I thought that after two rounds of chemo, I’d pretty much know all the side effects. I was wrong.
The third chemo cycle has whacked with a whammy.
Each chemo treatment has presented slightly different side effects from the previous one. With chemo #3, it’s been more than a slight difference on this seventh day of my treatment cycle. I now understand what other cancer patients say about getting through chemo and how it gets tougher as you advance through more treatments.
With the first and second chemo infusions, I would feel rough on day three. By the eve of day four, I was bouncing back to better energy levels and stronger emotional and physical health. By day five, I could feel that I was slowly starting to get better.
It came as quite a surprise that this third chemo session has hit as hard as it has these past few days. It shouldn’t have been a surprise, as medical professionals treating cancer patients tell them that chemo side effects are cumulative as more of the medicine stays in their system after each infusion.
Yesterday, I was one-third through this current chemo cycle. I have yet to bounce back to better energy levels and stronger emotional and physical health. I am now getting familiar with chemo fatigue.
As a cancer patient, you are well educated about chemo fatigue, but you really don’t know what it’s like until you start to experience it. I am now experiencing it.
Chemo fatigue makes you feel more than just tired. There is lethargy with chemo fatigue - a mental, emotional, and physical tiredness. There are times when you literally struggle to move your body, even if its just a few steps or climbing a set of stairs. Your memory tends to fail you with all of the chemo drugs in your body.
This third chemo cycle has redefined sleep deprivation in my life. I have never been a good sleeper, but it’s gotten much worse while living with cancer and chemo.
With the lack of sleep, a side effect of the chemo that has arisen is clogged sinuses. With this chemo cycle, my head has been stuffing up at the end of each day as if I had a bad cold. Overnight, I will reach points where I can’t breathe because I am so stuffed up. It forces me to wake up several times a night to hydrate my mouth. The ongoing “chemo dry mouth,” is now further compounded because of mouth breathing with clogged sinuses. The head cold symptoms do pass once I get up and move around.
Presently, a “good” night’s rest will have me sleep three solid, uninterrupted hours. Any sleep time after that is a bonus. The bad part of all of this is that I have never been a napper, so catching up on sleep during the day seldom happens. Maybe it will with advancing chemo fatigue.
Throughout my cancer journey, I have been emotionally strong until these past few days of chemo cycle #3. There is now an emotional frailty that has unexpectedly crept in with this third chemo cycle. The littlest day-to-day things can set off a river of tears that rise up in me from nowhere.
I’m also acquiring new fears because of the many treatment related complications that have beset me. I have to be selective in where I go in public places due to cleanliness concerns that can pose an infection with my chemo-lowered immunity. I also have to watch my contact with people who may be sick as they too are an infection risk, so my social life is affected. These concerns, when combined with the various chemo complications make me want to stay close to home, rather than be out for any extended period of time. Consequently, I am becoming more selective on where I go, and with whom I spend time.
However, one of the biggest whammies with this chemo cycle is the loss of appetite, which has really shaken me. Until now, I’d been feeling well enough to eat and enjoy most foods while undergoing treatment. This is a perplexing phenomenon for me. For a foodie, this loss of appetite is disconcerting. It comes with a reduced sense of smell and taste, accompanied by a constant acidy-metallic dry taste in my mouth. Many foods now disagree with me.
From when I rise to when I turn in at the end of the day, I have no desire to eat anything. I don’t have the smallest scrap of an appetite. My stomach hurts because it’s empty, but food is unappetizing—especially raw fruits and vegetables, acidy foods, and any kind of meat. I literally have to force myself to eat. For anyone, food is fuel, but its even more critical for cancer patients to repair chemo damaged cells with proper nutrition.
It’s a new chapter of struggle in this cancer journey. Each day, I make a vow to renew this cancer fight with Strength, Courage, and Determination.
This week marks closing one chapter in my cancer chemo treatments and lays the groundwork for opening a new chemo chapter in the next few weeks.
I have finished my first set of three chemotherapy injections. As I had been forewarned, this round of chemo is taking a while longer for me to bounce back from due to the cumulative effect chemo has on one’s body.
