Post Surgical Report

Here's the email message that I sent to all the folks on my list today. I know they gave me some Decadron as a pre-med before the surgery today, and I expect that's what is making me so perky right now. I figure if this works like it did during Chemo days I will be dragging my rear tomorrow, and will truly be lounging on the sofa watching movies. Today I had a bit of a "House"-a-thon and also played Sudoku on my new Iphone, a real guilty pleasure. Tomorrow, movies. And veggie chips...another guilty pleasure that I have decided I deserve to indulge in at this particular time. Thank goodness we have Trader Joe's here in Nashville now.

Hi all,

Had my surgery today to replace my  expanders with permanent implants.

Ouch! Fortunately, I have Percocet.  Never used to like that stuff but in this instance, I’m very grateful to it.  An ice pack is helping too.

Surgery went smoothly and I was home by  noon. I figure I’ll be on the sofa most of the weekend but have had the energy  to do a bit of emailing and to paint my nails. I have to be careful to keep my  arms down and not to lift anything over 10 pounds, and I’m actually trying to  keep it to 5 pounds today. But already I am noticing how nice it is to have  those boulders out of my chest.

Dave is taking fantastic care of me  and I know he is very relieved to be able to do it. Mom saved the day back in  November and it was very special for me to get to spend that time with her,  but I am very happy not to need to ask for emergency help, to be able to  handle this ourselves, Dave being well enough to provide the care-giving  without compromising his own health. I prefer to have family visits when I’m  well and able to go have fun! And any of my out of state friends, that goes  for you too!

I’ll be updating my Facebook pages, both the personal one  and the “Adie Grey is Kicking Cancer” page, and also my blog, but I won’t keep  emailing gory details. You of course may check the postings or contact me if  you want to know more, but I don’t want to wear out my welcome! I’ll even post  some pictures when I’ve got the bandages off...clothed and discrete ones of  course!

Thanks always so much for all of the well wishes and supportive  emails. It helps me massively to know you all are out there thinking good  thoughts for me. I’ll try to respond to everyone personally in the next few  days. With the supportive energy I could sense all around me, I was amazingly  calm going into and all through this experience. That felt really good; thank  you again.

Those of you here in the mid south, I hope are safe  from the storms. Thinking good thoughts for you all.

Wonderful Weekends

I really really love my weekends and they are really really too dang short! I love my job, but I miss having more discretionary time. Saw a friend who I haven't seen in a long time at a party today; we talked about the up and down sides of working for "the man" as opposed to working for yourself. It's great to have the benefits...insurance, paid time off, etc...but it is a price to pay for no longer having the authority to simply choose to sleep in today, or to travel at a whim. I function much better and sleep deeper when I fall our around 1 am and sleep until 9:30. That approach will not work with my job schedule. I have to adapt.

But I did get to have lots of time with friends this weekend, the monthly game group met last night with much hysterical laughter involved. That is one smart group of women. I kind of crashed out suddenly around 11 pm (I may stay awake until 1 am on my own time, but am not necessarily coherent in those late hours!) and had to leave quickly to feel good about driving home, but then got a bit of a second wind when I walked in the door. I hope those ladies know how much I appreciate and admire them. I don't feel like I ever say out loud the thoughts I have from the heart. With the heightened awareness of the frailty of mortality, I aim to say my inner love messages out loud but never feel that I adequately succeed.

Dave is better every day; we took a walk today up at the agricultural center nearby and he did okay, but pooped out sooner than he used to. I'm glad he's on the mend, but he still has a long way to go to regain the strength he needs for our trip and for a healthy life in general. I'm hoping he may go for cardiopulmonary rehab at my center, but knowing him, he'll want to do it himself. Backing off and giving one's loved ones the space to make their own choices is a very zen aspiration and often very challenging, but in the long run, necessary. Last Thursday was our 26th wedding anniversary; we had a lovely meal and I will post pix of that soon. The whole weekend has felt celebratory.

