Ah...drain-free...and chemo scheduling

Drain #3 (well, technically it was #2, but it was the last one of three to come out) was finally removed today. Yay! The nurse kept acting weird and I finally asked her what the problem was and she said she was concerned we might be taking it out prematurely. I asked her why she thought that since she has been telling me for a week that once it's been putting out less than 30 cc per 24 hours it would be ready to come out and it's been under that threshold for 3 days now and she explained that once it's out there's no going back and that the only other way to get the fluid out if it accumulates is needle aspiration. I wanted to say "so what?" since I've been poked and prodded constantly for weeks now (not to mention spending 5+ months getting weekly needle injections during my bed rest/pregnancy) but she explained that since I have the tissue expanders in my chest there's a risk of puncturing them when needle aspiration is performed and if THAT happens I'd have to have another surgery to get them out. At that point I fantasized about looking her in the eye and telling her I hoped that would happen because I'm not too thrilled with these expanders - they hurt and yet they haven't even been inflated yet - they feel awful and I know it'll feel even worse when they start pumping them up to stretch my skin...at this point I'd love an excuse to say take them out and let me have small B cups - I'd be happy with that. I just kept quiet though - I don't know why, maybe it's because I was too wrapped up in the anticipation of the icky feeling of having the drain tube removed - it's like they're pulling your guts out. As soon as it came out, I started leaking! That didn't happen when the other two drains came out and the nurse was worried and started sopping it up with gauze. I reminded her that the threshold meant there's still fluid - that the other ones were removed when the same amount of daily output was occurring. She didn't seem to care. She gave me a bag of fresh gauze and tape to take home with instructions to keep it dry and clean and sent us on our way. I'm so glad I'm free of the ace bandages that were wrapped around my breasts and my waist 24/7. The breast area was wrapped to keep the drain tube close to the incision and my body and my waist was wrapped with an ace to use as a hidden pocket to tote the drain bulb around without having to wear a jacket or sweatshirt with a pocket and risk Cooper seeing the tube and pulling on it. It was uncomfortable, to say the least. As soon as those came off - even before the drain was removed - I felt better, free. In the morning I go to the hospital for an out-patient surgical installation of a port-a-cath in preparation to start chemo soon. It will take up more than half of my day. I will be so glad when that is over with and hope it won't irritate me all the time. ;/ I have my pre-chemo meeting at the local UCLA cancer center on the 7th - to go over how the chemo will be administered, how it could affect me, what preemptive medications I'll be given to combat common side effects, etc. Then, the following week I'll receive my first treatment. Before I start the chemo I am going to schedule a family photo shoot to mark Cooper's one-year birthday so the pics can be taken before I lose my hair. ;/ Gah! ;/ I don't care much about my messed up boobs or losing my hair, but I don't want to ruin happy Cooper milestone memories with cancer-related issues/reminders if I can avoid it. Hey cancer, you're really crimping my style - I hope you're scared as hell because I'm gonna blast you into oblivion!

Gearing up for phase two

This past week of healing from the surgery has been good - have needed the pain and muscle relaxer medications only once per day, if that (I'm still sore and get tinges of sharp pain in some spots, numbness and tingling in others but compared with the first week it's a huge difference). I am still not cleared to pick up Cooper or to drive so I'm incredibly grateful that my mom, Janet, is here to help out. She's amazing and Cooper adores her. She's able to be here because of an amazing program at her employer where employees can donate unused vacation time (that they may otherwise "lose" if not taken by a certain date) to a bank of hours that employees in need can apply to receive for emergency situations. When my mom's boss heard about my diagnosis and that my mom needed/wanted to come out here to help me through this, he immediately submitted a request to get her a bunch of paid time off since he knew she'd exhausted her earned vacation time for the current year. It's an awesome program for which she and I are both very grateful. Anyway, I have one drain remaining on the side where I had numerous lymph nodes removed, but I feel fairly confident that I can have it removed Monday if we make the trek down to UCLA - and I think we will do that since the incision where the drain comes out is really bothering me - no sense in waiting til my Wednesday appointment down there if it's ready to come out. I also would like to have it be gone when I go in Tuesday morning to have a port-a-cath installed in my chest (another surgical procedure) - I'm sure the radiologist placing it would want it out before the port placement too. Anyway, it's something I'm NOT really looking forward to but has to be done. I just don't like the idea of having some hard plastic thing under my skin which can be seen and felt 24/7. I realize that the functionality of it will be of great benefit to me in that my chemo treatments will be easily administered without destroying the veins in the one arm I can be injected into, particularly since I'll be undergoing 8 cycles of chemo. It can also be used for blood draws which will occur before every treatment plus sometimes in between treatments. Still, the idea of this thing creeps me out. I have to ask the plastic surgeon or his staff tomorrow whether it's even OK to have it installed in my chest since I have the booby tissue expanders in. I think the other location option is in my arm - I'm not sure which would be worse to be honest. Besides getting the drain out, I have two other phase 2 tasks to accomplish Monday - call the oncologist to schedule my first treatment, and attend a support group. I am definitely planning to make that call. The support group I'm not totally sure about quite yet. Here's the thing - the group is for people that are "in treatment". It's not focused on a particular type of cancer, or those in a particular stage of illness, and thus I could find myself surrounded by reminders of what my disease could turn into rather than focusing on what it is now and the hope that it won't go further. I know there's value in connecting with others that have/had cancer - that's why I signed up with the organization in order to participate in their groups and services - but I think I am going to look for a breast cancer specific group (this organization doesn't offer one right now) that I can attend instead so that there is at least that aspect of commonality instead of walking into a group of all types, all stages, all everything. I just really need to channel my mental energy into positive, hopeful and determined states of thinking and that is challenging enough without being confronted with what I imagine I might find if I go to this group. There, I made up my mind. haha. Instead of going to that group I will look for a different one. I also need to look for a different therapist - the one I went to on Thursday was....well, let's just say she's not for me. I'm fairly savvy in the area of individual therapy and I know what works for me and what doesn't so I need to make some calls to see who else is nearby that might be a better fit. I haven't been getting the amount of sleep needed for a healthy individual, let alone a person like myself battling cancer and in need of a boost in immunity, so I'm taking steps to address that problem. We resumed Ferber training with Cooper this weekend and I'm thrilled that it's been quite successful and not at all painful as our last attempt was. I actually managed to eek out 10 hours of sleep last night - broken into 3 different "sections" with just minimal interruption time and that was amazing - that's the most sleep I've had in one 24 hour period in over a year! I had to help myself a bit by taking some diphenhydramine but it worked which is great because I really don't want to take prescription sleep pills since I do need to be responsive if Cooper does wake up. Anyway, I think the sleep issue is finally being worked out now that we've got Cooper doing much better (just 1-2 wakings per night compared with being up every 2 hours all night long before). That's good news :) Speaking of sleep....it's time to do just that. Good night!

