We're feeling better

I'm feeling better about how Nipper is doing. I didn't get a chance to call the vet but late last night I looked up his drugs on the manufacturer's Web site, and the side effects listed for one of them is pretty much what he's been going through -- decreased appetite, increased thirst, behavioral changes. So that made me feel better.

He's not as restless tonight, even though we didn't get our walk in. Tomorrow is the citywide cleanup, so Mom and I went through the garage one more time to put some other stuff out to be picked up, and then, well, it was time for "NCIS" and "The Amazing Race."

That's all for now.

Happy birthday, bro!

Today is my big brother's 39th birthday! That
means I have a year to plot something for the big
4-0. Heh heh heh.

Have a good one, bro.

Nipper again

I'm worried about my dog again. It was a week ago tonight he had his trouble and I stayed up half the night with him.

Overall, he seems fine. He's happy when we get home, excited when it's time for a walk, begs for our food when we eat. But he's hardly eaten any dog food in the last week. I can get him to eat a few handfuls if I handfeed him, but he will not eat from his dish. I even washed it real good last night. I'm tempted to try buying a new dish. Maybe there was a big bug in it and that freaked him out.

He's drinking more water than normal, and urinating more than usual. Maybe that's because of his medicine. Tomorrow I call the vet. His stool seems normal.

Tonight he was real restless after we got back from our walk. He wanted to stay out back, then he wanted in. He lied on the oversized chair for a minute than wanted out again. Then he wandered around the house for a couple minutes and wanted out back again, then wanted in. We went out front and sat in the yard for awhile, and he seemed fine then. We came in and he was a bit restless again.

He seemed to settle down a bit when he got up on the couch and kind of half-lay across a throw pillow. Maybe his stomach or whatever is bothering him again and that makes him comfortable. He's dozed a little and seems more relaxed. Hopefully he's stay calm through the night.

More energy

Feeling better today, although I did sleep a lot. Tonight I do feel like I have more energy, so maybe Sunday will be a better day. There's a citywide cleanup on Wednesday, so Mom and I went through the garage some and picked out some stuff to put out -- old lamps and some other junk we always said we'd do something Trading Spaces-worthy with. There's a bit more room in the garage, and maybe tomorrow we'll decide to throw some other things out. There's some boxes and an old mattress that we'll wait until Tuesday night to put out, since there is a chance of rain between now and Wednesday. Feels kind of good to get rid of junk.

Nipper seems to be doing better. He doesn't have his normal level of energy and doesn't hop up on the bed or the couch as quickly, but he seems like he feels better. I'll see what the vet says sometime early next week. Hopefully it's just some kind of infection. Maybe we can find something to get him to quit eating rabbit poop in the back yard. That might help.

Blood test on Monday. Hope my white blood cell count comes out OK this time.

I ticked off my surgeon

I had an appointment with my surgeon this morning, and was expecting her to put a metal clip in my breast where the lump is. Only when she started the sonogram, she could barely find the lump! In her words, it is "virtually gone." I was just in shock when she said that. I certainly don't think she even expected this. Mom said that when she left the exam room she muttered "I knew I should have put that clip in last time."

Anyway, no clip today, but the chemo and lumpectomy are still on. I guess the surgery will be just a bit more difficult for her to find anything, especially since I'll have one more chemo treatment before then. I think I'm still in a bit of shock. I'm going to go hug my dog and have a good cry before I go to work and spread the news there.

Feeling good today

I was dead tired after yesterday's treatment and slept pretty much the rest of the day, except for watching "Navy NCIS" and the finales of "Big Brother" (ho hum) and "Rockstar:INXS" (J.D. will last the contracted year, probably no more than that).

Today is a pretty good day. I haven't had to take much anti-nausea medicine today, other than the emend, and I had to take nap after lunch, but otherwise I'm feeling good. Stayed home from work, though, since the fatigue is the biggest thing I have to deal with. I usually go back to work Thursday and Friday, but both those days I tire out pretty quick, especially on Fridays, which for paginators at least, is the busiest day of the week getting stuff done for Sunday. Not the boss seems to think it's important to get all that done on Friday. Leave it for the Saturday desk person to finish. Never mind that the Saturday desk person already has a 10 to 11 hour workday and is lucky to get a long enough break to zip through McDonald's drive through for something to eat while working at the computer.

Woops, took a wrong turn there. That's for another blog. Anyway, I'm off in a few minutes to get my Neulasta shot and pick up my lawnmower that I took the shop nine days ago and all they apparently did was change the air filter and the shock, despite the fact I told him I suspected an oil leak. I'm making sure one of them can start it before I them a damn dime, though. And if even if they can't start it, or it's spewing a lot of white smoke still, I'm still taking it and finding someone with better customer service.

Still groggy

But I'm feeling good. None of the nausea or anything, just real tired. We picked up Nipper at the vet, came home and all three of just went right to sleep. I slept until about 7 p.m. Maybe. Seems like I had lunch somewhere in there. Chalk it up to chemo head.