I'm working on reducing my animal protein consumption. I don't really know how to think like a vegetarian, but I'm doing okay in my creeping toward that goal. I can't bear the thought of veganism as I love my yogurt too much, (and eggs, and cheese) but I think I can reduce the reliance on these foods along with reducing my meat intake. I know I generally feel better when I'm eating mainly fruit and veggies. But I stay hungry a lot and have to plan well to avoid snacks that are likely to spike my insulin and to get adequate calories. I had hoped to take part in a clinical trial of Metformin, a diabetes drug, to prevent recurrence of the breast cancer which I intend to have not recur anyway, but the drug approval process has been so long-winded that I am now no longer a candidate as Friday was my one year anniversary of diagnosis. I'll have to find other ways of controlling my blood sugar as that is a major predictor of survival.  Lentils are a very exciting discovery; I've always loved them, rarely cooked them. Friday  I came up with a great lentil dish that was easy and is still yummy as leftovers. I can see that there are tons of variations I can enjoy with them.

I am eagerly anticipating my upcoming surgery, April 15th. My understanding is that it will be a very easy procedure as it is being done in an outpatient facility, not even at the hospital. Yahoo! I'm hoping that means no intubation, and a twilight sleep type sedation. And a nice, not very knocked out week off of work. Fingers crossed. Our niece Bethany has tantalized us with the prospect of a visit during that time, and it's been ages since we got to really hang out with her. I'm hoping it happens, and looking forward to sleeping as late as I want!

Change of plans

It's been decided. We will postpone our trip to Italy until the fall. Good lord willing and the creek don't rise, as we say around here! I'm trying to be here now with this and not to develop a fatalistic attitude about the trip, not to feel afraid that it simply won't happen. It just seems that we originally started to plan a European vacation for our 20th anniversary, when Dave was diagnosed with lung cancer, then we started to try to do it for the 25th, when I got my big C diagnosis. Then this...it's a zen challenge. Must stay in the present and not jump to the illogical extreme, as, according to Dave, I frequently tend to do.

The benefit of not taking the trip is that I will get to have my next surgery, swapping out these hard-as-rocks water balloons that have been expanding my pecs for the permanent implants that will feel soft like a breast. There's no pain at the moment, but the expanders are annoying and in the way. For work considerations, I would have had to wait until July to do the surgery if we went on the trip, but I can used that time instead to take off for the surgery. So that will take place on April 15th. Over a year post my diagnosis. It's a long road, but I'm feeling good.

Lately I've had a return of the burning mouth syndrome. I've tried to figure out what I was doing during treatment and during the expansions that made the problem disappear. The only things I can think of are high doses of B vitamines and the use of pain killers - valium, oxycodone - during the expansions and the huge amounts of Glutamine that I was taking during treatment. So I'm back to Glutamine twice daily and trying not to forget to take my B vitamins every morning. The pain is not gone, but it is reduced significantly.

Weekends are far too short...

"Me" day

I woke today feeling a bit agitated after not sleeping much. Dave had to get up early for his big work day. He teaches Mondays and Saturdays with the weekends being the most popular. And with his poor sleep and frequent coughing, I did not rest well either last night. So I decided that rather than going to yoga this morning, I would work out in the afternoon and run errands in the early part of the day.

Got my tires tended to, my eyebrows shaped up and the dog bathed, some minor repairs to the screen porch and a variety of other things handled that have been waiting attention. It felt good to just kind of follow my whim today. But mid-afternoon as I prepared to leave for the gym to get sweaty, I suddenly had a hit of that occasional total exhaustion that I used to feel on a regular basis during chemo and that still overtakes me now and then. I took a nap. Spent this evening shopping, picking out an IPhone and chatting with friends I ran into along the way. Got 15 minutes in on the elliptical before the gym closed...could've sworn they close at 8 rather than 7.

I think I want to revisit a mainly vegetarian diet again. I did that for a while after initial diagnosis and lost a lot of weight, felt really good. I'm challenged though in meal preparation - I'm just not used to planning vegetarian menus. But if I can get Dave to go along with it, I think he would really benefit from it too.  That is bound to be a tough sell, and I think right now, he needs to eat anything and everything that appeals to him and that he can get down. He's skinny as a rail. How can he enjoy the wonders of Rome with no appetite? He certainly can't go with no energy!

