The New Plan

The new plan is to finish the radiation (12 more after today) which will end on Wed., Aug. 12th. The week of Aug. 10th I'll get an injection of 5FU each day, Monday-Friday. This is an alternate way to get the 5FU, and will work just as well. The Dr. was explaining to his "Fellow" (doc-in-training) how he's not worried about it affecting my blood counts because I responded so rapidly to the Neupagen shots (which raise my wbc). He told him all about how I was in so much pain within 2 hours of getting the shot, and how they hadn't seen that before--glad I could be of help in the "fellow's" training! That's me --the "oddball"! :-)

After radiation is done it sounds like they'll give me a 2 week break and then we'll start the rounds of chemo--every other week for 4 months--with the FOLFOX cocktail that I had before. This should work out perfectly for Rachel's baby shower the end of Aug. I am always amazed at how God is working in all this and making sure I'm not too sick for any family events. I can't wait to see how God works it out with Rachel's baby coming in Nov. By then I should be pretty sick, but I need to be able to hold my grandbaby as soon as I can! So, I'll trust God, and not worry about it!

I am feeling pretty good. I took my last pain pill this morning--don't need them anymore, as the intestines have calmed down. Still don't have much of an appetite. Pink Lemonade has been the drink of choice lately--I'm getting tired of plain water, but need to keep the fluids up. I need to get more protein, tho. That's a bit harder to do, as nothing tastes very good, especially meats. I also need to start taking more iron pills--my hemoglobin is still around 9.1. It never seems to go up much. My ankles are swollen, but the docs say it'll just take time to reabsorb all the fluids I got during my hospital stay, and the blood clot in my pelvic area is making the one ankle worse. I had to go to the hospital on Friday to get an ultrasound of my right leg because that ankle was really swollen, but the other one wasn't. Thought I was going to miss my birthday dinner! Dr. J. came out and said I must have missed him, and came all the way down just to see him. He's so nice, and funny. Aways happy and positive.

I feel good about getting on with my treatments. I need to keep fighting this. As sick as I get, at least I'm DOING something about it. I want to live a long life and see all my babies have babies of their own, and I hope I can find ways to help others going through this. Please pass on my blog address to anyone you know that has been recently diagnosed with cancer--often reading about what others have gone thru helps. I know it helped me, and the support of other bloggers continues to give me strength.

Love and blessings to all!
Tina