After you know you have cancer, things start to happen very quickly. So, now that the doctors all know, I have decided to go with a breast specialist to remove the cancerous cells in my left breast and my lymphnodes if, of course, they had been affected, which they had. So, the docotor, in Cleveland, following the line where the general surgeon had cut to remove the tumor itself, removed breast cancer tissue that he thought was affected and 4 lymphnodes. They only removed 4 because they did a test with blue dye that turns the node blue if it had been affected and only the first lymphnode turned blue. This test is called a sentinal node biopsy. You pee like you drank smurfberry juice for about 3 days...
OK, so, I spent the night in a Cleveland hotel right next to the Clinic with Jim and my mother that first time and we left to come home the next morning. I had a couple of drains sewn into my side and had to keep track oif how much fluid came out of them every day. Home nursing came by to help and show me how to drain them and measure my fluids. One week later I was to go back and have the drains removed.
We went back a week later to find out that they did NOT get it all. I didn't have clean margins and my new oncologist, Dr. Chuu wanted 18 more lymphnodes removed. So, that surgery was set up for the 3rd week of February. My mother and I went the second time, alone. The second time they kept me in the hospital overnight and I paid for my mom to spend the night in that hotel, they should have somewhere for family members to stay. If they did, no-one ever offered it to us. After I woke up from the surgery I was sick from the anesthetic. There were no nurses around at all. We paged and paged and tried to get someone in the with one of those things you throw up in but, no luck. Theren were those air things wrapped around my legs and neither one of us had ever seen those before, so I could not get out of bed either. My mom quickly grabbed the pitched of water that was sitting there, dumped it down the drain, and held it for me to vomit in.
Still, no nurses. I was highly disappointed in the nursing staff at that hospital, bt the room was beautiful. My mother could have slept in there with all of the comforts of home. Hell, it had it's own couch and everything.
What I did not realize was that my mother was scared to death to drive in the city. Especially if she didn't know the streets and this was all one-way streets. So, the next day, when I was released, she came over on the bus to the hospital to get me. And we had to go back to the hotel on the bus to leave. Me, having 3 drains this time and not permitted to do much of anything for a while, especially with my left arm.
So, I drove us out of Cleveland....and to our first stop 2 hours away. My poor mother is that afraid of snow, and ice and traffic. Roll it all together and you have me, less than 24 hours out of a partial mastectomy driving out of Cleveland! To this day, my mom still worries about the weather when she has to go anywhere.
The removal of the drains is never a pleasant experience but the one drain had nerves that had started to grow onto the end of it's tubing because it had to stay in longer than a week. Not enough fluidhad drained from it, and on occassion when I tried to strip the fluid out of it, it was like no other pain in the world. But the worst part was when they took a drain out too soon and the underneath of my arm had to be stuck with a needle needle to quickly get the fluid out that was collecting where the lymphnodes had to be removed.
It would now be time to meet with the oncologist in Altoona that would be handling my chemotherapy.
And I would like for everyone to know that when all of this was happening, that my children were being very well taken care of by my family members. My sister Jamie @ one point stayed over, Dana helped out, mostly Gerald and Mary, my Aunt and Uncle. Everyone had my back, eight years ago. I do want to say, "thank you" for that, for being there when I needed you. Jim was taking off work to take me back and forth to appointments and some days we were just getting back in time for him to go to Pitsburgh for school. He had almost lost his job @ one point. By the time that second surgery in Cleveland happened, he had been warned. That is why it was just my mom and I. It was ok though. We really were not sure where this was going anyway were we?
This was all in January, February and March. I am pretty sure the Chemo started in March. I have tried to block most of that out. I begged my mother to never, never take me to chemo. Gerald was married to my friend Mary. Meaning that my friend was now my aunt. She and I were friends since childhood. She became my go-to person. She took me to chemo every other Thursday. The doctor was great. Dr. Chuu. The nurses were pretty good too. I didn't get attached to them like I am my current nurses. There were more of them and the chemo room was just too clinical. There was one side with a tv, and around the back of the tv was another tv, where when the first side ran out of chairs, you went to the other side and read magazines or books or listened to music if you had brought some. There was only one private room and that was rarely used. I never had chemo with the same people so I never got close with any of them, not like now.
Cytoxin, Adriamyacin and I forget. They would do blood work, send me to the doctors room, he would see me, check my counts, then escort Mary and I to the Chemo Room. After I would get settled Mary would go back out to the front waiting room and wait until my treatment was over, which was hours. She usually brought a book or some magazines too. I had a really bad first treatment. BAD. It started out with the oncology nurse putting a warm bag on my hand to bring up the blood vessels. Then they would attempt to put the IV needle in which was always excruciating too. We all know how painful an IV in your hand can be, and now that I had all of my lymphnodes removed from my left arm every IV had to go in my right hand and every needle stick had to go in my right arm along with the blood pressure cuff. If they stick me in my left arm aor do a BP there I could end up w/lymphodema which is not another problem that I need. I should wear a medical bracelet but I don't believe in cheap things that fall apart so I am gonna save up for a gold one. Or at least sterling silver. It just has to have the basics engraved. My mom got me one once but it fell apart on me.
Back to the first chemo. I had premeds to keep me from vomiting. It works for a couple hours maybe a day. Then when it hits your system you know it! Take a bad hangover by times 10. That was chemo for me. BAD. I cried and cried. I was curled up in a ball, in a fetal position and wanted to die. And I mean die. Seriously there were times I would be sitting in the bath and wondered how long it would take for my body to bleed out if I sliced my throat, or my wrists. Who would find me? Would it be better to drive my car into a large tree at 80 miles and hour, with my luck I would just end up paralyzed for the rest of my life.
For a week it was awful, awful, awful. Then, exactly one week later, I woke up with all of this energy, and wanted to go shopping. I felt normal. I was so happy but I only had one week until my next treatment. In the meantime I worked, as much as I could, I worked. Still single mom, paying all of the bills on my own, even though Jim lived with me, I did not want to rely on him. Sometimes he would purchase groceries. And that would help out.
That was when I started learning about people. You know the whole "you find out who your friends are" it is so true. Getting very tired,more to come tomorrow (I hope) I hope you stick with me.
No comments:
Post a Comment