*TAMOXIGANG* All the fours...44!

[GoodbyeRubyTuesday]

Apologies for the bingo reference, couldn't think of a witty title but the other thread is very nearly full.

In honour of our new thread I have piled extra apple pudding on the trolley so tuck in :)

Yay for Handbags. Glad that's one done. Am sending no icky SE vibes.

Hope appt goes okay, Betsy. Which day is your op??

Tiny, glad the port-a-cath's settling down. You should most definitely give it a name. You're right no other bagel matches up to Brick Lane ones - we have a dozen in the freezer, though am not telling DS as he'd demand them all instantly! I'm good mostly, though having a bit of a battle with paranoia, but nothing I'm not used to... is the closest to a bitter smiley.

woohoo for one down handbags :)

My appt was fine thanks smee, the nurse practioner even commented on how quickly we got through it, and I made him giggle when I said "well I'm generally fit and healthy, apart from having cancer that is." My op is next Monday afternoon.

Arf at Betsy.

Feeling blergh, sick, headache etc. have popped all the anti-nausea drugs I'm allowed at the mo. any idea if I can take paracetamol too for my head?

handbags - I was told no paracetamol as it can artificially lower your temp. Ibuprofen ok though.
Portacath inserted. Bit sore now!

Not long till your op Betsy
Weebarra glad it went ok
Handbags sorry you feel rough, maybe get an early night and see if you can sleep it off ?
Just saw on the news there is a cancer unit they are investigating for long wait times and falsifying data so they didn't look as bad had to check it wasn't my hospital thankfully not

handbags - I was also told no paracetamol but if you are desperate just take your temp to check it's OK before taking the paracetamol.

well I'm back from seeing the surgeon to discuss reconstruction- all Ok except he won't operate until the diabetes goes - so fingers crossed once I stop the steroids my glucose will come down fairly swiftly. I may have to investigate whether dietary changes would help or - I'm guessing not as GP didnt suggest any.

webarra my portacath was a bit sore the first evening, and I felt my neck very stiff. There was huge improvement by next morning. Though I had a bit of tenderness for a few more days. 7 days later, I'm no longer even aware of. And it worked a treat for chemo yesterday.

handbags too bad you are feeling rotten. My sister told me trick on nausea is to take the pills as soon as feel the first niggle, rather than wait until you actually feel nauseous. For both of my sessions to date I felt worse nausea wise on the evening I got my chemo than I did any other day.

It's day after chemo for me. Woke up with a slight headache and queasy stomach. Felt better after meds and food. Slept lots during the day. Hope Ill be able to sleep properly tonight. Have found that light snacks helps the queasy feeling.

And DD1 has a vomiting bug. She was at friends house after school today, and started getting sick while there. Poor DH has his hands full, as he doesn't want me to go near her, so he is dealing with all that. I feel so sorry for my girl.

Hi all- treatment went fine but was lengthy as am also on something to strengthen my bones and help them get over tumour damage so had that too, so far no se except stiff neck from sitting around and usual ultra wired feeling from steroids. But think what I had today is relatively ok on se except feeling bit stiff and tired. Next week when have tax is the test...

Handbags - yes to paracetamol but check your temp as Rothes said. Wee -hope bruising goes down.

Will read and catch up now not besides myself (and respond to your pm pigeons). Hnd so nice that there is no news from you on wound front . Hope you had nice quiet day topsy.

Oh Smee do hope you are okay and are getting the support you need. Yes, that will do - raised eyebrow to the cancer!

Betsy - found myself having that exact conversation myself. Yes, I am all fit and healthy, well apart from the cancer. An oxymoron if ever there was one.

Handbags - Hope the anti-sickness drugs are starting to work their magic. Don't forget to drink, drink, drink, loads and loads of water - school boy error I made on my first round.

Night All.

Malt - I am just tuning into the 10 o'clock news and the lead story is the cancer unit - shocking.

Kitkat - a low GI diet would probably help and certainly can't do any harm

Glad all went well gigs and I hope the tax truck doesn't visit your house next time

Handbags hope the SEs aren't too bad

That cancer unit fiddling the figures is shocking

I saw in the local rag today that my breast surgeon has won an award for patient care, he is lovely though, so well deserved :)

Met my cancer twin today in the breast clinic today.
I have noticed her in the waiting area of the chemo unit as she too is younger than most of the patients - the younger women all smile at each other, even if we don't know each other. We met and chatted today and she is the only other person I have met who has such a scary, aggressive tumour (literally zero to golfball over night). She has the same oncotype as me, same lovely-dr.-of-the-hopeless-cases (his speciality is developing new chemo treatments so he collects all the likely incurables for drug trials), same drug regime, no nodes and only one tumour but what is a tumour or two and nodes between friends. It was lovely to share experiences as she is the only one I have ever met who has gone through the same really really scary whirlwind time just after the mammogram. She is lovely, and we will bump into each other every three weeks until I am done with my Herceptin.
I was telling my DH about this lovely person I met and then it struck me that we both have a 50/50 chance of outwitting and outlasting this thing - and it struck me what this statistic means. Fuck I hate this shitty disease. I have gone to bed early to cry.