Today is chemo day #4. I am still feeling a bit nauseated and out of sorts. In the last two chemo cycles of chemo, today’s out of sorts day would have been day three. With each successive chemo cycle, one can expect to add another day to recovery, so after today’s out of sorts day, tomorrow should have me feeling better.
Three chemo treatments are now finished with the first phase of treatments. Three more are to come with a new cycle of chemo drugs. The next three cycles of chemo will be harder to endure as the injected cocktail will be harsher on my body than the first one.
I will be required to pre-medicate before treatment as the potency of Taxotere—my next chemo drug--has more side effects and possible allergic reaction than the first compound, so medication is used in advance to minimize complications.
The three cycles of the second chemotherapy drug will be hard on finger and toe nails, so I will be supplied with ice packs for my hands and feet to offset the possible loss of nails with treatment. As well, Taxotere can create painful side effects in joints and muscles, which is the side effect most cancer patients say is hardest to deal with in receiving this cancer-fighting drug.
I also met this week with my radiation oncologist who advised that I would need 16 rounds of targeted radiation for the last phase of aggressive breast cancer treatments.
The daily rounds of radiation will be 15 minutes each and will start six weeks after my last chemo cycle in November. I can expect to be in radiotherapy before Christmas this year and running into mid January. Supposedly the side effects are much lessened than those with chemotherapy, although I can expect some minor discomfort in the treatment area akin to sunburn.
Today also marks the start of the next round of Neupogen white cell count booster injections so that my chemotherapy can continue on schedule. By next Thursday, the injections will be over for this chemo cycle, so I am looking forward to not having to contend with muscle and joint pain for a few days when the needles are done.
As predicted, chemo is slowly starting to get tougher to get through. I am feeling a bit more fatigued than the last cycle, which I am told is a normal reaction. I feel a need to rest and sleep more.
As the chemotherapy continues to accumulate in my body, I am learning more about slowing down and listening to my body. I move on more slowly in my treatments and do so with Strength, Courage, and Determination.
As I write this blog, the smell of freshly baked bread wafts through the house. I’ve returned to the pleasure of making home made bread today to amuse myself while under treatment. It’s one of my boredom busters.
There is something soulful about baking bread from scratch and smelling it throughout the house as it rises and bakes on this late summer day.
I took on making bread today because I feel quite well in this third week of my second chemo treatment. I am counting down to my third chemo session next Tuesday, which will be halfway through this second stage of fighting cancer.
Living with a cancer diagnosis seems so far away as I get lost in baking for a few hours today. It is a joyful time. I’ve been waiting to do this for some time, as my right (dominant) arm hasn’t been strong enough to bake bread since before my mastectomy this past spring. I am thoroughly savoring the experience.
While combines ride over Manitoba fields harvesting wheat, oats, rye, and barley at this time of year, I’m reading recipes that don’t use any of the flours made from these grains for the baking I am doing. Unfortunately, my gluten intolerance disallows using of any of these wonderful grains in baking.
Instead, my culinary flours come mostly from far away places, some with exotic sounding names. Recipes I am using today will comprise of several combinations of flours including: amaranth, sweet rice, garfava bean, sorghum, chickpea, urad (black lentils), corn, quinoa, brown and white rice, coconut, mesquite, potato, soy, bajra (millet and rice), buckwheat, millet, teff, and tapioca.
Ground almonds and flax, potato, corn, and tapioca starches, sunflower, pumpkin, millet, sesame, chia and poppy seeds, honey, cider vinegar and maple syrup will round out the recipes and add delightful tastes to the breads that will be made. Because gluten free flours don’t bind dough or batter the way gluten does, xanthan or guar gum will be used to do so.
The lack of gluten also means that one bakes bread without kneading dough, relying on drop batter to form breads. There is a definite knack in baking with gluten free flours, and after several years and many recipes later, I am finally starting to master the art of gluten free baking.
Today’s baking will result in breads that are healthier and tastier than any gluten free breads I can find locally in stores, and far less costly. By the end of the baking session, I will have made savory, dessert, and sandwich breads. All of them will taste quite similar to their equivalents made with traditional flours, but their texture will be slightly different.
Breakfast tomorrow will be a treat as gluten free foods can make the first meal of the day a challenge!
