The Never ending story

Scotty is back. Yay again. Hannah is sick. I took her to the drs and she has a bug and is mopey. I am trying to keep her entertained while I get some work done from home. It's a tough task for sure. She will be fine but once again it's another unscheduled detours in this thing called life.

I'm back working out at 545a 4x a week. It's good to be back into the morning routine. I missed those ladies. The energy we all have together is amazing and heck, we have a good time.

I cleaned out my closet this past weekend. I feel lighter. There were just too many old clothes sitting around and no room for anything new. So many of my clothes are just too big - I'm not complaining, just it takes time to go through it all and decide what to keep. I am not going back to that old size, so I am not keeping it. Period.

My friend, Avelina, is a judge and she suggested a women's shelter in Leesburg to donate to. She offered very kindly to take it from me on Thurs during boot camp and have her friend who runs the shelter pick it up. I would rather it go to a good cause. My closet looks so good and organized and I feel good about having my clothes go to some people who need it. Last week we went through shoes and donated 5 bags of shoes - mine and the kids. Scotty is going to do that this weekend.

The Dreaded Pink Eye

I woke up this morning with the dreaded pink eye. I have no idea where I picked it up from because no one else in the house has it. Hannah said my eye looks like a vampire eye. I started on some antibiotics this morning, so I should be good to go tomorrow. I had to skip out of boot-camp this am because of it. I didn't want to share equipment while I was infectious. I'm so considerate!

Scott seems to have either been very sick this time from the chemo or picked up a bug. He was in bed all last night and skipped dinner and then took the kids to school today and came home and slept most of the day. I didn't want to take Nate into daycare myself because of my eye. He seems to be better now.

Bye bye chemo pack...

Yesterday, Scott went back to G'town to get his chemo pack removed for the last time. No surprise to anyone: we were not sad about it one bit. Hannah said we should throw Daddy a party! I said we will once we are all done!

Scott is tired. His foot is hurting too. He says it feels like there is a big blister on the bottom under the skin. So he has a slight limp. Not sure what that is from. I will email the dr this weekend if it persists.

This weekend we have a lot going on. Hannah has a party to go to at some laser tag place. She is the only girl invited to her friend Matthew's party. It doesn't seem to phase her at all. We also have to go sell GS cookies for a few hours in front of AC Moore for our troop. Then on Sunday, we have Sunday school and a Purim party after that. But keeping the kids busy means they won't have time to get into trouble (at least in theory).

Chemo 11

We went to chemo session 11 last Tuesday. Scott is doing well overall, no real concerns beyond the normal ones. His bp is a bit high but nothing earth shaking. He also started getting some headaches which Dr M will be monitoring. The chemo session went off without any issues.

We had to share a room for a while because they were crowded. It turned out to be a good thing because it was yet another moment where both Scott and I realized how lucky we are. The man was from Fairfax. He has stage 4 colon cancer, spread to his lungs. Probably in his early 50s. He has been battling this for 3.5 years and is now allergic to most chemo drugs. He is at G'town in a trial that gives him some drug to see if it can slow down the cancer, not shrink it, not cure it. If it doesn't work - which they will know within 2 weeks - then that's it -- he is out of the trial and there are no more known treatments for him. This guy was also being made very sick from the meds. He was throwing up and just nauseatious the entire way to the hospital and while he was there. He was still in fairly good spirits and very nice. I asked him a lot of questions. He said he didn't really have any symptoms prior to this -- however while he was in the bathroom, his brother in law told us that this guy's wife had colon cancer too but they caught it early. She urged him to get checked and and sure enough. Very odd coincidence I think. He also said that he did have some signs like constipation. Again, we are very fortunate.

So Scott has one more Folfox treatment to go. We talked to Dr M about what will go on after that. They will schedule him for a CTScan and he will proceed every 2 weeks with the Avastin drug. It will be a few hours as opposed to a 6 hour process every 2 weeks. How he recovers from the Folfox will be gradual. It won't be like all of the sudden, he feels great - it will happen over time. They did stop the oxyplatin a few weeks back and Scott started noticing a slight improvement after about a week. He still can't really handle cold things, but it's not as bad as it once was.


Hannah was sick last week and Scott had chemo the same day. School called while we were at G'town. We had to scramble to find some help to pick up Hannah. Thankfully, Bill Buermeyer was able to get Hannah from school and then it turned out Maya had the flu so was home with Pat. Ellen dropped Hannah off there for a while and both girls slept then Annette took both girls to Dr. Lisa late afternoon. Dr. Lisa gave both Nate and Hannah Tamiflu since they were both exposed to the flu bug via Maya even though Hannah tested negative. Then I picked her up after we got home from the hospital. It was really hard on us trying to figure out who to ask, how to ask for help and handle it all from the confines of Georgetown Hospital. When we get home from chemo -- we are both drained for different reasons and then to have to handle poor Hannah sick. It was a lot. I had to then run to Target, get the scripts filled, then feed Nate. Hannah didn't eat. Then Hannah threw up all over the couch in the family room. So I sent everyone upstairs, cleaned that up, got Hannah calmed down and in bed, got Nate ready for bed and then went to bed myself. Then, I had to stay home from work for another day because there was no way Hannah was ready to go back. She just started eating normally again last Friday. It's a lot to handle thats for sure. I am tired just blogging about it.