I'm sorry! I shouldn't have posted that. I am a few days from the end of radiation and I am very tired. I had to travel to the hospital and back twice today and go to work in between and have a herceptin infusion as well as rads tomorrow. I'll be back to myself after a good sleep.... I'm sorry. Ignore me.

uk this is the place for sharing those middle of the night fears.

Hope all people starting or restarting chemo regimes are ok today.

Sad day for me as its the funeral of a friend who died of cancer. Same age as me. Our oldest children were born at the same time. It's just horrible.

Uk as foo said, this is exactly the place to share all the dark thoughts you can't voicelsewhere, we understand

Foo sorry about your friend, I'll be thnkng of you today, I'm sure it will be a tough day all round, shitty cancer indeed :(

I hope the chemo team are doing ok?

Morning all

Well done handbags on getting through your first Chemo. I hope you aren't feeling too rough this morning.

gigs sounds like you had a long day. Hope you have a nice peaceful day today.

foofoo sending you a 'special' (((((((hug))))))) Today will be a day of VERY mixed feelings. But don't hold anything in. Let all the emotions flow. Try and remember the good times you had together. Will be thinking of you

Hope everyone else is doing okay, and you all have a good day.

Xxxxxx

UKSounding I can absolutely relate to sharing your lousy odds with your chemo buddies. When I was diagnosed another mother at the school had recently been diagnosed, our tumours were not twinnies as hers was Her 2 neu and mine ER+ she had a few more nodes but we had 60% and 50% chances respectively (that's just not good enough she told our Dr Geek) our hospital specialises in younger women with rude tumours, being a bunch of geeks they find them fascinating , so in due course we became a posse and we coped through a combination of black humour and holding hands as we looked over the cliff. We still share a special bond because WE ARE ALL STILL here 12 years later, we justify this by saying that the our suspicions that most of the bad statistics are deep fried Mars bar eating , hard drinking even more than us, smokers who didn't get the best treatment early enough, and therefore not us, were clearly true warning this is not a scientifically sound hypothesis but will do for morale purposes Are you over the Atlantic. I spent the years following treatment in Hong Kong, I think the cultural differences are interesting, in Hong Kong you wake up to a picture of your tumour to reassure you but if you are across the Atlantic I think you will get the same level of follow up with scans etc that you could only dream of here. Dr geek said that if they made my follow up regime the recommended one here the wait for scanners would be months, they just do not have the resources. Anyway I hope your tumour twinny provides you with the support we had.

smee my actual tumour twinny. In need of the paranoia box? Thanks for mentioning that about pain. I know rationally that the pains in my hip, rib and now my bloody shoulders and arms are creaky worn out tendons and ligaments but it doesn't stop me worrying whether it is Cancer, or Osteoprosis. And Topsy I think the rib pain is quite common when you have had a mastectomy, my physio described any surgery, even if muscle isn't removed as like taking the muscles and tendons running from the site and winding them up, it screws up the balance and length of the muscles and puts pressure on tendons and ligaments and it is true that most of my problems are on that side. Slow growing is good and hopefully the other scans can put some of your worries at rest.

gigs glad the first treatment wasn't too bad and holding hands for the tax truck.

foofoo

Waves to everyone, I like the idea of the chemo angels stopping the SEs, sending them out on a mission.....

Morning all
Tired today, we noticed last night one of the pipes under the bath was leaking so had to get up every hour to empty the jug we'd put under it, different leak to last time ! Thankfully have nice friend who has stopped it dripping this morning and is going to fix it properly later
Started the dreaded steroids again this morning, hate them ! Last time though

Foo foo will be a tough day for you, sending you love and strength

Handbags how are you feeling now ?

Gigs glad it went ok yesterday I was thinking of you, hope you're feeling ok today and managing to eat a little

Uk I agree with the others, let it all out here it's a good place to say things that you wouldn't say to your nearest and dearest incase you upset them. Saying that I often say to dh things like better enjoy Christmas incase it's my last

Love to everyone else x

Morning all
Tired today, we noticed last night one of the pipes under the bath was leaking so had to get up every hour to empty the jug we'd put under it, different leak to last time ! Thankfully have nice friend who has stopped it dripping this morning and is going to fix it properly later
Started the dreaded steroids again this morning, hate them ! Last time though

Foo foo will be a tough day for you, sending you love and strength

Handbags how are you feeling now ?