More Boredom Busters
Yesterday, I bid adieu to several pots of summer flowers that surrendered to this year’s growing season. They were no longer able to endure the long stretches of scorching heat, downpours of rain and gusty winds that we’ve experienced these past few weeks. By Labor Day, I expect that the rest of the patio flowerpots will have also surpassed their summer glory.
It was nice to have something concrete to do to take away the boredom for part of the day.
Yesterday’s weather was a pleasant change with lower temperatures. I welcomed the lower temperature, as I was finally able to be outside comfortably. The blood thinner and chemo drugs I am on make tolerating hot weather and humidity difficult, and there is a heightened sensitivity to sunburn while under chemo treatment. However, yesterday’s air felt like a whiff of fall outside with a daytime high temperature of +17.
As I worked and looked around the yard and neighborhood, the signs of summer ending are surfacing everywhere. Slowly, summer is drawing to a close.
Early morning dew was on the windshields of vehicles parked outside. Some leaves in our back yard are starting to turn yellow. The return of wasps around our windows is a sure sign that late summer has arrived. In the near future, we will have our first frost, signaling that summer is over. Next week, schools will open their doors to welcome this year’s classes of students. Cocooning for colder weather isn’t far away…
Yesterday also marked a return to part of my past.
It’s been over 20 years since my sewing machine and I were well acquainted. It took me two weeks to get my courage up and convince myself that sewing might be a good boredom buster, as I find ways to occupy my time from now until next summer when I may be able to return to work.
As with anything new that I undertake in life, I need to spend some time ruminating about what I want to do and how to tackle the project. I also need to prepare to get the things I need in place before I start a project. Getting reacquainted with my sewing machine was no different.
So, I’ve spent the last two weeks in and out or fabric and second hand stores scouring for supplies. Our dining room and spare bedroom have been converted into sewing and sewing storage stations.
I will ease into projects that were once familiar by using cheaper materials until my comfort level rises, and I have once again mastered the intricacies of sewing and using my machine. The last time I sewed extensively was over 20 years ago when my kids were small and I was a stay-at-home mom.
My goal with returning to sewing is to learn how to quilt so that I can make tapestry quilts. It has been something I have wanted to do for a very long time, but didn’t have the chance to do so while raising a family and building a career over the past three decades. My cancer diagnosis is giving me a chance to do something that was put on hold for a long time.
With chemo being an unpredictable experience with each treatment, it would be difficult to attend classes to learn how to quilt. I’ll learn the art through self-teaching using two new “how to quilt” books I purchased.
Eventually, I will have to figure out what to do with the stockpile of items that will be made. Ten months is a long time to be productive with a sewing machine! My daughter says I should open an on-line store on an artisan web site. Perhaps this could take care of the “mental” challenge that’s missing for me with treatments. It might be fun to create a business plan to do so.
With September upon us next week, I have enrolled in two classes for cancer patients that start next month. One class is in art, the other in yoga. Both are new experiences for me. The classes are designed to give patients alternatives in learning to live with their disease, and provide tools to manage the stress that comes with a life-threatening diagnosis.
I look forward to the changing of the seasons, my new classes, and the challenges that lie ahead in finding things to keep me occupied. I continue to walk on this cancer journey with Strength, Courage, and Determination.
Today is day six of my second chemotherapy cycle. I’m feeling a bit chilled as I look out my window to a dreary Manitoba sky and an unusually low August day time temperature of 16°
Chemo cycle two has been similar to the first cycle with day three once again making me feel “out of sorts”, with the poison percolating in my body. This time, I didn’t lose my sense of taste and have a less intense metal taste in my mouth. I still have dry mouth. I am more tired though than the first cycle, which is something that I have been forewarned about and is expected to increase with each treatment.
By the time my sixth treatment cycle occurs, I’ve been told that the fatigue will dominate my life and I won’t feel up to doing anything but resting.
As well, because I have acquired a low white blood cell count condition called “neutropenia” as a result of my first cycle of chemotherapy, I’m now navigating through having Neupogen in my body and dealing with its side effects. Neupogen will be part of my chemotherapy regime until I complete the sixth cycle of treatments.
