Chemo Round 3 & Radiation Completed(!!)
Hello friends and family! Happy 2018! It has been a while since my last update -- December was a busy month! I hope everyone had a very happy holiday season. :) Chemo, round 3 of 6: On December 18th, I had my 3rd round of chemo. Because I had a reaction during my second round of chemo, I was given an extra dose of Benadryl this round. I felt the effects of it immediately and slept through most of my chemo infusion with no complications. What was tough about this round of chemo was that I had a dentist appointment in the morning at 7am, a radiation appointment at 10am, and then chemo at 11am. It was a full day! I was exhausted at the end of it. The week after chemo, I can tell that symptoms are getting a little worse. My nausea lasted longer than before and the neuropathy (tingling in my fingers and toes) became more noticeable. These were all expected, though. My oncologist says that the symptoms will get worse with each round. I'm also getting my hearing checked once a month with Dr. Andrew Golde of Advanced Ear, Nose & Throat Associates (great doctor, very compassionate and understanding!) to monitor for hearing loss. With neuropathy, if you already have any amount of hearing loss (I have low frequency hearing loss), it may worsen with chemo. So far so good, though -- my hearing is still as bad as it ever was! Working: As of now, though, I feel fine and I'm back at work! With the help of my short term disability leave management team and my manager, I started work again in December with a modified work schedule. During each round of chemo, I'll be on short term disability for the first week. And then work from home for the next two weeks. It has only been 2 rounds of this work schedule and so far it's going well. It's incredibly helpful to be able to not worry about work during my first week of chemo each round since that's always the worst week. And, since I'm working from home when I do work, it allows me to rest during the day where needed. Special thanks to my team at SunTrust for picking up the slack while I'm gone and being understanding and supportive of me during my treatment. Having a team like is what makes it easy for me to enjoy what I do. I actually can't wait to get back to work full time again. All in all, I'm grateful to be able to work during my treatment with my modified schedule -- it helps to pass the time and makes me feel "normal" during my treatment. One of the tough things about being off work for me when I was recovering from my surgery was that there were times where I didn't know what to do with myself. I started to run out of table space for my puzzles. Lol. And, I couldn't travel -- that was tough! One of the things I look forward to doing when my treatment is done is going hiking, camping and traveling again. Only 3 more rounds to go! DE96: I flew out to SoCal in early December to celebrate the holidays with Erwin's family and also his grandfather's 96th birthday! Every year, his mom's side of the family gathers in SoCal to celebrate Daddy Eddie's birthday. It was a great celebration which included a cooking competition, gingerbread house decorating competition, trivia (this family loves competitions!), and karaoke. It was so much fun and I'm so happy to meet so much of his family. I didn't grow up with a lot of relatives around me so my family gatherings tend to be small. It felt really nice to be a part of a big family -- especially one that is close, goofy, and fun. I can't wait to celebrate DE97 later this year! Radiation, round 2, 3, 4, and 5. Completed! I completed all 5 rounds of radiation with the last one being on December 21st. Hooray!! Radiation has been pretty uneventful except that I did develop a urinary tract infection which my radiation oncologist prescribed an antibiotic for and so now I'm all clear. What's a bit funny is that I was initially hesitant about sharing with you all my UTI experience. Erwin had to encourage me to do so. It's funny because I'm pretty open about everything else (chemo, radiation, hysterectomy... CANCER!) but a UTI makes me shy. LOL. So anyways, there it is. I'm glad radiation was done before Christmas and that, going into the new year, I only need to focus on getting through my chemo treatment. I plan to celebrate when my last round of chemo is completed (February 19th). I don't know what I'll do yet but I'm going to do something! Any suggestions?? :) Wishing everyone the very best in 2018.
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