Gigs glad it went ok yesterday I was thinking of you, hope you're feeling ok today and managing to eat a little

Uk I agree with the others, let it all out here it's a good place to say things that you wouldn't say to your nearest and dearest incase you upset them. Saying that I often say to dh things like better enjoy Christmas incase it's my last

Love to everyone else x

((((hugs for foofoo))))) from me too. You take care, bound to be v.tough.

Hope you're feeling less stiff, Gigs. Great no se so far (if still true?), but Tax ahead must be daunting.

I used to pop paracetemol Handbag . Didn't do it on first cycle though as wanted to know what was normal for me. I kept quite a detailed log of symptoms/ how I felt every day too - definitely worth doing that if only so you can work out when you start to feel better each cycle.

UK, definitely you're allowed to post like that. We've all thought similar. Sometimes I reckon it helps just to admit you're scared. Be weird if you weren't. xx

Betsy, Monday's not long away! How are you feeling about it all? Hope looking forward in a way. Once you're through that, you're so close to the future.

Kitkat, that's annoying about the diabetes, though I'd bet you're right and it will suddenly go. Strange they're not giving you more help with it, but maybe that's because they're confident it's transitory?

Waving to my twinnie, Pigeons. Your aches sound irksome. Could they be arthritis?? My paranoia's rather daft, as the problems with the preventative mx side. Logically that's v.unlikely to have developed cancer, the pain is intermittent, came on after a bra-less run (!) and I know is most likely to capsular contraction/ scar tissue. Still makes me anxious though. Bloody cancer. G'ah to it.!

Malt, hope the steroids don't make you too loopy. Last time though, yay!

Hope Kurri's not too bad today. Also been thinking lots of MAS and missing her. Am going to head over and see if I need to growl on that thread Amber's been so hacked off by.. Wishing you all an okay day.

hugs for everyone who is feeling down at the moment - we all get it from time to time - either dark thoughts or from the SEs.

I hope everyone who has had chemo this week is still OK and no-one gets awful SEs.

thanks all for the advice re diabetes. I'll talk to my chemo nurse today to see if I should be being a bit more proactive re diet - it may be that it's not worth worrying about whilst I am getting the steroids but when the chemo finishes maybe I could help things get back to normal.

We've agreed on Jan 16th for the Op so I will be disapointed if it has to be pushed back - am seeing the surgeon on 17th December to review so I'll have about 3 weeks after the end of chemo to show some improvement (which actually doesn't sound like much time at all).

plonks rather large arse as they weighed me at pre-op yesterday and I've put in 10kg since dx, depressing... on the paranoia box for smee, topsy, pigeons and anyone else who needs it.

if you had asked me yesterday smee, I would have said glad the date is soon, looking forward to it being over etc. Today however I'm having my first ever bit of a wobble. Eeek. I know in my heart of hearts it's the right think for me, I guess it would be strange NOT to have a bit of a wobble though?

malt - grr for steroids, BUT LAST TIME :)

gigs and handbags - Hope the SEs haven't got you?

I agree this is the pace to share our gloom - but also our good news. There have been days on here where everyone has had gloomy thoughts/news and other days when everyone is busy enjoying themselves doing "normal" stuff.
I'm still feeling nauseous though it is now 4 weeks since my last chemo. Perhaps I have been a bit over confident as I haven't taken any of the anti-nausea, stomach medications since the Oncologist told me I wasn't going to have any more chemo ... for the moment.
I'm also still ridiculously tired. I managed a day at work yesterday and would like to try to get in for a second day on Friday but perhaps it is too much too soon? It's most annoying monitoring my work from remote access and seeing my assistant proficiently getting on with it!

Am doing ok tho haven't moved from bed - quite nice to rest. Am keeping diary as smee suggests.

Smee - echo what was said about cancer pain being constant drone not off/on like muscle strain when you move. Lord knows I have enough tumours to choose from tho the latest Bruce Forsyth not painful . Katherine Jenkins in my neck has been worst .

KitKat and Betsy, have just got back from Onc and have the Emend pills in my bag - feel so much better knowing that they worked for you guys and am much more positive about Friday's treatment.

Foo - did a double take on your post - am also off to a celebration of life aka a funeral today. It is OH's friend who is my age and also pass away from cancer. It is sure going to be a tough day - weather here is pissing down, so matches my mood. Sending you lots of love and {{{Hugs}}}.