Chemo - Round One

Facebook post from September 27, 2010 at 12:18am
"Chemo. All the cool moms are doing it!
Feeling so very blessed for wonderful friends who will watch my kids, clean my house and feed my family during all this! I love you all!"

My first chemo treatment was Monday, September 27, 2010. I decided on Monday as my treatment day after learning that days 2-5 would probably be my worst, but that I would start feeling better after that. With 2 of my 3 kids in school all day, I wanted to try to have my worst days when they were out of the house at school, and hopefully be feeling better by the weekend when they were home. I was trying to minimize their exposure to what I knew was going to be a rough few months for us all.

I bought a pink duffel bag (very appropriate, right?) to bring to chemo each time, and in it I had my favorite green blanket, a book to read, and thank you cards that I was behind on. Michael accompanied me to the first treatment (I was only allowed to have one guest at a time in the infusion center). After a long wait in the waiting room (which unfortunately happened every time I had treatment), I met my nurse Kathy and we got started. I would get the Taxotere first, followed by the Adriamycin (which would be hand administered), and finally the Cytoxan. Along with beginning my premeds the day before (anti-nausea and a steroid to keep infection at bay), I had numbed the skin around my port with the Lidocane cream I was prescribed before arriving. I was shocked at how easy it was to hook me up to the IV and infusion pump – seriously straight out of a science fiction movie! After getting some IV fluids and taking more anti-nausea medication, I was all set to start the Taxotere. Kathy sat with me during the administration, as some patients can have a strong reaction to it. Fortunately, I handled it ok. But I had to pee so many times because of all the fluid! Thank goodness the infusion pump was on wheels.

Up next was the Adriamycin. Also known as the “Red Devil,” Kathy hand administered this drug to me from 2 large syringes. It was red, and it smelled gross. I was also asked to have something cold in my mouth while I was receiving the drug to keep from getting mouth sores, so Michael had gotten me a pina colada slushy from the machine in the patient snack room. My body handled this one ok as well, but on what seemed like my 100th trip to the restroom, I was greeted with the signature red urine in the toilet. It wasn’t blood, just the dye in the medicine. It made my pee look like strawberry lemonade!



The last drug was Cytoxan. I had some sinus pressure and discomfort during the administration, but it wasn’t too bad. I even slept for a little while.

Michael and I had lunch together that he brought in from the cafeteria. Although there was a TV at my station, we didn’t watch it. We just talked quietly and took it all in. It was suddenly all very real. Looking around the center, I was the youngest person there by at least 30 years.

My appointment was at 9:30 am, and we didn’t leave the infusion center until after 3pm. It was a long day and we were both exhausted and apprehensive about what the next few days would entail.

Facebook Post from September 27, 2010 at 5:53pm
Home from chemo and resting (or trying to!) Everything went great. Now we wait to see how my body takes it. But I have cleared Target out of all possible remedies, so I am prepared for anything!! Thank you all so much for the messages, texts, love and support. Check your boobies, girls!

The Port Is In

Facebook post from September 19, 2010 at 7:48am
"Day 2 of the required trailer trash bath and it's already getting old. Can't wait til Wednesday! (the iv port I had put it can't get wet for FIVE days, thus the no showering. With all these tests and implanted items, I swear I am turning into Jason Bourne. Do you suppose my chemo info session will have a segment on combat and international spies?)"

Be Prepared!

With the date of my first chemo set for Monday, September 27th, there was a lot to do to get prepared.

My Port:
I had my port put in a couple weeks before chemo started, and it was a relatively simple surgical procedure, and I was in and out of the surgical center in a few hours. The operating room was the most hideous shade of green, and when I commented on the color, the scrub nurses told me it was a color chosen by one of the doctors on staff and they hated it as well. (When I say aweful, I mean AWEFUL! Think army green gone wrong. On all the walls!) Because they used twilight anesthesia, I was not completely asleep during the procedure. It was certainly a little weird to be slightly awake during the surgery! Not being completely under anesthesia also resulted in me asking some random and slurred: “Do you do these surgeries often?” is one I remember asking. How embarrassing! Although I’m sure they have heard worse. The recovery was easy, but I barely survived the 5 days of no showering. It was a trailer-trash bath for me until I could get the surgical sight wet. But it was all worth it in the end to make chemo just a little bit easier.