A new day and another big day ahead

Today was a new day. A much better day than yesterday. Tomorrow will be even better since the drains that dangle from my breasts and which I have been toting around for a week now will finally be removed. They're so incredibly annoying (and gross) - I have to wear a robe with pockets to keep them from pulling out of my body and they itch where they come out and sometimes it burns too. I'm pretty sure the tightening and aching I feel in my chest is the drains too because the pain is originating from the drain holes and not the surgical incisions. Even if the drain removal doesn't eliminate the pain that remains, I'll be thrilled to have them be gone so I can trade in my robe and chest bandaging for a shirt instead. The bandages smell now that they've been on me for a week, and are falling apart too. Doc said I could take it off as long as I keep the drain holes dry and clean but that sounded like a challenge I might not be able to manage effectively so I've opted for the smelly bandage LOL. Thankfully it goes tomorrow morning. :) So, first thing in the morning I'll be at UCLA with mom in tow, having my bandages removed, the drains removed, and getting a refill prescription for the pain meds from the plastic surgeon, Dr.Crisera. After that, we meet with the cancer surgeon, Dr.Chang, to review the pathology (which we already know about), to get instructions for caring for my left arm which is at risk for lymphedema now, get a prescription for a compression sleeve for my arm for traveling or days with lots of activity to protect the arm, and a prescription for physical therapy which I know I will need a good deal of since I have numbing and other weird sensations in both arms ever since the surgery. Once we're done at UCLA, mom and I will head to the store to pick up a couple of new bras for me to use temporarily while my amputated breasts are in their pre-inflated stage (in 2 weeks they'll start pumping up the expanders to stretch my skin in preparation for implants that will be placed later on) since none of my bras will provide any support or smoothing under clothing since all of my breast tissue and both nipples were removed in the surgery. I'm not completely flat since the expanders are in there. I'm not at all freaked out about the strange appearance of my breasts (they really do look like amputated limbs too - very strange) - I was never really attached to them before and in a strange way it'll be kind of neat to see what it's like to be small in that department for a while. Don't tell Bob, but if I find myself enjoying being on the small side I might just put in a request for smaller breasts when it's time to resume reconstruction. I've always been large in that area - so much so that I had them reduced/lifted just 5 years ago because I found them to be such an annoyance and I've always dreamt about having small perky ones so I could occasionally go braless - well I guess my chance for that is here now haha. Anyway, I've had a few visitors today which was great. My friend, Tara, brought her friend, Candy, by to talk to me - she's a breast cancer survivor of over 15 years. I love hearing survivor stories :) She was so sweet and offered for me to call her any time. Thank you, Candy and Tara! For dinner we had my friend, Kristy, and her adorable daughter, Addie, over. We had so much fun watching Addie & Cooper play as they usually do. "Cooper & Addison Olsen" sounds wonderful, doesn't it? haha! Then, our sweet friend and neighbor, Sarah, stopped by too to chat about her availability to help out with Cooper on occasion (she's a nanny/sitter). I'm so incredibly blessed and grateful for everyone's friendship and support. I couldn't ask for a better support network of friends and family to be by my side throughout this journey. Thank you so much for being here for me! So...I march onward toward another new day which I know will be just as great as today, but likely even better - at least in the physical healing department which is key right now so that I can quickly move on to the next step in the cancer ass kicking mission. Thanks, everyone, for your support and prayers. Please keep it coming - you're helping me so very much and I'm so grateful. Love, Julie PS - Cancer, I have more friends than you do - so there!