welcome to the recap of Week 18, where holidays happen and it becomes hard to remember what day of the week is currently in progress.

monday was one of only two days i appeared at work. end-of-year is always a bit of a busy time, so the day was well-spent cranking out budget items for 2020. that evening, andy and i headed north to my parents to begin christmas festivities. tuesday, we had a christmas (eve) meal for lunch, followed by some gift opening in the afternoon. that evening was our now-traditional dinner at applebee's with my brother's family. this was all fine, aside from the moment that our waiter lost control of my mountain dew and redistributed it across our menus, over the table, and down to our chairs and the floor. this was a first for me, very exciting. the poor waiter felt terrible. mostly i plucked ice cubes out of my purse and wiped down the inside and outside of my wallet; i was annoyed, but all was well. we spent a little while at my brother's after dinner, and then andy and i were off, driving through the thick, patchy fog, back to columbus.

wednesday was a leisurely morning, and we headed south to andy's parents for a christmas lunch. later in the afternoon, once other family members showed up, there was the opening of presents. we hung out at his parents for the rest of the evening, chatting and playing games with family.

the next day, thursday, was back to regularly scheduled life -- chemo day, round 7 of taxol. nothing out of the ordinary, morning infusion, afternoon nap.

friday was back to work, which was confusing, because i spent much of the day thinking it was a monday due to having the previous several days off. more budget entry for the day, and then the evening was spent at molly and ralph's with basically the entire oches crew, plus other local family friends like us. it was great to catch up with everyone and be surrounded by people i have known and loved for many, many years.

saturday was spent back at andy's parents for a leisurely day of eating wings, playing games and hanging out with family. sunday afternoon was spent watching the train wreck of the browns 2019 season come to its final, disappointing end. (farewell, freddie).

nothing truly new or exciting to report, which is not necessarily a bad thing. this week, 2019 is out and 2020 is in... let's do this.

as i mentioned in my last post, there was a pox upon our house last weekend, so we took things very slow and easy. lots of ginger ale and quiet activities and looming paranoia that i was going to catch whatever unpleasant stomach bug andy had... but thankfully, i emerged unscathed.

monday and tuesday were work days as usual. wednesday, i was on campus at osu for an all-day training. classes are out, so the area wasn't too crazy for morning traffic. easy parking garage access, starbucks literally across the street via crosswalk, can't complain. during the training, i sat at a table of people from various agencies and disciplines; we all worked together pretty well and overall the day was pretty interesting. later in the evening, i caught up with a friend for a spontaneous dinner, which was lovely. kind of a random day all around, which was a welcome, weird change of pace.

thursday was chemo day as usual. round six of taxol: halfway done! nothing of note, other than having a very chipper nurse that day. i spent the afternoon sleeping on the couch, also as usual. then it was dinner, finishing the last of christmas shopping, and an 8pm showing of the rise of skywalker. (shout out to the star wars franchise for consistently releasing movies right around andy's birthday). this made for a bit of a late evening, but at least we knew we didn't have to worry about spoilers!

generally speaking, the weekly thursday chemo infusions are still going well. i basically sleep all thursday afternoon, but am back to work on fridays. i have already mentioned the ongoing stomach issues and HOT FLASHES and dr pepper weirdness. on that note, i think things are overall becoming blander as far as my taste buds. i'm not getting any metallic tastes (a common chemo issue), but things are just becoming more and more... meh. so that makes mealtimes less fun. i am also getting some discoloration on my nailbeds, mostly on my thumbs and big toes. it's dark enough that multiple people have asked what happened, how did you hurt your thumbs? but they aren't lifting up or falling off or hurting or anything unpleasant like that, so i'll take "darkly colored nails as a side effect" with no complaints. another recent development is that basically the lining of my nose is sort of... well, not bloody, exactly, as i'm not getting nosebleeds. but anything involving kleenex also involves a trace of pink or red color. this is pretty normal due to the taxol, but is still always slightly disconcerting to see. ah, the joys of chemo.

