Chemo Day 1

The day before I had my chemo I received these beautiful flowers from my former bosses and co-workers, Pam's Flowers ROCKS!





I was very nervous going in today, but I held it together. I walked into the very tiny room and was directed to chair #4 but a pleasant smiling nurse. As I looked up, I saw under the #4 a plaque with a dragonfly. Sign #1 that one of my best friends was with me. Denise and I who have known each other since we were 9 had matching dragonfly tattoos done in 2010. I sat down and just before the nurse was about to sit down and explain some things, she said "Oh you have a gift, take care of this first" I had no clue. I opened it up and inside was a beautiful glass turtle from my other best friend who I've known for more than 15 years and a card that, of course, made me cry. Last year Tammy's friend Pam and I gave Tammy the gift of a turtle tattoo (private reason) so she gave this to me to take with me each time to know I'm with her.Sign #2 that my friends are here. Tammy then came to visit me later in the morning during her break. :)





So I began treatment. I was a little freaked as the nurse started looking at the back of my hand. Immediately I took control and said she could not use the back of my hand. I have great veins, but they have tons of valves very close to each other and the length of the IV needle had a very difficult time getting thru and it's incredily painful. So off she went searching for more veins. Little tough that day as I had already made 2 other stops to have 2 other types of bloodwork done, but she managed to get it in and did very well. :) The first procedure was to infuse me with fluids, 2 hours worth. I drank water and juice as well, as suggested, ran with my pole down the hall to the bathroom every 20 minutes trying to beat everyone else running lol. Finally when that was done, she gave me 22 pills to take and then began the GEMCITABINE (Jem-SITE-a-been) brand name Gemzar. This is the one for the lung cancer. It really burned like mad going in so she had to make some adjustments with adding saline solution to make it bearable. She also wrapped my arm in a warm blanket. Everytime I got up to use the ladies room, I would come back and Peter would have new warm blankets for me, he's take my shoes off and wrap me up. He was so supportive, I was glad to have him there.

During this 2 hour treatment, I had the pharmacist come in to talk to me about the new medication that I needed to take (back up to 12 pills a day again blech!) and to be sure there were no interactions wit all the other stuff I take. We were good :) Then the lady came in - her name was Ashley so I liked her right away :) - to discuss homecare. There will be a nurse coming to the house for the next few days to see how things are going and how I manage any side effects. So far nausea last night, but no vomitting. Pills took care of it. I was also given the usual drug card, so in addition to Peter's medical coverage, my drugs are 100% covered. We really weren't worried as most of them were under $2 with his 90% coverage, but it is offered to everyone. The nurses are available 24/7 to come to the home. One of the meds I have in my possession are injections for nausea but they can obviously only be given by a registered nurse and they are my last choice. Did I mention I HATE puking...haven't puked since my stupid drinking days lol.

The last infusion I had took just over an hour, CISPLATIN (SIS-pla-tin). No burning with this one. One of the volunteers came over and handed me a beautiful crocheted (?) blanket to keep me warmer, it was FRRRRREEEZING in that room. She told me to take it home, they like to give a blanket to first timers :)It's just lovely.




Well we were all done, handed an inch of reading to do at home, given a few instructions and off we went -- oh did I mention that the cancer parking was changed to renal parking, you think they would have let us know??!! and Peter got a $25 parking ticket...grrrr, gonna fight that one!

Thank you for all the calls, emails, posts and love. I felt your support all day :)So far, it's 8am and I still feel good. Nurse will be here in an hour and a half :)