Nipper is doing a little better. He gets up and goes outside. Hasn't eaten any dogfood, but he licked the remains of the mashed potatoes I made for dinner, and I think Mom just gave him some toast crusts a bit ago. He's not himself, but he's better.

Mom's pretty tired, too, but at least we got a treatment room with two recliners today, so I think she got some sleep while I was getting treatment, too.

Getting tired again. Just thought I'd give a short update before heading to bed.

Night, all and sweet dreams.

ruff night & day

I'm still groggy from my treatment this morning, so forgive my any typos or weird run-ons.

Today has not turned out the greatest. Not really about me, but my dog.

A little before midnight last night, he acted like he wanted to go out, so I got up, let him out the backdoor and played a Yahoo computer game while I waited. He wasn't out long, maybe 10 or fifteen minutes, and got a long drink of water like he usually does after coming in from taking a pee (refilling, I guess.). He seemed fine. We went back to bed. I crawled in bed, he lied down on the floor. Pretty soon, I reazlied he was making this kind of little groan on a somewhat regular basis. I got on the floor with him, and his breathing was a bit shallow, and every so often, he pull in his lower abdomen sharply, and that's when he groaned. He also didn't want to get up, not to go outside or even for a treat.

I did manage did get him out the front door, but all he did was lie down on the porch, not go out in the grass to go potty or anything. I finally got himinside and he settled on the floor near the TV. I lied down with him and petted and talked to him, and that seemed to help calm down his breathing to something more normal. I was getting myself worried sick that he would die right there, his chin restingon my arm. And I begged God not to him away from me, not yet. I still need my beast friend to help me get through this rough spott in my life. But I shouldn't be so selfish, I guess. If this will be Nipper's time, I should let it be, and let it be as easy as possible.

Mom got home from work about 6 a.m., andshe sat with us for awhile. After she put her head down for a quick nap, and I took a shower and got dressed, we managed to get Nipper on a blanket that we used to carry him *most* of the way to my car. He didn't like it much and got the last part of gettinginto the back of CRV himself. Such a big, brave boy.

We left him at the vet's, describing the symptoms, and headed over to the cancer center. My check in and chemo was pretty routine. The doc was pretty understanding of why I seemed upset when she came in the exam room. Called the vet from the treatment room and they said the vet wanted permission to do an ultrasound. Told them OK, and that we would stop by on our way back home.

The vet visited with us for awhile when we got there. Nipper does have some sort of mass in his abdomen. She said a blood test would be a good first step, to see if he's got infection. Next step has several options. We could have her (the vet) open him and take a look at what's in there, or we could have an ultrasound-guided biopsy, which she says she's not too comfortable with, but knows a vet who is, or we could have a CT scan. The latter two would mean taking him to Manhattan, to the K-State Vet school. That's kind of along drive.

After the blood test results, she called. Mom took it, so I don't have all the details, but she is prescribing a couple antibiotics for him. She thinks the mass is near his liver, but is not affecting how his liver works. So that's some good news. And I think she'd said earlier the mass is fluid filled, which sounds like it's not awful.

He seems a bit more chipper now that we've got him home, but still awful tired A lot like I feel right now.

Back to bed, then. Think of me and Nipper as well.
Thanks
JunO

3rd time

Tomorrow (Tuesday) is my third treatment. I'm not as nervous as I was the first two times. Maybe it's because I know what to expect (you could argue that fact, since I pretty much slept through the second one). I have seen where quite a few people say the effects get worse as you go along, but I'm hoping I won't see that happen. Even if it does, the side effects I've suffered have been pretty minimal -- just fatigue for about four of five days, and the low white blood cell counts. As long as I can work most of the time, I'll handle this OK.

Ever since my diagnosis, I've talked with one of the reporters at the newspaper where I work about doing a story or stories on bc, especially on the number of younger women who are being diagnosed (my surgeon said I was the fifth person under the age of 50 from our region she had seen this year). She's looking at doing it next month, for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. The reporter suggested I do a first-person account. I think it is a good idea and that it is important to get the word out about breast cancer. I'm just not sure how much I want to be directly involved in the story. Yes, I have this blog and anyone in the world can read it, but here I do have a certain amount of privacy. The only people who seem to be regular readers here are family and friends whom I've sent the link to. If it's in the paper, then everyone will know. Right now, in my daily off-line life, it's really just family, my co-workers, my mom's co-workers, a couple neighbors and a handful of friends who know. Am I ready be stopped in the soda shop at lunch or in Wal-Mart by strangers who want to talk? Or people from my hometown e-mailing or calling? My privacy is something that's important to me, but I also think it's important to let younger women know they're not immune to breast cancer just because of their age or because it hasn't been in their families.

Obviously, this is something I'll have to give a lot of thought to.

Missed it!

I was at a doctor's appointment this morning (female stuff ... you don't want the details) and missed all the excitement at the office today.

