Almost Stage 3

9 more "radiates"--then I will glow for good

Ok whoever said radiation is a cakewalk is a big fat liar!!  It burns like hell and scars some people for life. I have had 24 full breast and underarm radiation sessions.  If you are told to do this ask about your lymph nodes.  Are they are being targeted as well? Since the cancer had spread to my lymph nodes, I wanted to know--I also was told by my lymphedema specialist that radiation there would make my lymphedema worse. So I was more than interested. Now I have 9 "boost" sessions where just the tumor site is radiated.  Every morning it's the same gig for 6 weeks and every Monday it's meeting with the doctor time.  They have given me the same gel strips used for burn victims. They are about 2 by 2 and you peel them off the backing and apply to your wounds. Are we having fun yet?  Tonight is a party for my BFF Candace Jordan celebrating her Chicago magazine article.  Being picked up by my dear friend Paul and John and Samantha are coming too. It's these times that help make one forget the days--work helps too even if it can be trying.  For those going thru this--keep up your normal life as MUCH as you can--if you can call my life normal at all! 

BFF Candace and me when I had hair :-(

Radiation Burns Like Hell!!

Ok 3rd week of radiation and my half a boob is burned and red....hey what do fair skinned people do when they are radiated 34 days in a row?  I heard my poor mother suffered the same fate. My sister accompanied her to radiation 23 years ago--she got burned--endured....and died anyway.  All I can say is thank God for those in the radiation waiting area who share experiences and ideas and remedies (drink Golden Seal tea, said one wisened African American lady of advanced years).  The people I deal with in this department at Rush University Medical Center are very nice and helpful--and mostly ON TIME which is miraculous in the medical community--but they can't stop the pain that one endures during any of these treatments.  So home tonight--using the cream that is supposed to make this less painful and hope the discoloration isn't permanent because being bald is about as much disfigurement as i can handle at the moment!!  :-) 

 

Radiation Starts--oh Good Times

Well a cakewalk compared with chemo but still a pain in the tushie.  First off, it is NOT without unpleasantness--it's just that after chemo it's more like a little tap on the arm than the poke in the eye with a stick which is chemo!

However, the people handling my radiation at Rush University Medical Center are as different as night and day to the chemo area--the chemo area there is a dark, dank place where everyone is very brusk and wields a lot of needles!

The radiation people seem to...well.....radiate! So six straight weeks of this every day at 9:45am! Hope I don't start glowing....  :-) 

It's all about the LOVE!  

Final Chemo Round Still No Picnic!

Great story--way back when I was athletic I went to rent skis in Aspen and the dude asked me "height and weight"? uhhhhhh, "why do you need that?" I asked--"well if I give you the wrong skis for your height and weight you could actually crash and die!"  So I contemplated that-- then shaved 20 lbs off!!  Hey it would have to be life or death for most women to give their real weight to a stranger--but chemo--well that's the one that counts.  Your dose is based on your size, current toxicity levels, blood counts, etc and yes indeed you can die if it's wrong so I had to bite the bullet.  I am grateful this was my last round on Tuesday and only can pray I will never have to repeat--radiation is next then 5 years on drug therapy.  But most crucially the journey has just begun--now that I am in charge totally (because what I have learned is that no one else is believe me)-I have to actually devote the next year to doctor's checkups and demand the tests I feel I need in addition to those they may assign me. I also plan to go to the renowned Dana Farber Institute sometime in late summer to have a total checkup and "second opinion" about my treatment thus far.  Vigilance is key--I will be tired and hairless for a few more months but hope to be back to the same old annoyng Rhonda by spring.  Love to you all and thanks for the support. I will keep all posted as I continue to share what I learn as I go.  With my sister at Xmas sans wig!

I thought cancer was bad until I got lymphadema!

Yes, this is the most hideous of all side effects if you ask me!!  (who did?) When you have damaged lymph nodes, or you have them removed, very common with a diagnosis of cancer, your lymphatic system is immediately put on HAYWIRE status...lymphatic fluid doesn't get drained properly and swelling occurs in the affected area--in my case the left chest wall and arm all the way down to the hand.  Much of mine is due to the scar tissue that formed from the removal of 21 lymph nodes! So it now looks like I have a Mickey Mouse glove on sometimes and boy that's so fun when you are also bald!  Anyway, there a few specialists in this arena and that's sad because you need to see them so often!  If anyone is suffering from this the best place to go is LANA--Lymphatic Association of North America and

 http://www.lymphnet.org/usefulLinks/usefulLinks.htm

You Think You Have Bad Hair Days!

So come to find out I should have clearly been given the option of full or partial mastectomy by my surgeon and yet I never was!  This could cause a problem--he'd better hope it doesn't reoccur on the right breast I think--why are WE not given the right to choose what's good for our lives?  And just when you think you couldn't look worse you find out 85% of chemo patients GAIN weight because for 3 weeks of the month they have an appetite but are too fatigued to exercise--and you are now bald--whoo-hoo sick, fat and bald--can't beat that combo to feel tip-top!  Everyone have a great Thanksgiving. Today was second round of chemo--I am halfway home!

  Me getting ready for the wig festival!

  Visit with the Greenbaums cheered me up!

It's Exhausting!!

What I want to share is the pure exhaustion you feel the subsequent weeks after treatment.  This is probably why they give it to you every third week--so you can recover. It feels exactly like what it is--your cells are dying and with that hopefully, the cancer. I am trying to walk through the tiredness when possible.  John and I go to East Bank Club and one thing you can do for yourself is to build muscle.  When you have lymphadema, as I do, then you need to be careful to NOT overdo on the side of the lymph node removal.  I am stressing all the complications because if this had been caught in Stage One as it should have been the further problems of chemo and lymphadema would NOT have occurred.  And therein lies the message. Ladies, regular screening mammograms are NOT enough and YOU control them do not let your doctor bully you into thinking those are ok.  Maybe for very small-breasted women between 35 and 50 but I would submit to you FIGHT for a better mammogram. Insurance companies do NOT want you to have them--but fight for them--especially if you have any gut feelings, close family members with it, early menses, late live first childbirth, dense breasts etc.  Let's stop letting insurance companies run our lives!!! Although I have to commend mine--Blue Cross has been fabulous through this!  

Loyalty Like No Other!

So support, comments all from family, friends and colleagues are like doses of vitamins to fight this thing--you never realize how much you need it until you get it--and then it helps you sail through.  Well, SAIL might be pushing it--so chemo treatment people promised me a lovely 3-5 day EXTRAVAGANZA of feeling like shit and I could check each item off one by one starting Thursday Nov. 5th--right through to today the 10th when I am just barely walking--but did make it up the 3 flights to office to have great morning meetings with my staff--the miracle workers getting me through this--then comes in the accountant, personal trainer for staff and lunch (not feelin' it!) but it's great to see all after first hideous round. Even though I am told each round will be worse--now I know what to expect and how supportive people around me are--John, Antonia my housekeeper that if I could I would marry-and countless others--but with 5 dogs only 2 seem to really sense an illness-trying to nuzzle the cancer out of my breast SINCE I found the lump!  No lie!  But my bulldog is beyond loyal--he has NOT left my side-not once even to eat the whole weekend I was in bed in a ball of agony.  I finally took this shot of us myself. He saved me. Thanks Tyrone.