....snowy days and IV's

Today we woke up to snow. Now it's a good thing there was no school due to the 'special election' or maybe there might NOT have been...anyway I thought it would be a GREAT day to finally do some 'me' pampering. Nails/pedi. AHHH...
Got myself to the salon, but didn't feel great getting up this a.m. Just downright BLAH, but knew I had to get moving. Did my 'thing' at the salon, and thought, I need something to get me moving today. Home and called the Cancer Center. Told them I had no energy, just felt yukky...GET UP HERE, they said, so I did.
In to the power port..no blood return. This is getting crazy. My BP was 'better' than it has been, the body just isn't doing it's thing. In comes Nurse Maureen to poke me in the arm to get some blood! UGH. After all this, I should be able to handle most anything! Nurse Sue comes in with a GIGANTUOUS bag of IV fluid, or at least it looked that way to me!! Took almost two hours to drip it through. Could say I did feel a bit better although I wasn't sure I was all that dehydrated, but then again, it's been so long since I've felt really GOOD, how would I know? We headed home, voted, and I managed to get some pasta into me. Now I'm ready for BED! Want to get to work tomorrow. NEED to work, need to be productive. It's my only saving force right now.
Let's see how it goes....

..again

Yep. AGAIN. Thought it started out to be a good week. Up each morning to school, feeling 'decent', aside from this nasty cough. Wednesday, January 13, I go about my business, head to the nurse for my daily temperature reading and it's 99.6! She's concerned as she figures later in the day it will get higher. Suggests I go home and rest. Off I go..rest I do.
Woke up around 4 pm and the fever has spiked to 101.7! OH OH. knowing that in my case a temp of 100.5 is cause to hit the ER, I called the cancer center and spoke to the nurse. She advised me to get up to the ER as it could be pneumonia. Fortunately for me, when you are a 'cancer patient' you get preferential treatment. They don't take any chances when you're running a high temp. Off to chest xray; negative. ER doc comes in and wants to do a CT Scan to rule out a blood clot in my lungs. That too, came back negative, so it was determined that I had a very bad case of bronchitis. On a strong antibiotic to combat that.
My oncologist calls me tonight (Thurs) and said she was concerned about some nodules that had shown up on BOTH the CT scan's I have had in the past week. She wants to keep a close eye on them along with the radiation doctor. They will do another CT Scan in a month or so to see how it looks. She's pretty sure it has to do with the cough, so I'm not even going to worry about THAT right now!
Radiation begins on 2/1/10.

..should've read those 'vampire books'...

So here's the deal. NO ONE feels as lousy as I did for over ten days and not have it be 'part of the process'. I knew it was more. Sometimes ya just gotta take the bull by the horns and insist. Had a chest xray on Tues. 1/5. No word from the doctor on Weds. I figured if it was pneumonia, she'd call. On Thursday, 1/7, I had an appointment with radiation. The nurse taking my vitals said my BP was extremely low as was my oxygen levels. Upstairs for some IV fluids. Well...I became the human pin cushion. ME? WHO HATES NEEDLES!?? Oh yah. SO dehydrated, no one could get any blood from my 'dry veins' OR from the port! FINALLY, we get a nurse who could, and I was able to give some blood so they could do a blood gas on me. They put in four bags of IV fluid to 'perk me up'. Sent Susan home, enter Barry. Oncologist comes in and we 'discuss' my options for NOT doing the Taxol. She made me feel a LOT better about bowing out. She feels that with the radiation and the pill afterwards for 5 years, I should be good. She also said my red cell count was low and I needed to come back to the cancer center on Friday for a couple of pints of blood. No problem, I'm coming in for a CT Scan anyway.
The CT SCAN: ohmygawd. Had to drink two bottles of berium in the morning. One was bad enough. Had the second on my way into the center. NEVER made it to the garage, up it came. YUK. Just about dragged myself into the center; they grabbed a wheelchair and a bucket for me. Had CT SCAN and upstairs for my 'blood'!! Should've been a vampire!!
HOME AGAIN...on the couch. Maybe in the a.m. I will feel like a new person!!!

..oh what a week

Well, my last infusion was on December 28. By December 29, I was 'down for the count'. Couldn't get out of bed, felt like death was knocking on my door. God Bless my husband, Mother Teresa in disguise. He made me eat/drink, even though I wanted NOTHING to do with either. I passed on so many 'social events' this evening being yet another. I just can't get it together. I'm wondering about school tomorrow morning. Not sure I'm going to make it out of bed, let alone get there early.
I will just take it one day at a time. I am still battling a cold and cough, something that won't necessarily go away anytime soon with my cell count down. If I feel this way on Monday I will call the doctor. Don't want anymore overnights in the ER!
And here I thought 2010 would be my road to wellness.....