so, somehow christmas is upon us? this is clearly impossible, but the calendar shows otherwise. plenty of travel and hustle and bustle and hanging out with family... let's do this, week 18. merry christmas!

a pretty uneventful week in Cancer Land. sunday afternoon was an early celebration of december birthdays for andy and his sister. so, a nice lunch with family, some chatting, some games. we lingered long enough to have leftovers for dinner there... a pretty relaxing day.

the rest of the week was pretty standard. worked monday through wednesday. thursday chemo, no new side effects, same old mild digestive issues over the weekend. there was some house cleaning happening on thursday and friday, in preparation for having people over for board games for andy's birthday weekend... but alas, it was not to be. poor guy woke up not feeling well, and it has continued throughout the day. we're taking it easy today and will do the same tomorrow. hey, at least we're all drinking ginger ale around here nowadays.

similar to last week, i thought i would share something slightly different, due to the lack of anything dramatic going on (not that i'm complaining). a couple of years ago, before any of this current mess started, i stumbled across a clip of  the standup comic, tig notaro. i don't remember which clip it was, but i remember enjoying her dry delivery and weird observations. down the internet and youtube rabbit hole i went, watching more clips and reading random articles about her. eventually, i found a write-up about her standup set at largo in 2012, in which she strode on stage and began her set with, "good evening, hello. i have cancer. how are you? is everybody having a good time? i have cancer." it was not, unfortunately, the beginning to an elaborate joke. just days after receiving a diagnosis of bilateral breast cancer, she forged ahead with a show and ended up giving an incredible standup performance. the audio of the show had been recorded, and she was persuaded to release it as an album (titled "Live" -- but pronounced with a short i, not a long i -- a command, not a description).

when i first heard the album, i found it hilarious and horrifying and brilliant and funny. i mean, when what you do for a living is basically share funny observations about the world, i guess it makes sense that the only way to cope is to work through it. the audience was right there with her. once they realized, no, this wasn't a joke, it sort of morphed into a half comedy show, half group therapy session. it was, as one audience member announced, "fucking amazing". totally agree, dude.

i dug out this album and put it on a continuous loop in my car soon after my own diagnosis. it was, and is, pretty cathartic. many of the issues she deals with on the album (there are so many!) actually have nothing to do with me. but her descriptions of cancer: the initial shock, biopsies, and even just announcing the diagnosis out loud, all ring true. i can probably credit some of my current attitude and outlook of my own experience to this comedy set, as ridiculous as that sounds. (though i can credit the idea of blogging about it, to my friend jana. hi, jana!). little did i know that a comedy album and a friend's blog, both about cancer, would end up being unintentional research for my own future. but all of these things are part of the reasons why i am blogging... it's helpful for me, it's informative for you, and to be honest, dealing with tragedy without humor would be even more tragic, in my opinion.

anyway. all that to say, here's a comedy set that resonates with me, and relates to this Cancer Land blog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kz-lV4t-3w&list=PLQQwrcUnrOndEvTJKT8Bu75y_S_lAZkOT

she may not be your cup of tea. that's okay. but perhaps some of you will enjoy.

next week is Week 17, which seems like a lot of weeks? but still chugging along. let's do this.

with thanksgiving over, it was back to the normal schedule for Week 15. my quest for new drinks has brought ginger ales and root beer and lemonade into my beverage rotation, which is a nice change of pace. the weird stomach issues continue, and i expect they will be with me through all of chemo. i have learned that it is worst from saturday evening through sunday evening (regardless of menu or diet), but knowing is nice? i guess?