I was prescribed this white cell count booster drug to stimulate my bone marrow to produce more white blood cells so that my chemotherapy cycles could resume to three-week intervals. Neupogen is also needed to help prevent infections because the army of white blood cell counts in my body needed to fight off infection is not as plentiful due to being killed off with chemotherapy.
My doctor said that I can expect two main side effects with Neupogen--bone and/or muscle pain. The injections are given daily for seven days on the same side of my body as the blood thinner, alternating sides each day.
Generally, Neupogen is injected in the abdomen. Because my tummy is already bruised and tender with the daily blood thinner injections, my chemotherapy nurse recommended that Neupogen be given in my upper arm. The Neupogen needles can still be very painful like the blood thinner shots, but at least they don’t leave me feeling tender and bruised.
My first day Neupogen was two days ago with a 7:00 a.m. injection in addition to the daily blood thinner needle. It was only a matter of hours before I could feel Neupogen at work in my body on the first day of the injection.
As I was getting groceries on Friday afternoon, an achy fatigue started in my calves. I’ve felt this ache before when I over-exerted at the gym or took too long a hike when my body should have quit earlier. The aching has not left since it arrived.
Yesterday, I could feel the aching starting earlier in the day. By last night, I gave in and took some Tylenol to make coping with the aches more comfortable. The only other recommended relief for the pain is warm baths.
Today, the aching is pretty much constant. It hurts even more if I bear weight on my legs for any length of time.
Neupogen is an interesting drug. It is made using E-coli bacteria and is extremely expensive. The daily one ml dose is $200. I need seven doses of the drug during each chemotherapy cycle. Fortunately, the costs of it are covered by the organization treating me for cancer. Yet another gift I have been given by our provincial cancer organization to fight off cancer in my body.
Although I am feeling a bit tough today, I realize that this discomfort provides me with dividends in my fight against cancer. I’m moving a bit slower, but I continue on this cancer journey with Strength, Courage, and Determination.
After one week’s delay due to extremely low white blood cell counts, I was finally able to undergo my second round of chemo treatment today. Yesterday, I again needed to have my central port IV line cleared with more blood thinners to enable blood tests for chemo prep.
The chemotherapy treatment centre is an interesting place of contrasts. The environment is one of serious medicine in treating life-threatening cancer diagnoses combined with cheery surroundings and calm. Several devoted chemotherapy nurses work very hard to allay patient fears, provide education, and bring comfort and hope in a time of angst.
The treatment room faces south. The wall of windows lets warm rays of sunshine light up the room and creates cozy comfort. On cloudy days, you can watch the clouds change colour and dance in formation across the city’s prairie sky.
There is a reception desk, a small waiting area, bathrooms, two treatment bays of four recliners each, two beds, and three private treatment rooms. A nursing station sits in the corner for nurses to observe patients, do the required patient paperwork, and field phone calls. IV poles and pumps, syringe disposal containers, medical supply carts, and garbage cans round out the ambience of the room at each station. From Monday to Friday anywhere from 30-70 cancer patients are treated daily at the facility.
A classical guitarist may come by and provide soothing music to relax patients undergoing treatment. Overhead t.v.’s can be accessed to distract patients from witnessing deadly poison being injected into their veins to chase and kill cancer cells.
The nurses are constantly available to field questions and to provide assurance to patients with their treatments. If one is cold, heated blankets are available to soothe your chilled body to warmth. An array of magazines are available should one wish to read. Facial tissue boxes are placed at each treatment station, along with a visitor’s chair.
Some patients bring in their own distractions, which may include personal portable DVD players or laptop computers. Others choose to play cards or do crossword puzzles. Some patients simply visit with their companions who drove them to their treatment.
Volunteers from the cancer care program stand by eagerly waiting to hand out patient treats of juices, tea, coffee, and cookies. If you’re being infused over the lunch hour, you will be asked if you want a cup of hot soup and crackers. At the food station, water is on standby to hydrate patients to aid in flushing chemotherapy out of the body. Crushed ice is available to help minimize side effects of some chemotherapy drugs while one is being treated.
The spectrum of patients being treated includes occasional young adults, and a few middle-agers. A good majority of patients who are receiving chemo are seniors. In my early 50’s, I feel young and old amongst the group being treated depending on the patient mix on the days I’m there.