The director of the local humane society came to the office today to talk to the executive editor about an abused dog they took in. She brought it to the office with her. The poor thing has a mangled paw that might be amputated and its tail was just a stump, I was told. But, the first thing it did when it got into the editor's office was to take a dump! Apparently, the odor took over a good portion of the office, too. Our clerk went in the women's room and brought out the perfumy-odor covering spray stuff for his office. But that stuff usually just makes it smell like rosey crap for awhile. By the time I got in from my doctor's appointment, though, I didn't notice anything. The funniest part of all this is that my editor isn't really an animal person. I'm sure this just solidified his feelings ... so to speak.

Of course, after one of the reporters told me about this, I couldn't resist. As I delivered a page proof for my editor to look over, I said "So, what's the latest poop?"

I'm sure it wasn't the only ribbing he got today.

Things are going OK

I hadn't realized I hadn't posted all week. Guess that should be a sign things are going really well. Or really, really bad.

No, just kidding. If things get tough, Mom has e-mails for a bunch of friends, including one who has access to update here, if I can't. So no news is good news.

My white blood cell count was low again on Monday, but they let me go to work this time. I have my "isolation chamber" at work -- it's kind of a storeroom off the conference room, so I'm away from the general population for when my immunity is down or if someone in the newsroom gets sick. It's kind of like having my own office. I can play CDs, but my collection is actually kind of limited. If anyone has any suggestions for some new artists I could check out, PLEASE do so in the comments. I'm getting bored with my '80s compilations, greatest hits, etc. Something new would be nice.

It is kind of lonely in my space, though. One of the things I like most about the newsroom is there's always something going on and it's one big open room, so everyone gets keyed in on what's happening. It might be editors and reporters and photogs working on a story, breaking news, someone's personal news (new grandbabies for a couple of people recently), the stuff reporters hear that would never make it into a story (otherwise known as gossip) or whatever's going on in town via the scanner. I don't get all that, and I do miss it. This week the ad manager had a high school and then a college class in to talk about print advertising, and I was grateful just for the human noise!

But, it's what I've got to do, and will have to for awhile. At least when my WBC is up, I can hang out for awhile in the newsroom in the afternoon and chat, as long as no one's sick.

On the hair front, the fallout seemed to slow over the last week or so, leaving me with some baby-fine covering. But that actually got annoying, because even just the breeze from the ceiling fans would blow it around quite a bit. It doesn't hurt, it's just annoying. So I had Mom trim it down real short the other night, to about a quarter inch. It's much better to deal with now. I don't wake up with a big, dark spot of hair on my pillow (or spitting hair out of my mouth) and the shower drains much better! So all is good. As can be.

Long weekend

Day two of the three-day weekend. Hope everyone is doing OK. I know it's not a holiday for a good number of people in the South and their relatives across the country. I wish I could do something to help. Watching the coverage on the news of all the evacuees and those still looking for help in the devastated areas makes me depressed. I can't believe sometimes I'm seeing something in our own country. And I can't believe the lack of immediate response from the federal government. It's not like this hurricane just appeared out of nowhere in one afternoon and surprised us.

It's been five days since my second treatment, and I feel like I'm getting back to a "normal" level of energy. Seems like for about three or four days, I'm just zapped. I worked Thursday and Friday, and was just dead tired by the time I got home, especially on Friday, probably our busiest day of the week. Saturday was mostly just resting, although I did take Nipper for a short walk. We took a longer walk today, and I actually did a bit of exercise. I bought these dumbells a while back, and today used just the bar without the weights for some upper body training. I'll probably do that for a week and then gradually add weight. I just want to be careful with the port and all, although I've read on some bulletin boards some people are back to their normal activity a month or so after surgery. But maybe they were more active than me to begin with.

I do want to be in decent shape when I have my surgery, which will be about the first of November ("decent shape" being a relative term, of course). And I want to make sure I get back into shape after surgery, within whatever limits I'll have afterwards. I've never been real strict about any kind of exercise regimen, except for walking the dog, but I think this is as good a reason to get serious.

Anyway, that's been my weekend. The excitement for tonight and tomorrow will probably be laundry. I'm pretty thankful for something so boring, really, considering how many people are just trying to survive in this world.

Take care.

P.S. Anyone can now make comments again, not just registered bloggers. I changed that for awhile because of the stupid spammers.

Great news!

Saw my surgeon today for my first sonogram since before treatment began ... and the tumor has shrunk! It's 28 percent smaller! Whoo-hoo!

Not having too many side effects this time either from my second treatment. I was tired Tuesday and Wednesday, and went back to work today. Since I don't get a blood test until Monday, we've got me in the "isolation chamber" until we know how my white blood cell count is. It's just a small storeroom off the conference room, but I think I'm going to get spoiled. I've got about twice the desk space I normally do, plus I've got my CD player hooked up to some external speakers (which I never could really do in the newsroom), plus I don't have to put up with all the yakking that sometimes goes on right at deadline. Of course, I kind of miss being around everyone and all that yakking, too. But I have the paper's "Bob the Buffalo" mascot costume to keep me company. He's not much of a talker, though. Maybe I'll get him a skullcap.