Weekly bloodwork

I went for my weekly bloodwork today. White count was actually on the high side (from Neulasta) and my red count was still low, but up 1 point from last week. They also took blood for an iron panel. If my red count is still low next week, I may need an injection of Procrit.

A hairy thought: I'm finding I'm wearing bandannas with a cap far more than the wig! Which is exactly what I've read and heard everyone ends up doing. Taking a shower is a snap....I spend far less time in there now. I imagine my water bill will be lower! But I still can't wait to grow my hair back. :-)

Story time

So I went to the library to find something new to read....I get tired of reading about breast cancer all the time....I decided on a non-fiction book about food-- figures! Author Barbara Kingsolver moved her family from Tucson to southern Appalachia to live off the land. I actually think it's a great idea. Maybe I'd pick a different location, but the idea of getting back to a simpler life is appealing. As long as I could have a satellite dish to watch the Steelers, I'd be good to go!

I also picked up "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan," about two women in 19th century China. We'll see which book holds my short attention span the longest!

I'm waiting for the weather to cool off....I want to start taking my dogs to the dog park again and want to do some work in the backyard....it's a jungle out there! I have to be careful about insect bites and cuts and scratches, but I'll take the necessary precautions. Ciao for now!

Oh, I almost forgot....happy birthday Becky! xoxoxo

Ho hum

Nothing new to report....I'm feeling pretty good finally. Hope you are all well. Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Thanks, Joe!

A big shout out to my brother Joe for shaving his head as a show of solidarity for his sister! Woo Hoo!! Okay, what about the rest of you???? ;-)

Weekly blood count results

White blood count good today, red count kinda low, but not low enough to warrant a booster shot. I guess that helps explain the extra-tiredness I've been feeling! Maybe I need to eat a steak or something. Sigh.

My Faux 'Do

My niece Chrissy wants to know what kind of new hairdo I selected. I picked out a short layered one that is similar to the last haircut. I guess I would call the color a medium auburn. Yep, I'm a somewhat fiery redhead! It's cute, but I miss my own hair!

Rainy day

We've had a lot of rain the last couple of days. We needed the rain and the temp has been below 90 degrees. :)

I'm feeling much better. I thought my weekly blood work was today, but it's tomorrow...chemo brain! At least that's my excuse for every time I forget something. Cheers all.

Not so tired today!

I'm feeling better today and thank goodness, because I'm completely out of dog and cat food and the natives are getting restless!

Another tired day

Pretty tired again today. Watched the first half of the Steelers-Bills game, crawled into bed at halftime planning on watching the rest and found I couldn't keep my eyes open! Eventually turned off the game because I kept falling asleep. I don't think I'll run around shopping after my next treatment....pretty sure that's what did me in this time!

I'm glad the Steelers won, but they were wearing these old-time "throwback" uniforms to commemorate the franchise's 75th season. The colors looked like brown and gold instead of black and gold, so to sum up my impression in one word: U-G-L-Y. Will they be wearing these for every home game this season??

Sleeping Marathon

Wow, I could sleep nonstop today. Just got up to have some soup. I don't feel queasy, but I'm definitely not up for much more than soup right now. I imagine I'll feel a lot better tomorrow. :-)

Okay, now I'm tired.

Took a nap after running around a bit this afternoon. And my dogs were incredibly annoying the entire time Maxine was here! They are still doing their best to annoy me. Sigh.

Happy Friday!

I'm feeling pretty good today. I slept well last night. Maxine and I are going to do a little window shopping and she'll head back home later this afternoon. I'm sure I'll be ready for a nap after shopping! Hope you are all well. xoxoxo

Chugging along

I went for the Neulasta shot and IV fluids today. I feel a little spaced out and tired, which is about the same as last time. Took a little nap this evening. Other than that, nothing new to report. :-)

Round Two

I had my second treatment today and all is well (so far). My doctor was very pleased with how well I did the first time around. She said usually the side effects are worse after the first treatment because it's such a shock to your body. So I feel blessed to have done so well!

Maxine was great company and we chatted up the nurses and the woman sitting next to me. After I was done we went to eat and went to a few stores. Kinda tired, but I won't nap so I can sleep well tonight.