On my first visit, a chemotherapy nurse whose homeland is Korea treated me. She came to the chemo unit four years ago via nursing stints in intensive care and oncology wards. She was kind, upbeat, and very thorough in her teachings about the three chemotherapy drugs that would be sequentially injected into my body.
Today’s treatment was slightly different than the first time. My chemo nurse came to the centre via Lethbridge three years ago in association with her husband’s work transfer to our city. She was kind, attentive, compassionate, and made sure I was comfortable. It took three heated blankets before I was warm today--the coldness likely came as a result of getting up too early on the treatment day anticipating what was to come.
Today also featured an orientation on how to inject neuprogen—the blood cell boost medication I am required to take on days four to ten of each chemo cycle to prevent my white cell count from dipping too low and delaying treatments. This medication is made from e-coli bacteria and requires delicate handling and refrigeration.
With neuprogen, my husband adds another needle medication to the blood thinners that he has to inject me with each morning. I simply can’t give myself these needles. I get lightheaded each time I get a needle, and have been advised by my treatment nurse to lie down for a few minutes after each injection until I rebound.
When neuprogen is added to the daily blood thinner injections, the supporting drug costs in addition to the anti-nausea steroids is over $2,400 a month. I can’t imagine what the costs of the chemo prescriptions are. Our medicare system and the cancer treatment unit cover the costs of some of these drugs, but not all of them. This cancer fight is not only taxing on the body and spirit, but also on the cheque book.
Two chemo treatments are completed. There are four more to go. I take small steps forward in continuing to walk in this cancer journey with Strength, Courage, and Determination.
This past Sunday our daughter and her husband were wed, while on the same day our son and daughter-in-law took possession of their first house. It was a big day in the lives of our four kids and their parents. There was happiness and excitement all around for different reasons.
The whirling of the wedding weekend began on Friday morning. I was scheduled to go to the cancer treatment facility for blood tests to assess my red and white blood cell counts in preparation for my second round of chemo to follow two days after the wedding.
The oncology nurse who was to draw blood for the tests had difficulty collecting samples as my central port line had a blockage. I was injected with yet another blood thinner to clear a blood clot that had plugged the line preventing it from allowing blood to flow easily for the tests. An hour and a half later, the line was cleared and blood samples could be collected.
Prior to the blood tests, I had been feeling an indescribable fatigue on Thursday and again on Friday morning. When the test results were delivered Friday afternoon, the fatigue made sense. My white blood cell count was at 0.50, when it should have been at 1.2-1.5 to enable my second chemo infusion in four days. I felt frustrated and discouraged because my body let me down once again in this cancer fight—all the worse because our daughter’s wedding was in two days.
So with this blood test result came a new set of dire warnings and precautions. My body had very low immunity and was very highly susceptible to infection from day to day contact with people that one takes for granted.
My oncologist’s nurse warned me that with the wedding on the weekend, I was to restrict my contact with all people. No congratulatory hugs and kisses in a receiving line or elsewhere. No contact with people who had any kind of illness as simple as a cold or flu. I had to wash my hands often. Wearing gloves during the wedding and reception was deemed a positive move.
If my body temperature reached 38°+, I was to report immediately to an emergency ward despite the wedding, as my body would be housing some kind of infection that could be deadly if left untreated as I had very low white blood cell counts to fight it off.
If it weren’t for our daughter’s wedding, I would have likely been advised to stay home and rest all weekend to aid in elevating my white blood cell count.
Consequently, because of the low white cell counts, my second chemotherapy treatment was postponed for another week. I will have more blood tests done on Aug. 9 to assess my blood cell counts to see if chemo can resume as rescheduled on Aug. 10.
As well, I will now need to have another series of daily injections to boost my blood cell counts so that my chemotherapy treatments can resume to a three-week treatment cycle, and make me less prone to infections.
I will meet with my doctor this Friday to discuss the risks and benefits of the blood cell booster treatment, which will take place daily from days four to 10 in my next chemotherapy treatment cycle and subsequent ones to follow.
The Wedding Day
In one part of the city early in the morning, our son and daughter in law were packing breakable items into their car, and dodging downpours of rain while driving to their new home to drop things off and breathe in the rewards of first time home ownership.