Chemo Info Session:
Michael and Ashley came with me to tour the chemotherapy wing of the hospital and learn all about what to expect from the drugs. I was impressed with the facility – it was so new, clean and relatively private. My nurse, Cathy (who would become a favorite over the next few months) gave us the tour and then shared all the specifics. Most of what she told us I already knew and had been told by my oncologist. But it was helpful to hear it again, and it made me feel like even though I was one of the many patients who would receive treatment there, I was important. We disussed what to expect on treatment days, when I would feel the worst, when I would feel better, which medicines to take and which to avoid, ways to stay healthy, wigs and hats, etc. An interesting bit of info I got during the session was shared with Mike and I after Ashley had left early. Nurse Cathy looked at both of us and said “It is ok to be intimate while undergoing chemotherapy. You will just need to use protection.” Thinking she was referring to me, I told her that I had an IUD and we should be fine. She then said “No. He (pointing to Michael) will need to use protection – from you.” Who knew?

The House:
Not knowing how chemo was going to affect me and having the fear that I would, in an extreme case, be incapacitated for the next 4 months, I began to get things organized around the house. I stocked up on things for my kids, bought comfy clothes for myself (who wants to wear jeans to chemo?), and gathered every chick flick I owned in my bedroom so I would have something to watch if I ended up confined to my bed for a while. I filled up soap dispensers and had hand sanitizer all over the house to help keep germs away. I even convinced Michael that putting a small refrigerator in our bedroom would be very helpful during the chemo months. We picked up a stainless steel one from Sam’s Club and stocked it with water bottles, juice boxes and chocolate milk boxes for Norah (she would be home with me every day and was still in her “must have chocolate milk” phase). I also created a medicine basket next to my bed containing EVERY remedy known to mankind that I could possibly need: Tylenol, Motrin, anti-diarrhea, stool softeners, Pepto-Bismol, heartburn relief, mouth spray, nasal spray, Claritin, Benadryl, etc. If Target sold it, I bought it!

Priesthood Blessings:
Whenever I am faced with a difficult situation, a trial or challenge in my life, I have often requested a priesthood blessing for direction and comfort. Facing cancer was no exception. I had Michael give me a blessing during that first week of craziness, and I was also fortunate enough to receive a blessing from a visiting member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. What a privilege that was for me, and while I will not share the details of the blessing here, I will say that he blessed that my doctors would know how to heal me and I would live a long and healthy life with my family. My faith in my Savior and in the promises given in those blessings truly sustained me throughout this ordeal.

Breast Cancer Blankie

The kids and I snuggling under what is affectionately known as "the breast cancer blankie," a gift from my sweet neighbor Maggie.

"Mom, Are You Going to Die?" My Kids and Cancer

Facebook Post from September 16, 2010 at 11:58pm
Best part of my day: While in line at IKEA for an ice cream, Norah looks at me, and using her deep voice (think "It's so fluffy" from Despicable Me) and says "I love you so much. I just love you." Not sure if it was ice cream inspired, but I'll take what I can get! Sweetest girl EVER!

The instant I knew I had cancer, my first thought wasn’t about myself, my husband or how we would get through it. My first thoughts were about my kids. How will they react when they find out? Is this experience going to change our family? Will their life be divided into the time before mom had cancer and the time after? Will they look at me differently?

Ryan, then 9, is an extremely observant kid, and he knew something was going on due to the amount of time I had been on the phone, the hushed conversations, the tears and amount of doctor visits I was going to. I am sure the girls (Stella, 6, and Norah 3) felt the tension but they didn’t say anything to me. Even though I was convinced that I had cancer before I was officially diagnosed, I didn’t want to tell the kids until we knew for sure.

I knew the kids had heard me speak about cancer before – my sweet grandma Shirley passed away after battling ovarian cancer in 2008, and my friend Ashley lost her mom Jamie to pancreatic cancer in 2009. They knew both of these strong, wonderful women, and they knew that cancer had cut their lives short. I was afraid of what the word CANCER would mean to them.

After it was official, we decided to tell them. I explained that the doctor found something in my chest that shouldn’t be there, and that in order to make it go away, I would have to take some medicine that will make me sick, and eventually have surgery. Ryan asked “Do you have cancer?” His next question was “Mom, are you going to die?”

I felt incredibly blessed to be able to answer his second question NO. I told him that while I would get sick and lose my hair, and this next year would be difficult for us all, I would be just fine in the end. Once I told them that I would be ok, the rest just didn’t matter to them. That was all they needed to know. Kids are incredibly resilient, and my children amazed me time and time again with their strength, faith and incredible love.

In an effort to help them understand a bit about what was going to happen, I decided to rent a few books at the library about moms who have cancer and how their families cope with it. While I was grateful for the sweet words and well-illustrated books, in the end, reading the books was just too difficult for me. Reading them to myself brought me to tears, how could I ever read these to the kids without becoming a complete mess? I showed them the books, but I didn’t read them aloud and I don’t know if they looked at them or not. I wasn’t ready for that yet.