to be honest, not a whole lot interesting happened during the week, so i thought perhaps i would take you on my usual chemo journey. on thursdays, i generally wake up around 7:00-7:30am (depending on my appointment time), shower, and head downstairs. i take my prescription tube of lidocaine cream and glob some on to my mediport area to get that numbing action going, then cover it with some good ol' Glad press and seal, as recommended by my doctor, to keep the cream in place and off my clothes. as i have said before, the press and seal works surprisingly well on human skin, which is a weird thing to say. then i eat some breakfast, we pack a cooler for my DIY cryotherapy (two cryomax ice packs for my hands, and two specially designed socks with inserts for frozen gel packs), and andy and i are off to the oncologist's office. (side note: all of my care is being handled through ohio health's riverside methodist hospital / bing cancer center. though the oncologist's office is at a separate off-site location, it is all still officially through riverside. i thought it was weird at first, but it's actually nice to not have to deal with hospital traffic and parking).

after arriving at the oncologist's office, we check in at the front desk. all the usual insurance and address verifications and copay, and then i am given a yellow sheet with my current appointment information on it. i bypass the normal blood draw department and continue down the hall to the infusion room, where i drop off my yellow sheet at the door, and we sit and wait for a few minutes. when they call my name, i am led into the infusion room, which is lined with stations around the outside of the room with recliners, IV drip poles, and infusion pumps. whoever my nurse is that day leads me to one of the recliners, and we begin the blood draw process. since i have a mediport, the chemo nurses do this instead of the regular blood draw department, which makes the initial setup more complicated, but the rest of the process far easier. the nurse peels away and removes my press and seal, then wipes off the numbing cream and cleans the mediport area. then she (they are all women nurses at this office) will give me a count of three and insert a special needle into the mediport (which hasn't hurt yet -- thanks, numbing cream!). the needle leads to a tube, probably about five inches long, through which she then runs regular saline to make sure my mediport is clear and working properly, and then my blood draws are done from/through this tube. i don't know how many vials of blood they take, maybe two or three? i don't really watch.

i am sent back to the front desk with my yellow sheet of paper, while my blood is sent for immediate testing in-house, which will show whether my body is ready for another round of chemo yet. then we sit and wait for a few minutes until my name is called, and a different nurse takes me back into a typical doctor's office room for height/weight/blood pressure/pulse checks. i change into a gown and dr. m shows up and does some tumor measurements (or, at least, she used to... as of this week, she said there is nothing she can even really measure, as it all feels like normal breast tissue from the outside at this point -- a good thing!), she answers any questions i have, gives any updates or scheduling needs, and clears me and my blood work for chemo that day.

then it is out of the gown and all the way back down the hall, past the front desk, to drop my yellow paper at the infusion room door, and sit and wait for a few minutes. when my name is called, i am generally led back to my original recliner from earlier, though sometimes it is different. first up is the pre-chemo medications. at this point, that tube hanging out of my mediport is now hooked up by a nurse to more tubing, which is sort of run through the infusion pump, and that tubing is hooked up to saline and whatever medication i am getting at that moment, which are hanging out on the IV pole. nowadays, i am getting benadryl (to prevent any allergic reactions) and dexamethasone (a corticosteroid, used in my case for anti-nausea), which i believe i get at the same time, and takes about twenty minutes to complete (signaled by the infusion pump beeping, which wakes me up from my benadryl nap). this is then followed by pepcid (for those lovely indigestion and heartburn side effects), which also takes about twenty minutes. to keep neuropathy at bay, i am supposed to use my DIY cryotherapy fifteen minutes before and after the taxol treatment, so i begin using the ice packs on my hands and feet during the pepcid drip.

after the pepcid but before the taxol, i generally take a bathroom break, because when i'm all hooked up with the tubing, i need to drag the IV pole and infusion pump around with me... and it's generally best not to be dragging chemo drugs all around the room, just in case. also, i'm getting INFUSED WITH FLUIDS ALL MORNING LONG, something's gotta give. then it's back into the recliner, the pepcid drip is switched out for the taxol drip, i kick my feet up, and i watch colbert on andy's ipad, since my range of activities is greatly reduced due to all the ice packs. after about an hour, the infusion pump beeps when the taxol is finished. the nurse unhooks all the drips from the tubing, and the tubing from me, and the needle from my mediport (which is usually the only time i feel discomfort from that area, since the numbing cream has long worn off). i hang out for another fifteen minutes to keep the cryotherapy going, and then we pack up the ice packs, and are out of there, usually well before noon. a combination of errands/lunch may happen, but at some point we make it home, and i am glad to nap on the couch for a couple of hours.

and there you have it. welcome to a day in my chemo life! not terribly exciting, but perhaps illuminating and/or interesting... pulling back the curtain on mysteries you likely never thought about fifteen weeks ago. i know i hadn't. but here we are! let's do this.

