Final Round of the Red Stuff

Fourth and Final Round of AC

Check out my rockin' port and the red
Adriamycin going in to kick some cancer butt!

Monday was my fourth and final round of Adriamycin and Cytoxan. I have mixed feelings about this. Part of me is happy that we've made it through the first phase of chemo. Most of me is just scared that we aren't going to be able to get rid of all the cancer through chemo since I still feel large tumors inside my breast and have many swollen lymph nodes. I still want a pathological complete response so badly and am praying like crazy for it!

I was surprised by how low my white blood counts were. They didn't go up very quickly over the weekend and were below the threshold for doing chemo. The nurse had to call my doctor to get the approval to administer the chemo. This makes me very nervous for phase 2 of chemo. I'm pretty sure my counts don't go up with more chemo, only down, potentially delaying chemo rounds. eeek. Let's pray that doesn't happen. 

Because my counts are so low, I'm starting to wear a mask places. I look so cool with my bald head, pushing a newborn around, and now a mask. Today at Boston Market the cashier gave me "drinks on the house". So at least I'm getting free tea out of the deal- gotta love that!

I slept the entire chemo session Monday (that picture is from round 3, I wasn't nearly as chipper this week). My dad watched David so I could come home and sleep the rest of the afternoon. Then today after my steroid shot I again slept the rest of the afternoon while my Mom watched the baby. Normally I feel really bad the day after the shot (that's when I spent the whole day in bed last cycle), so the trend of the week may repeat itself tomorrow. I'm really not okay "wasting" my days/weeks in bed. Drives me bonkers!

Beacon of Hope

During chemo I was doing my devotional from a book that my fellow cancer buddy Jamie had given me. The inside cover was signed by a group called "Beacon of Hope Cancer Ministry". I googled them and found it is a support group that meets the third Monday of the month at a church a few minutes from our house. It just happened to be the third Monday, so I emailed the contact and they invited me to come that night - again, these "coincidences" have stopped surprising me.

I really enjoyed the session. The facilitator was excellent. She has lost five siblings (including two in the last six months) and both parents to cancer and was formally the director of a cancer clinic. Surprisingly out of the 20 or so folks there, only two of were currently fighting cancer- the rest were survivors that had beaten cancer. Talk about a hope filled room! They are making me a quilt and I'm super duper excited about it. It's going to be turquoise- weee! I'll definitely be going back. 

Get it? ACUTE baby! Onesie credit: Kris J.

David's One Month Check-up

I'll leave you with some non-cancer related good news! David is growing big and strong. Not only did he surpass his birth weight (which he hadn't done by the two week mark), he flew by it! He was 6 lbs 9 oz two weeks ago and today he was 9 lbs 5 oz. He grew inch too! He was previously in the 10th percentile for weight and now he is up to 50th. He has a long way to go to catch up with big brother Noah (aka "the Tank") who is in the 99th percentile for everything but this formula-fed baby is going to catch up with the breastfeeding ones before we know it!