2nd Week - AC Treatment

 Day 9 since my 1st AC Treatment was much like Day 8. It was on Day 10 that I noticed a real difference. I was part way through the day when I realized what was different. I felt normal. I didn’t feel like I was living in some funky weird alternate reality. I suddenly had the brain power to start working on some science for the classroom. I had been wanting to clean-up, organize, and create a bunch of my digital science stuff, and I really wanted it ready for my new replacement teacher. I was able to get through two-thirds of the science stuff over the next few days. The final one-third will get completed during my next normal stage, or I may work on it here and there, I’m not sure, it all depends on how each day goes. 

Hair was continuing to fall out and shed everywhere. I’ve been joking with Brad about how I’m just going to “blow a coat” like animals do when the seasons change. I had been toying with the idea of a drastic haircut. I finally found an idea on-line and showed it to Brad. His response was something to the extent of “That’s cool” which was probably an exaggeration to make me feel better. I know he likes long hair, but he also knows what’s coming. So we decide that we will cut it on Day 14, right before my next Chemo Day. 

On Day 14, I really noticed an increase in hair loss. I keep picking it off of my shirt and finding it everywhere. It was crazy. Good thing we had decided to go with Phase 2 of my hair that night. Just to set the scene, I’ve been cutting Brad’s hair for years with our clippers. He has cut my hair before with scissors (I was between hair stylists for a little while). So for him to take clippers to my head was totally new for both or us. First, we laughed so much I’m surprised we didn’t have to shave my whole head. I also never realized that when you take clippers around someone's ears, it vibrates their eardrum and they feel in their throat. That was new! The really amazing thing about knowing you're going to lose your hair is, it really gives you some freedom to try crazy stuff you would never be brave enough to try otherwise. What’s the worst that will happen? If I hate it, we shave it all off. I mean, we all know it’s coming. So here’s the results of the Phase 2 haircut. FYI - we found out that I have a little heart shaped patch of pure white hair growing in the back of my head. Who knew? 

Day 1 of the 2nd chemo cycle. I was super excited to get the last remaining patch/bandage/steri-strips off from the port procedure I’d had 2 weeks before. It's been annoying that for two weeks I have had to cover that area with plastic and tape every time I take a shower. Everything looked good from the incision. They access the port which I had put lidocaine on before arriving. That all went smoothly and was pretty much painless. Got the blood drawn, and went to meet with my doctor. We discussed everything that had happened and how I was feeling. I showed her my calendar of symptoms, side effects, meds, etc. Everything looked good. We discussed some changes for next time, but we both agreed that we wanted to go through the next cycle without changes as we both thought that having the port the day before chemo may have had an influence on my side effects. 

Now bear with me as I back up into the past for a minute. I need to preface what happens next. When I had originally met with my surgeon, she had made the comment that I would likely start to feel some occasional pain in my tumor after the second round of chemo. Well, I had noticed on Day 13, that I had felt a couple quick, mild, stabs of pain in my tumor. I had tried feeling it and couldn’t quite figure out what was different, but I knew something was different with it. So now I fast forward to the present. I hadn’t told the doctor that I thought the tumor was different, not sure why I didn’t. I think I wanted to see if it was in my head, and sometimes you just forget stuff during the conversations. The doctor starts feeling the tumor, and she immediately says that it's softer. That means the chemo is eating at the cancerous tumor and is working on shrinking/melting it. That’s great news! Basically, if any stray little cancer cells have migrated somewhere, they are also getting killed off. All my blood work comes back normal, so I’m good to go down and start chemo. They start me off with my routine saline, steroids, and anti-nausea stuff. Then comes the Adriamycin aka Red Devil. This time around, I notice that my normal feeling starts wearing off halfway through the injection. The tired, foggy brained reality starts to set in where things just aren’t quite right. I won’t lie, it kinda sucks. You get teased with these days of relative normalcy, then you get thrown back into this other reality where things aren't as crisp and bright. Oh yeah, I’m back into this funky weird place for the next 10 days or so. Yea! But at least I know it’s working. We finished with the Taxol, and this time when I got my Neulasta patch, I asked for it on my stomach because peeling it off the back of my arm last time was such a painful nightmare. Apparently I didn’t need to get two layers of tape like the nurse gave me the first time (thank goodness!) By the way, it was much less painful peeling it off the stomach for me. Will probably go that route from here on out. 

On Day 1 of the first cycle, that night had been pretty rough. On Day 1 of the second cycle, it was so much better. I had made sure to eat breakfast and lunch, in case I didn’t want to eat that night. That turned out to be a good idea. It was later that evening when I began to feel ever so slightly nauseated. I took one of the prescribed pills, and I certainly helped. The biggest thing was just being tired. I slept pretty hard that night. 

Day 2 was better than my first Day 2, which was nice. Not to sound like a broken record, but just being tired is the biggest hurdle. And whether it’s the tiredness or the Chemo Brain, it took me half a minute to think of the word bumper when I was outside looking at my dad’s truck, and I totally put in a phone number wrong into my phone. On the plus side, my port is bothering me less because I don't have a big taped patch there stretching the skin all the time. 

Here are just a few more pictures from the week.