended right when the radiation was done. So that's how long radiation takes :)

I can't feel anything at all from it. I just finished radiation #12 yesterday and I can see a little line where my skin is changing color. I'm using MiaDerm and Radiation Rescue, plus LavaDerm and frankincense throughout the day. Hopefully that all helps prevent horrible burning. We'll see how I feel in a few weeks. I am getting 28 treatments total and should end August 11, assuming everything goes well i don't  have to take any breaks in treatment.

Post Surgery Report

I'm finally getting around to a post.  Surgery was Monday, June 1st.

I was so scared to go in, but everything went well. One big fear was the anesthesia. And when I ended up with a young anesthesiology fellow, I was nervous. The supervising doctor would be switching off with her because it was such a long surgery. And I was just that, a long surgery. I was expecting 8-10 hours and was worried about that. But it ended up being 12 hours!

I went to the IMU (a step down from the ICU) from surgery and was there for 4 days. It was a rough recovery. It's hard when you've got abdominal and chest recovery at the same time because you can't compensate for one by using the other. I had to rely on my legs and it was hard. I won't go into the detail of my surgery but you can look it up if you feel the need. I chose to do a double mastectomy with immediate DIEP reconstruction (that's the part I'll leave up to you to look up). 

When I received my pathology report, it was great news! It looks like chemo was very effective. There were a few, random cancer cells still present, but a lot of tissue showing "chemo effect". That basically means the masses where cancer was present were destroyed! They removed 16 lymph nodes and 6 of them showed chemo effect. They still remove everything because of the few cells left. We don't need them replicating!! 

Because the surgery was so long, blood clots were a worry. I had to take lovenox shots every day for 4 weeks. Not fun. Luckily I have a couple of nice friends that were willing to come over and stick me every morning. I was too scared to do it myself.

Again, it was a rough recovery. But I had a lot of help and I'm VERY thankful for it. It's been very hard for me to be so useless to my kids. I want to be able to take them to the park or the carnival or for ice cream or a walk. I couldn't do any of that for several weeks. It's a little sad for me to send them with others.

But I'm feeling pretty normal now. My energy is coming back and I'm doing well. I have limited range of motion in my left arm and I'll have to do exercise therapy and work on that. It's because of the lymph node removal. 

Anyway, I'm so happy to have that behind me!!