And yes, I got up the next morning and went to boot camp...

Scott and I are tired of this whole thing! We want it over with -- talk about an understatement! Scotty can't even enjoy most foods because of the taste change. It has obviously and literally affected every piece of our lives. For instance, before cancer, I fell asleep before Scott. No issues. Now, Scott is in bed sometimes as early as before 7 and I sometimes can't sleep in our room because he snores. If I fall asleep before he does, I am fine - after, not so fine. So even something mundane as our sleeping arrangements have changed.

How am I? I am ok. I am very emotionally tired of this whole journey. There are times when I get upset and then I have to remember, it's not his fault, it's not my fault -- it is what it is. I sleep a lot on the weekends when I get a chance. I am working out 5x a week to help not only with my overall health, but to just be able to handle the stress that is on me. So, I am ok.

Chemo 10

I don't have a lot to report first hand for this chemo. I did attempt to go to GTH with Scott for this session, but during the ride there I started to get sick again and by the time we arrived, I was super sick. Annette drove into Georgetown to come and get me while Scott went through with this session.

From what he told me, they decided to stop the oxcyplatin which causes the sensitivity stuff due to his latest report from Great Wolf Lodge and the numbness that started during the trip. Neuropathy is a slippery slope they say, so they don't want to take any chances. They did say though that since they are stopping it, it may flare up and get worse before it gets better. His weight went up last time but is back down again. His blood pressure is not seriously high but they are still watching it since Avastin can cause high bp.

Scott got home around 530 and was pale and feeling nauseatious. He went pretty much right to bed. He is very fatigued this go around. Spending a lot more time in bed sleeping than previous chemo weeks. We have until March to go with the FOLFOX and it's starting to really wear thin with not only Scott, but everyone in the house.

It really hit home this past week. With me having the flu, it really highlighted what a topple effect me getting sick can have. Right now the house is a disaster because for the week I was "out" of it, no one really did much of anything. I run a well oiled machine right now, and when we run out of oil it really shows. It also brought home the fact that when I get sick, there is no one to take care of me. I' m not having a pity party, just stating the realization how hard this all is. I think I pushed myself too hard to get better which is why I had a violent relapse on Tuesday. If I'm not there to take care of things, who will?

My birthday was hard too. Scott was very tired so we really didn't do much of anything. I didn't really expect a huge blow out but it was hard sitting there at 730p eating my ice cream cake solo. Some may think -- after being with the kids so much, that must be nice -- but it was hard. I did get a painting from a painter that I just started admiring: Eli Halpin. My brother and Janine have a painting in their SF apartment and I just loved it. She lives in Baltimore so we found a place we could buy one -- we bought one of her owls. It's in my family room right now and I love it.

Great Wolf Lodge

Great Wolf Lodge...hmm. What should I say. We got out of Ashburn on time around 930a and headed out. We had a very uneventful drive to Williamsburg. Stopped for lunch at Sonic and then headed to GWL. We waited in a very long line to check in. It was about 1p. Our room was not ready but we knew that we could head to the water park. While in line, the Grimms and Perkins arrived. The Buermeyers had already been there and set up camp in the cabana we rented. All was going great, although I was starting to not feel right. About an hour after that, I laid down in the lounge chair in the cabana and fell asleep. Yes, right in the water park amid the noise. The Frescholtz's had arrived by this time too. Around 4p, the room was ready and I left the water park to go lie down. Scott and the kids came back around 530p. We had dinner plans with the group. I dragged myself up and got dressed to go. We met in the lobby and headed out. We did reach the parking lot of the restaurant. It was then I realized if I even smelled food it was not going to have a good outcome. We turned around to drive back to the hotel. Nate said he was hungry and Scott told him he would get them something to eat -- it was over for me at the mere mention of food. I reached in the back of the car, found a grocery bag and well, you can imagine the rest. Scott quickly pulled into a dark parking lot where I got out and like a high school girl drinking, got very sick.

We got back to the GWL, I went to the room and Scott took Nate and Hannah to see a magic show in the lobby and get some dinner. They returned and we all went to bed.

The next morning, I slept in and Scott took the kids to the water park. We checked out of the room around 1030a and I went to say hello to everyone in the water park. I really was very weak but didn't feel horrific. We left the park around 1p. The kids and Scott stopped for lunch while I slept in the car waiting for them. I slept most of the way home. What a great memory!

I was sick basically until today - Wednesday - off and on. The kids did have a great time at GWL and thank god for friends.

sick

i have been sick with the flu. I will update when I feel better.