Just One...

Time is marching on.
One day at a time......

Mom is feeling well but the chemo is not working so far.
Some of us are handling all of this better than others. Mom seems to be handling it better than most of us. Which is a very good thing.

Her hair has stopped falling out. I know that some people do not lose their hair to chemo but when hers started going I was sure it would all go. Oddly enough MY hair is now falling out more than hers is. I'm sure someone who is fluent in psycho-babble can explain that to me.

I love the people that tell you to suck it up. It's your mother not you that is going through this. Oh how I know that. But this is affecting all of us because we love her. She is a part of me just like my right arm is a part of me... How can it not affect me?

Don't get me wrong- I don't walk around weeping and whining all of the time. I don't bring it up in conversation with my friends or acquaintances. I answer when people ask how she is..

Someone asked how I can write here. It is my therapy. It helps me tremendously to get my feelings out. I don't have any close friends that I can just pick up the phone and talk to all hours of the day and night. It also helps to receive comments from people who have been through this or who just care.

I also believe with all of my heart that it helps when people say a prayer for a woman they've never met.

If that happens only once then I believe that my writing is the right thing to do.....

still learning...

As I said, I've learned a lot about my parents these past few months. I've also learned a lot about cancer.

One thing I've learned is that there are still people out there who are very uncomfortable with the word cancer. There was a time that you didn't say it out loud. You said, "The C Word", instead. I really thought in this day and age where cancer isn't immediately a death sentence, and we openly remind women to do self breast exams that people would not react to the word the way they do. But those people are out there, and they're the ones you'd least expect, and they look at you as if you've just subjected them to a string of obscenities...

I've also learned about ovarian cancer and genetics. Ovarian cancer is rare in the general population. When two women from the same family have OVCA, the red flags are raised. There are two gene mutations that have been identified that can cause both ovarian and breast cancer. If you've inherited one of these genes your risk of developing one or both of these cancers skyrockets.

As I am typing this, a sample of my mother's blood is flying across the country to a lab that will extract her DNA from it and look for this gene mutation. It is too late to help her, but if they find this mutation, it may help many other women in our family. Including J's daughters.......

better days...

The last few days have been wonderful. Mom seems almost back to her old self. She's still weak but they have the pain under control, and she is eating and sleeping again. Her outlook is cheerful and positive.

We went wig shopping and found two beautiful ones that look very much like her style now. Amazingly, her hair stopped falling out and doesn't look any thinner. She says she's going to get it cut short. Then when it all starts to really go, she's going to take control of it herself and have it shaved.

Dad told me if she asked him to, he would shave his too, but he's not going to volunteer. He said he's afraid what he has left will never grow back. All these years we've tip-toed around the hair subject so as not to hurt his feelings and we find he has a sense of humor about it. I've learned a lot about my parents these past few months.

a cruel coincidence.....

A couple of days ago, mom developed temp of about 102. We would have been really worried, but she had just had blood drawn the day before, and her white count was good. They told her to take tylenol for the fever and wait and see...
The next day she started feeling better. The fever was gone and so was the vomiting.
We then found out that two people she had been exposed to had a stomach virus that is going around.

The consensus now is that, in a cruel coincidence, mom contracted this stomach virus right after her first chemo treatment. I know how bad I feel when I'm sick with something like that. I can't even imagine how bad she felt.

Her outlook is much more positive now. She's starting to get some strength back, and is finally sleeping through the night.

She's ready for the next round.........