Regarding the trip, I achieved peace with the prospect of cancelling it today. It's interesting how some things that plague us can transition to become no big deal. I suggested to Dave that it might be the right choice, and the response was a basic sigh of relief. I think he still wants to try to do this as scheduled, but I gave him 5 days to have a dramatic turnaround or I don't think I want to go. Save it for fall. I'll try to arrange to have the tickets credited - I know they can't be refunded. But I'd rather do that then have the chance that we will go over and have a rotten time.

So I'm hoping that I'll get some sleep tonight while springing forward. Hope you do too, dear reader, whoever you are.

Frustration and Elation

written Friday 3/11

I have been focused on finding accommodations in Rome for the trip scheduled for a month from now.  I've made a number of minimally satisfying reservations without much input from Dave, as he has been really too sick since I returned from Florida to participate in the planning. And at this point, with him coughing, miserable and not able to eat much, the trip is not sounding very attractive. So I am frustrated. On top of that, the cat is not doing great, and my corporation is far below projected budget this fiscal year which will require me to change some of my other travel plans and wait for my next surgery until after July 1. Maybe we should just go ahead and eat the plane tickets and cancel the trip.

On the elated side, Vanderbilt is revamping its cancer care programs to a wellness model that will provide services during and after treatment, and offer screening and counseling for those at risk. The mind-body model. I will be on the ground floor of the start of the lymphedema clinic - a career opportunity that will let me practice a passion and develop a marketable skill. I will be involved in some advisory committees; I hope I can be creative enough to come up with some good ideas for program offerings. 

Trying to Catch Up

I am feeling darn good, which is good, because I'm back to mi vida loca - running a thousand miles an hour keeping house, keeping pets, keeping in shape and sane. Dave has been fighting a terrible cold since before I returned from my trip, and he is beginning to pull out of it, but it frightened me, making me concerned that it could develop into pneumonia and compromise our ability to take this trip to Italy that I spent the weekend working on. We have our airline tickets, but still don't have reservations for a room in Rome. I did get a room near the airport for the last night, and a provisional reservation in Florence for the couple of nights before that, and have been given a couple of quotes on Rome B&Bs that sound fine, but not quite in the neighborhood where I'd like to be. I'm giving it until tomorrow to see what all of the offers will look like, then I have to make a reservation! The trip is coming up soon, April 12th, and I am amazed how much time it takes to research accommodations, not to mention practice the language and plan the things we want to see and learn about. Just being in another culture will be enough to excite and inspire me. Even the altered American experience of West Palm Beach, with its Floridian natives and east coast transplants, not to mention to wide variety of Hispanics and other imports, helped ease the ennui of sameness that sometimes wears me down at home. Nashville has become a much more international place, but it's still not exactly polycultural. Or multilingual, whatever some of the locals may think, at least in comparison to larger, coastal cities.

Regarding my physical status, I was able yesterday to participate in an hour of yoga that required upper body strength that I haven't been capable of since the mastectomies. Longer downward facing dogs and plank poses than I've even attempted in ages. I still am not able to keep up with the entire program, but I made it through an hour. Then later on did a half hour on the elliptical. I'm trying to control my blood sugar, with more commitment now than earlier, as it looks like I will not be able to participate in the Metformin trial, not unless the FDA gets off of their butts and approves the medication. I would have to start within a year of diagnosis, and that will be April 1st. Haha. I really did think my surgeon was joking when he gave me the news...

Anyway, I have had a little bit of swelling in my left arm, but of course know what to do about it now, and I will be thrilled to swap out these Barbie-boobs for my permanent implants when I get the chance to do that, but will probably wait until July to allow me a chance to travel for pleasure and business - an additional 2 days of training in CDT for the head and neck - and to focus on getting the lymphedema clinic running with my hands on it as much as possible. That will also let it happen in the next fiscal year which will be good for the clinic. I'm eager to get these hand-balls out of my chest, but I'm happy to stay out from under the knife, with minimal pain as I have now, for a while longer.

Certified

I am a Certified Lymphedema Therapist.

I'm excited. I have a feeling that everything is about to change.

the above written Tuesday night. forgot to post. so much to say and no time to say it; will return this weekend.