The Game Plan

Facebook Post from September 1, 2010 at 7:17am
"My surgeon gave me a book called "I flunked my mammogram!" I love that title!!!!! I asked if I could have a bumper sticker :) Bring it on - I am a fighter!!!! 9 days off from the poking and prodding, and then the circus begins. Thanks to all of you for your love and prayers - trust me, I feel it! Love you all!"

After the diagnosis was official, my life then consisted of phone calls, texts and updates to family and friends across the country, and multiple doctors visits and scans. I sent and received so many texts during this time that my limited texting plan was exceeded for the month in just a couple days – I normally only used about 150 a month, and in the first part of September I had used more than 800! Obviously, my plan needed to be changed! I soon discovered that texting was the perfect way to communicate with everyone without having to explain myself over and over again.

After meeting with the breast surgeon I was referred to by my OBGYN, we finally had a plan in place. I would have a PET scan to see if the cancer had spread to any other part of my body, and then I would meet with a medical oncologist to discuss chemotherapy. My course of treatment would be chemo first, followed by surgery, then radiation. In an instant, the next year of my life was all planned out.

The PET scan was simple, and honestly, very relaxing. After being injected with the radioactive sugar (contained in a vile straight out of Mission Impossible), I had to wait for 90 minutes while the sugars worked in my body. Who wouldn’t mind sitting with a blanket in a comfy chair in a quiet, dimly lit room with magazines and a TV for 90 minutes all alone? I told the tech that it was the most peace I had had all summer and asked when I could come back. The CT scan that followed was short and easy, and after it was all over I got a Snickers bar – a yummy treat after having to fast all morning.

Michael and I met with the medical oncologist for a consultation and a discussion of what to expect with my chemotherapy. From the biopsy and PET scan we learned the specifics of my cancer. I had invasive ductal carcinoma. It was in my right breast and axillary lymph nodes, but had thankfully not spread anywhere else. I was ER/PR positive and HER2 negative. Because of the inflammatory nature of the cancer and the involvement of my skin, I was staged as 3C, the highest you could be before stage 4, the worst of the worst.

I would have a port placed in my chest to administer the chemo and save my veins from the torture of the drugs. I would receive 3 drugs – Taxotere, Adriamycin, and Cytoxan. My chemo would be once every three weeks, for 6 cycles. If I started at the end of September, I would be done with chemo in January. JANUARY. It seemed so far away.

My questions for him were typical of any person facing cancer treatment. How sick will I get? Will I lose my hair? Is it going to work? His answers were honest: Everyone handles chemo differently. Yes, you will lose your hair. And you have an excellent chance of this working and living a long and healthy life.

That was all I needed to hear.

Discovery and Diagnosis

This post is long and detailed. While some of the memories of my cancer treatment have been fleeting and lost, the week surrounding the discovery and diagnosis is still so clear, perhaps permanently ingrained on my brain.

Summer 2010 was winding down like any other, with preparations to send the kids back to school nearly finished and my family enjoying the last few days of freedom. On Tuesday, August 24, less than 1 week before school was to begin, I noticed that the right side of my right breast felt hard and firm. My breasts usually became swollen and tender around my menstrual cycle, but this seemed a little different. And my period was not due for a couple of weeks. I mentioned it to my husband Michael, and then thought if it didn’t get better I should probably make an appointment with my OBGYN soon to have it checked out. The next morning after showering, I was standing in front of the mirror putting on deodorant. I happened to glance in the mirror and noticed that my right breast appeared mis-shapen and there was a pucker at the bottom of my right breast. Honestly, it scared me right away. How long has that been there? Was I that unaware of my body to not notice this change? When had I performed my last self-exam? I immediately called my OBGYN’s office and she was able to see me in later that morning. My next call was to my friend Ashley to see if she could take my kids while I went to the doctor. I had started to panic a little, but didn’t want to freak out until I knew it was really time to freak out. Trying to rationally think things through, I thought it was probably just a cyst. I hoped it was only a cyst.

I went to my appointment just before lunch, confidently knowing hat my trusted OBGYN would know what to do. Even though I heard her say “I don’t like how this looks” and that she wanted me to go have a mammogram, I still felt pretty confident that I was fine. She never panicked and she never said the word “cancer.” The breast center could see me later that afternoon, so I left the hospital and went to Chipotle and had lunch in my car. I called my mom to tell her about what I had found, and that I was on my way to have a mammogram to find out what it was. I was calm and reassured her that I thought it was nothing, but that I would call her when I found out more.