Your prayers are helping tremendously....thank you!!

My New Look

So, okay, I'm a little freaked out about the no hair thing. I have to tell you, not a good look for me. It was a relief to get it done because the hair falling out in little chunks was also freaking me out. So I traded one freak scenario for another one.

Enough about the hair.....my next treatment is Wednesday. Family friend Maxine is coming down from the Villages to babysit. :) I told her to bring lots of stuff to read.

Alrighty then!

Ceremonial head shaving to commence at 1300 hours on Monday, the 10th of September. The salon is closed and Christine graciously offered to do it then.

Pittsburgh Steelers 34 Cleveland Browns 7
:-)

Hair There and Everywhere!

What a mess! The first clumps fell out today. Time to shave it! It's very disconcerting watching it fall out, but even more icky is the blooming mess it's making. No cooking or baking until it's all gone. I've always shed more hair than most people, but at this point I'm shedding hair more than my cat and 2 dogs put together! Yikes.

Think I'll put on my Steelers cap and go to the store. Game at 1:00p.m. GO STEELERS!!

BC Support Group

Yesterday I went to the breast cancer support group that meets the first Thursday of the month at the hospital near me. Very nice, upbeat group of women...we decided to form a team for the American Cancer Society's "Making Strides" walk at the end of October in Daytona Beach. It's supposed to be a very nice event. I'm planning on walking. We chose "The Booby Brigade" as our team name, tee hee. Try to say that 3 times fast....Yup. :)

Hair Today....

....gone tomorrow? Hmmm....think so....it's starting to thin kinda quickly. And it hurts! How weird is that? When I got my hair cut last week, Christine gave me a shampoo, conditioner and scalp treatment to try for thinning hair. It's made by Bain de Terre and I used it for the first time today. I'm afraid to even comb it now, sigh.

Good blood count and genetic testing results...

My blood work is good. My oncologist's nurse, Marty, called this morning to tell me I don't have the mutations for the breast cancer genes. Yahoo! I'll get a copy of the report next week and I'm sure I'll have questions for them. I'll post about this again once I have more info.

Gonna go take a nap....have a headache that won't go away....grrr.

Slow news day....

Nothing new here (I guess that's good!). Tomorrow afternoon I get blood drawn to check my WBC. I'm still feeling pretty good! God bless.

Friends

I finally spent the 2 seconds it took to look up and change the time zone on my blog. Much better!

One thing about contracting a crappy disease is that you start thinking about all the relationships in your life and you wonder why you let so many slightly fade or fade altogether. I'm hearing from folks I haven't kept in touch with very well and finding a new appreciation for all the people in my life. Something like this forces you to put things in their proper perspective and that's a good thing! And you find out what's going on in other people's lives and learn specifically how to pray for them and their families.

I found a new church home (again, it took something like this to finally get serious finding one). It's a small church I've visited a few times in the past and it's practically right around the corner from where I live. I've been attending the women's weekly Bible study and Sunday worship services. I've already met some great people and it's a great opportunity to serve others.

BBQ later today at my bro's house. Have a good holiday everyone! xoxoxo

I'm published!

I've been doing some freelance writing for Florida Hospital Fish Memorial in Orange City. I wrote an essay about breast cancer screening which appears in the September issue of Women's Lifestyle, a local publication. Yay!

Keeping busy....

Linda came over today and cleaned and we moved the furniture around in the bigger guest bedroom. I like it much better this way. I spent most of the day doing laundry. I got behind because my dryer vent needed cleaned. Got that done Thursday. It was pretty clogged, lol. Down here most of the homes have the vents going out through the roof so you have to get a chimney sweep service to clean it. Apparently this should be done every year and a half or so. At least now it doesn't take 3 hours to dry a load of towels! ;-)

I made chicken pastina soup today, too. Actually, it's not pastina but orzo. It's nearly impossible to find pastina in central FL. I have to say it smelled really good while it was simmering! I'm letting it cool and will have some tomorrow. Kinda late for it now.

You really needed to know all this didn't you? I promise if I've got nothing real exciting going on, I'll refrain from posting that day. LOL.