2nd Taxol Treatment

February 23, 2015 (Monday)- Today was my 2nd Taxol treatment.  I woke up and felt great and was not in any way scared to go for treatment today.  I was still a little bit nervous but that is to be understood when you are getting a chemotherapy treatment.  We were there for 6 hours again today.  They started the Benadryl first and this time I decided to give in and rest my eyes for a while.  Then I woke up and started reading a book they had there and then watched a little bit of a movie on my Kindle and surfed the web.  About 1:00PM Jeff ran over to Crown Burgers and got us some lunch.  I decided that last time I was able to eat snacks and not feel sick so we decided to try lunch today.  I moved over to the small table and chairs they had there and we ate our lunch but I did feel a little bit guilty that we smelled up the room and hopefully we didn't make anybody else sick with the smell.  I know when I was having the AC chemo that is the last thing I wanted was to smell things.  I think next time we will stick to Subway since it doesn't really smell.  Either way it was a yummy lunch and I enjoyed it!  After lunch I was quite anxious probably because I was bored.  Jeff was working and I had no one to talk to since most people were gone by then.  I have two more long treatments left.  Kaci will be coming to the last treatment, because they are so long I thought I could have my mom bring her over for about the last hour but she got upset and said she wanted to go with us in the morning.  Jeff said he won't work that day so he can help entertain her, we will have to bring things for her to do because 6 hours is a long time and there isn't anything else to do there, nor is there anywhere to walk around.  It will be nice to have her there though and I am looking forward to it.  Kaci painted my nails hot pink today and I wore my hot pink sweats to match, we totally forgot to take pictures today but at least I am documenting my nail color.  It is so important for Kaci to paint my nails the night before.  I met with the P.A. today since my doctor was in Hawaii and discussed the terrible hot flashes I am having.  She prescribed a low dose anti-depressant that they use for breast cancer patients that cannot have hormone therapy and she said it used to help minimize the hot flashes.  I will pick up the prescription this week and she said to give it about three weeks before it kicks in.  I hate to another drug but I am hoping it helps and unfortunately I will be taking drugs from here on out when I start taking Tamoxifen which is the hormone blocker that I have to take for at least 5 years but today the P.A. told me I may need to take it as long as 10 years.  I will do whatever I need to do make sure the cancer does not come back.  She also told me that the side effects I got from the first treatment are all I should see with the last three.  She said the pain should not be any worse than it was during the first treatment but the only thing that might hang around constantly is the neuropathy in my hands and feet.  She said that this can come on stronger the further I get into my treatments and stick around for a few months after I finish my treatments and hopefully it will go away.  She said in the younger patients it does tend to subside and not be a long term effect.  Anyway this week is another surprise as to how I will feel.  Right now I am wide awake and it is probably from the steroid, in fact this evening I decided to vacuum the house since we did not get around to cleaning the house this weekend.  Tomorrow I have to leave work at 1:30 for a funeral for a family member.  She is a distant family member but someone that I have always been close with.  She was 98 years old and she was a great, great aunt but she was always my aunt Bernice.  She was the shortest person I knew and I loved her dearly.  She was always so good to our family.  In fact I had gone to the viewing of one of her daughters back in October and then her other daughter died on February 12th and she dies on February 18th.  She wasn't even able to attend her 2nd daughter’s funeral.  I am sure she died of a broken heart because when we saw her in October she said she was doing great and still lived alone in her house.  I am sure losing her daughter in October was so hard on her and then to lose another this month was too much to bear.  Here is hoping that I feel great tomorrow like I did the day after after my first treatment!

Tonight as I  got in the shower I noticed that the rash that I had on my arms and hands has disappeared.  It may have disappeared a day or two ago but I just noticed it tonight.  I was so excited to have it gone.  I have some skin peeling from where all the bumps were but the bumps and all the redness is gone.  Today was 4 weeks since my last AC treatment.