Leave of Absense

I think this will be the second to last post for awhile unless something new comes up. Everything seems to be going ok on the cancer front. I have an appointment with my gyn onc on Monday so I will update about that. I am so happy to be done with everything and my big sunburn on my back is finally starting to heal, although now it looks like some kind of fungus because it's lighter than the rest of the skin on my tan back. I also got my port removed a couple of weeks ago so I am most excited about that. No more alien probe/tumor on my chest!

Other than that I have come to another major roadblock in my life. After talking with the nursing program director and dean (or yelling rather), it turns out that I won't be returning to school until spring quarter which is in March. Fuck that. I was told that I would be able to finish up with independent study, doing clinicals this fall and winter and then being done by March. The director instead tells me now that they have no one to teach the one-hour seminar included with the course, and so now I have to reenter the program with the upcoming cohort at the same time I took time off. They said it was "for the best" so I could allow myself to heal fully. Honestly, this is the dumbest thing I have heard in awhile because taking 6 months off IS NOT good for my education at this point. I need continuous clinical experience- with a big break like this I am likely to be extremely behind. I'm scared that I will be so behind that I will again have to repeat the course. WTF?!? Fuck Seattle U. I'm so done with their fucking program.

Sucks cause now I have no job and no school, meaning that my loans go into repayment mode soon. And I lose all the loan money I have been using to live on. Of course I told this to my dean and they apparently don't give a shit.

So now I am figuring out what to do with myself. Yesterday I returned from a 2 week visit to the Midwest to see my family and friends. Now in a week I am going on a road trip along the west coast from Seattle down to L.A. with a good friend. Should be another 2 weeks. Like I have anything else to do... I have been looking for jobs but so far have been denied new graduate opportunities because there are only 1-2 openings at the major hospitals around Seattle. I have no experience for the rest of the nursing jobs, plus no one is willing to hire an RN who will just quit as soon as she finds a nurse practitioner position. So frustrating.

Well that's all for now. Hope everyone out there is well.

Radiation DONE!!!

Radiation DONE!!!! 'Nuff Said.

Chemo DONE

Chemo is DONE! hopefully I never have to spend another day in the chemically-rank infusion ward! Now just 6 more radiation treatments!

I have enough hair to make little spikes! And full eyebrows! And a stupid rectangular sunburn on my back where I got radiation :(

Radiation sucks!

Not much to report. Radiation sucks. I'm so tired that I can do about one errand a day, and that errand is to drive to radiation. I don't have any diarrhea, but I have been nauseous a few times in the last week. Kinda randomly. And I am starting to get really bad chemo brain. I'm forgetful and am having a hard time bring up words to mind when speaking. Arghhhhhhhhhhh over a week to go...

I see the radiation oncologist once a week to go over my symptoms and the progress of the treatments. At our last meeting he recommended that I do an extra 3 treatments aimed at the area over my para-aortic nodes where the highest tumor was found. I was like, whatever, what's 3 extra days going to matter? Well we'll see now cause I'm getting really tired of this.

My doctor hadn't order a CA-125 for me yet so I demanded to get it drawn last week. I feel like they have totally forgotten about me- I hadn't had the test in almost 3 month! But all is good, I got it back and it was 9! I think that is my second lowest number yet. And it had better be cause I'm not doing this double whammy preventative chemo-radiation combo for nothing!

Other than that... My sis came to visit last week. We spend a good portion of the time napping or watching movies on my bed. She was just as tired as me! We did go to Karaoke and a fun Madonna-Elvis party though. She dressed up like Like-A-Virgin Madonna in a white corset, and I did the whole cone-boob thing. They were rocking costumes! Pictures to come...

Radiation grind

Just been doing the grind lately: chemo on mondays, radiation monday-friday. Radiation is definitely annoying because I have to plan my day around whatever time I have to be there for the day. I don't really have a set schedule at the moment, so each day I ask what's available and show up then. It only takes 20 minutes, but it's 20 minutes to drive there. They only offer it M-F until 4:30pm as well, so I don't know what people do who have a life to work around... what if people still want to work? Not that this applies to me at all, where I concern myself around whether or not it's warm enough to go to the lake and what to make for lunch. At least I get to socialize a little more during the day (usually I am alone during the day because everyone else is at work) at radiation- I have the same 3 techs every time. One girl is super cool- she is my age and is married to a musician. She listens to the same music as me and always changes the pop-music which is playing on the ipod when I come in to her special mix. It makes the whole process just a little easier...

Chemo isn't so bad. It sucks to have to be back in the Infusion ward. I was so excited to leave that place. I even have the same nurse as before. Luckily, I don't have all the side effects this time- radiation caused much more nausea and fatigue than chemo last week. All I have now is that good ole' metallic taste that I missed so much...

Other than that not much is going on. I went to another funk show last night which was pretty awesome. I wore my long rainbow-colored striped socks with my red wig. I looked like I shoulda been in a Skittles advertisement. Anyways, this is the first time I've worn my wig in awhile. I finally have just enough hair to not wear anything- no scarf, no wig. Last week we had this record-breaking heatwave- 103 deg high- so I got used to going scarfless. It's kinda nice because my hair is really soft and my head stays cool. I never thought for the life of me that I would be sporting a supershort pixie cut.

That's it for now..my sister comes next week to visit so I can't wait for that!