Week 14 was a very short work week. the friday after thanksgiving was a vacation day due to family being in town, and thursday treatment day became wednesday treatment day due to thanksgiving. so, that left monday and tuesday as my normal work days.

wednesday came bright and early, an 8am appointment to try and beat the chaos of the office's wednesday and thursday (and maybe even friday?) appointments all getting shoved into wednesday. it was the first treatment i would be receiving without seeing dr. m first (she usually sees patients every three weeks when they are on weekly taxol), and i was coming in a day early, which increased the chances that my blood work would show that i wasn't ready for another round yet, which to me would mean a wasted day and a wasted week of possible treatment. i was a little anxious about it all, as noted by the check-in nurse ("uh, is your pulse usually high?"), but i was cleared for that morning's chemo. to the early birds go the spoils: we got a chair in the far corner of the room, so not a lot of people or traffic, and plenty of room for andy's chair and all our stuff. i had a new-to-me nurse (taylor), and she was chatty and knowledgeable. nothing out of the ordinary with the infusion: benadryl, sleepiness, dexamethasone, pepcid; DIY cryotherapy, taxol, and watching colbert on andy's ipad. then we were free, and i can't remember any errands or fun anecdotes. i think it was home for lunch, and i took a nap on the couch for the afternoon.

on thursday morning, my parents rolled into town. shortly after their arrival, the four of us made it to andy's parents' house around noon for thanksgiving festivities. the day was a blur of food, family, football watching, and games, with a walk thrown in for good measure. i felt like i ate slightly less than past thanksgivings (more on that later), but still consumed too much. you know, the usual thanksgiving story.

friday was a sleep-in sort of day, a light breakfast at home with my parents, and putting up the christmas tree (with a partial strand of the pre-lit lights not working, which makes me very sad/irritated/arrgghh-y). then it was leftovers for lunch, a short trip to the mall with my mom, and they were headed home. the evening was spent doing a little cleaning up, a little game playing, a little chilling out.

saturday was the traditional deep-fried turkey for the michigan-osu game, with andy's family in ashtabula. plenty more food, delicious crispy-skinned turkey, and a blowout of a game. it was good to see those who didn't come down to the columbus area for thanksgiving, and to just hang out for the day. sunday late morning we departed back to columbus, listening to the beginning of the browns game on the radio, which was much better than watching the end once we got home.

as noted in previous entries, i have escaped more of the serious side effects from chemo. the one side effect i do have is minor, which i finally realized during the last week or two, though all the pre-chemo pepcid drips should have tipped me off. basically, i have a sort of stomachache and/or heartburn that constantly comes and goes. it's not nausea (thank god), but it's just... annoying. it sort of affects my appetite, it sort of doesn't. it sort of affects my digestive system, it sort of doesn't. it's not major, it's just always... there. tums doesn't really help (also: i have discovered that tums is/are kind of gross). i certainly don't have a desire to stuff myself full (the novelty of thanksgiving perhaps being the exception). i may need to return to smaller meals and snacks. we will see. it's not the end of the world, just constant and unexpected.

another thing which will come as a shocker to those who know me: dr pepper just doesn't taste as good as it used to. I KNOW. YOU ARE SURPRISED. I AM TOO. so i'm looking for a different fizzy fix. perhaps ginger ale and/or root beer? those sound like good options, though maybe it will be something completely different. who knows? slight changes all around in Cancer Land, but so far, so good. let's do this.