I had never had a mammogram before (I was only 34) and had no idea what to expect. It was pretty easy and not as nearly as uncomfortable as thought it would be. Once the mammogram was complete, they told me they wanted to do an ultrasound as well. Assuming this was normal, I agreed and went into the room with the ultrasound tech. The tech spent a good amount of time quietly searching around my right breast – near the pucker in the bottom, the firm outside edge and my armpit. When she was finished, she left and returned with the radiologist. I knew then that what they found wasn’t good. The radiologist told me they found 3 masses (2 in my breast, one in my armpit, or axilla), that they looked suspicious, and they wanted to do a biopsy as soon as possible. I got dressed, scheduled the biopsy for the following day and went right to my car. The tears came then. I knew this was no longer a cyst, and that more than likely I had breast cancer.

I called Ashley first. I remember feeling guilty having to tell her about what was going on, as it was just a little over a year since the passing of her own mother from pancreatic cancer. I arranged to meet her at our friend Jean’s house, as a couple of our kids were there for a playdate. The call to my mom was difficult. When I told her it didn’t look good, she burst into sobs, and I remember apologizing to her for having to give her such bad news. I know I called Michael, but I really don’t remember the call or his reaction. I know I didn’t want to have to tell him such horrible news while he was at work.

Pulling up to Jean’s house is a memory I will not forget. Here were my kids, playing with their friends on what they thought was just another normal summer day, and I was trying so hard to hold it together and not scare them with what I just found out. Our lives were going to change, and I didn’t know what to tell them just yet. I didn’t want them to know anything was wrong until I had all the facts. Jean, Ashley and I stood on the sidewalk, hugging, crying, and talking about what I had been told and what I thought would happen next. They listened and cried with me. What would life be like without the blessing of such good friends?

I received a call from my OBGYN while I was there, and she was very concerned, but also so confident about what I would do next that it gave me strength. She apologized about the situation and wanted to know if I was ok to drive, if I needed anything to calm me down or help me sleep. She told me that I would probably see a breast surgeon, and I heard words like chemotherapy and radiation and surgery. We would wait for the biopsy results and she would be in touch.

My biopsy was the following day, Thursday, Aug 26. Michael came with me to the appointment, but had to stay in the waiting room during the procedure. The same radiologist who had delivered the bad news the day before was the one to perform the biopsy. Laying on a table in the dimly lit room and guided by ultrasound, they took multiple samples at each of the 3 mass locations. It was uncomfortable, the sound of the punch they used was loud and unnerving, like the shot of a gun. The anesthesia did not numb me all the way through and I felt one of the samples taken near the puckered part of my breast. It was the most pain I have ever felt – I had tears spill out of my eyes instantly, but was too ashamed to actually cry. They placed titanium markers in the 3 biopsied locations, and I then had to have another mammogram to make sure the markers could be seen. I was miserable, and couldn’t wait to go home. On the verge of sobs the entire time, the minute I saw my husband I was unable to hold back the tears any longer and I cried most of the way home. I was in severe pain for more than 6 hours after the biopsy because of that one sample. I was told I could only take Tylenol for the pain, and I knew that meant no relief for me.

It would be a waiting game for the next few days to get the results back from the biopsy, but for me my fate had already been sealed. I knew I had cancer.

The next few days were a blur for me. I have never been on the phone as much as we were those first few weeks. I remember calling my in-laws on Skype in Ireland to tell them the news. It was difficult to have that conversation when you could see their faces react to the news. The immediate outpouring of love and support from family and friends was amazing.

When I finally got the call with the biopsy results on Monday morning (August 30), it was slightly anticlimactic. The radiologist confirmed that all the samples were malignant. The next step was for me to get in to see the breast surgeon. It was the first day of school for my kids. In less than 1 week, I had had an exam, a mammogram, an ultrasound, a biopsy and confirmation that I had breast cancer. I didn’t even cry.

Ready. Set. Write.

For the last few weeks I have had a nagging feeling that I need to write about this last year. That I needed to write everything - the good, the bad, and especially the funny. All of it. I don't know if it will be for my benefit, or to help those around me know what it was really like, or to perhaps help someone I don't even know dealing with their own situation. I am not a writer. I do not journal or blog. Despite the encouragement of my friends and family, I did not write a single thing down while I was going through my treatment. I think secretly I was afraid to REALLY know how I felt about all of this cancer business. But I think I am ready now. Come follow along with me as I share about this past year. XO