WEEK 15 & 16: Helpers Come to My Rescue! More Hair Hits the Road.

Two days after Chemo #2 was my birthday, May 8th (Thanks to you all who sent happy birthday messages!), and the day after that was Mother's Day. Hmmmmm... not heavily celebrated events with me feeling a little yucky. But the evening of Mother's day was good anyway, because Tasha, Jake and their two little munchkins, Dalyn & Braelyn came up for the week! Yay! Even when I'm not feeling great, it's so fun to have some family around (especially grandkids!). I have quite a bit of landscaping in my yard that requires a lot of trimming and leaf blowing, and since I was starting to stress a bit on getting that done this spring, Tasha came up to do some slave labor, and do my trimming. Thanks a ton, Tash!

Then to make the week even better, Collin and Tiffany and their little cutie, Landon, came Thursday night to spend a long weekend. Collin got to help Tasha out a little bit with some of the yardwork. Even better, Tasha & Jake cleaned out my pantry and a few of my cupboards that were badly in need. They ended up throwing out quite a bit a past-dated food. That's what happens when your pantry gets too full! Old stuff hides in the back!

Another thing Tasha did for me was to give me a very short buzz job. A little traumatic, but shedding all over my clothes and into everything else was getting annoying, and I just figured it was time. Tasha got the honors (?) and Jake took pictures of the experience.

Pretty gross looking, huh?

This picture is one of the first photos taken with my new wig, since I wore it to church for the first time the next Sunday. This is me with cute little Landon (and Dalyn hiding in there too.).

Effects of Chemo #2 were a bit more severe as far as bone pain goes. I found that Ibuprofen does help some. I threw up one time, my first time doing that after Chemo. I guess once isn't bad, but I literally don't get the flu, so I never throw up, making it a very weird experience. Overall, the effects of Chemo #2 were pretty similar to Chemo #1. Not the funnest thing in the world, but definitely survivable.

WEEK 14: Chemo #2 & The "Joys" of Hair Loss

On Thursday, May 6th, I went to Rexburg for Chemo #2. Back to Kylie's Fun Room! Same routine - inserting a needle into the port in my chest - and then pumping in all of the toxic chemicals. It takes almost 5 hours from start to finish. My dear, sweet, youngest son Chase drove up from Provo, Utah to hang out with me for the day. Part of the time he helped me with this blog. At that point in time I had barely gotten it going. Chase has been my technical support and "editor" on the blog. Thanks, Chase - couldn't have done it without you! Sometimes when I get to worrying that I'm too wordy or boring, he reminds me that I am doing this for me, not for any crazy soul who should decide to read it. He's right. This blog is sort of cathartic for me, and will always act as my record of the experience. So, sorry if I'm too wordy or boring, but OH WELL!

One of the big trauma's of Chemo is losing the hair. I had many friends tell me that they would wake up in the morning to big piles of hair on their pillow. Most reports say it happens 1 to 3 weeks after the first treatment. I would wake up every morning slightly paranoid, sit up, and look down at my pillow with great trepidation. Never happened. My experience was more like Laurie's; the shower was where most of the hair loss occurred. A few weeks after my first Chemo, washing my hair would leave my hands all covered with hair. But brushing out my wet hair - ouch! - that's where it really came out in globs. When I was in Provo with my friends for Women's Conference, it got pretty bad. Thanks to my paranoia, I had been packing scarfs and bandannas every time I went out of town since my first Chemo. I had some at Women's Conference. Though my hair was definitely thinning, RaeAnn & Lori didn't think I needed to resort to the scarves yet. But this picture shows the hair loss from one shower that weekend.

After the trauma of having the surgery on my incision the day after Women's Conf- erence, my sweet sister Barb, who came to hold my hand through the event, took me home to her house in Bountiful for the night. She told me there was absolutely no way I was riding the bus home. The next day she drove me home to Dillon. That just so happened to be her husband Steve's birthday. I told Steve, "Now we know who's more important around here!" Thanks so much, Barb! Sorry, Steve. I hope Barb threw you a good birthday party when she got home! (Of course when we get to be our age, birthdays aren't such a big deal anymore, are they?)

Barb spent the night at my house that night. While there, I had her go ahead and chop most of the length off of my hair. Shedding 8" strands of hair all over my clothes was starting to get old. Every time I would hold one of my grand-babies, they would come away with a hand full of hair. Yuck! I was getting grossly thin on top, and on the sides, but baseball caps worked good cause I still looked like I had thick hair poking out the bottom of my baseball cap. But I was ready with my scarves and wig when the cap no longer did the job. (Don't you love my "wig-stand"? It's a glass pitcher with a balloon taped on top. I was too cheap to pay $15 for a styrofoam one.)