The port placement was weird. They told me they were going to put me in 'twilight sleep' but I figured I'd still be pretty out of it. Nope. they draped a blue sterile sheet over me, except for the hole where they were working in my chest (even over my head!), put some pain meds in my IV then some sedative and then he went to work. He use a local numbing agent before cutting in to me, but i definitely felt those initial needles. It was pretty surreal. It took about 40 min, but it didn't really seem that long. I saw the xray of the port and the tube thingy they put in my veins- weird! The area is now pretty sore and i can feel the tube in my veins. I'm not supposed to lift anything heavy for the next week or 2. Sorry, toddler twins, mommy can't pick you up for awhile!
We were done by 10am so we went straight to the Oncologist to start chemo. I got the low down from the super nice nurse (shout out to Nikki!), she ran some bloodwork, which I am proud to announce that I scored well on.
I hadn't even studied. I'm hoping I score as well at my next chemo appt.
I got a lovely cocktail of pre-chemo drugs through the port before getting the dreaded chemo. The cocktail consisted of steriods, anti-nausea & 1 other drug. then another bag of a different anti-nausea drug, the combo should last up to 5 days & I only need to take the prescriptions they gave me when I have breakthrough nausea or after the IV drugs wear off.
Here I am getting the first of my 2 chemo drugs- they call it the red devil, although my nurse called it kool-aid. It didn't make me feel any differently, although with the 2nd drug I got a funny taste in my mouth (may have been perceived? ).
Finally my nurse put on my Neulasta patch- it's pretty cool, she loaded it with the drug, then put it on my arm. It beeped for a few seconds and then *snap* i felt the little tube go into my skin. Tomorrow at 4pm the meds will start flowing until they are gone 45min later. Very cool, eh? The neulasta is to help my body regrow white blood cells.
All in all, it wasn't a terrible day. I did notice that when I signed consent for the chemo, the paperwork said 4 rounds of AC, 2 weeks apart, followed by 12 rounds of T, given weekly. So instead of it being 8 total rounds in 16 weeks, it'll end up being 15 rounds in 20 weeks. I need to check with my oncologist about this, the nurse just said that the 12 round T was standard.
Emeline started a new grading period today and she's taking health. She had to fill out some paperwork that I also had to sign. I quick snapped this pic while she wasn't looking, but it totally warmed my heart <3 This girl is so amazing, I don't know what we did to deserve her!
I go back next wed to have my cell counts checked and instead of doing chemo again the following wed, we decided to push it to Tuesday Feb 23 because my oncologist isn't there on Wed & we considered doing it on Thursday, but my nurse isn't there on Thursdays (and we really did like her). So she said it was fine to push it forward a little bit. I'll keep everyone posted on how I'm feeling and how everyone here is doing. Thanks for following along.
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