Across town in our house, we had a hairstylist and make-up artist enhance the beauty of a bride and her maidens in preparation for an early Sunday afternoon wedding. Extended family loaded up trucks and cars to transport wedding flowers and decorations to the church and reception venue.
As the ladies were made more beautiful, the bridal parents and groom’s parents down the street watched weather forecasts on the Internet to see how long the rain was to stay.
On the morning of the wedding, it poured for several hours. By the time it was 1:00 p.m., the sun broke through the clouds and left us with a glorious Manitoba summer day for several hours into late evening when it rained again.
Our daughter looked gorgeous in her paternal grandmother’s 56-year-old vintage wedding dress. She smiled throughout the wedding ceremony at her handsome groom.
It was a day to remember and one that they will cherish for the rest of their lives. It was heartwarming to see the joy in each of their faces during the wedding ceremony and thereafter.
It was a day that was rife with all kinds of emotion. I felt elated and sad at the same time in not being well enough to feel fully present in experiencing our daughter’s wedding day due to weakness, low energy levels, and fatigue with my low blood cell counts. The heat and humidity added to the ill feelings. Admittedly, I was frustrated in being prevented from fully experiencing this big day in our daughter’s life because of my medical condition.
My cancer diagnosis was not going to prevent me in being present as best as I could during this wedding celebration. We celebrated with a wedding ceremony rehearsal and dinner on Friday, a traditional Ukrainian wedding wreath making ceremony on Saturday night, the wedding on Sunday, and a post-wedding garden party to open wedding gifts on Monday.
When it was all over, I was exhausted and feeling down for not being able to completely immerse myself into the fullness of the wedding weekend as I fight with cancer.
My dear friend Marianne put things into perspective for me in reflecting about the wedding. She reminded me that I was blessed to be able to attend the wedding after a cancer diagnosis, a mastectomy, cellulitis, and a wedding week countdown that dealt with a blood clot, blood thinners, and low white cell counts.
The Happy First Time Homeowners
As I write this blog, our son and daughter-in-law are overseeing movers coming to their place to load up a truck with their possessions to move to their new home. They have a lot eagerness and excitement in moving out of a rental property into an owned house that they can officially call their home.
They have chosen a 101-year-old character home in the south central part of the city. The home has been lovingly maintained and up kept. Several renovations and modifications have been made. The bonus for them is that the owners sold the house vs. someone who bought the house to flip it and make a profit.
In all, the kids looked at 250 houses via internet and real estate agent listings. They saw over 40 houses in person. The house they bought was the last house that they visited. They were in a bidding war with two other interested parties, but the owners chose to sell to them as they had no encumbrances with their offer to purchase.
Tomorrow, we will share in their joy of home ownership as we plan to visit them amongst their boxes and unpacking. The guys will assemble some new furniture that has been bought, while I will keep my daughter-in-law company while she places possessions in new places.
Unfortunately, I can only be a visiting observer in the moving process. I have to minimize my activities and need to be careful to not get overtired leading into a chemotherapy treatment in the next few days.
However, I will be in the midst of much merriment and sharing in the dreams of kids who are celebrating the satisfaction of owning their first home. It is yet another reward of being parents to adult kids who are finding their way in the world.
We will officially celebrate the ownership of their house with them on Aug. 20 during an open house “housewarming” party and tour they are planning for family and friends.
It has been a busy and heartwarming week. Living with cancer was put aside for a few days to celebrate the gifts of children and their mates in our lives. I live on with a new level of gratitude for the gifts of love, family, and friends in my life. With their help, I will continue my fight against cancer with Strength, Courage, and Determination.
Writer’s Note: this is being posted one week late due to our daughter’s wedding this past week.
An interesting sensory experience entered my world of chemotherapy these past three days. I’m calling it chemo head.
Chemo head is the feeling that your scalp is being stretched to the point of tenderness to the touch. It leaves your head with a unique throbbing sensation, which is different than a headache. A friend, Andrea, who is a breast cancer survivor, aptly describes it as the tension of wearing a tight ponytail that throbs once you release it from being held in place. Except that this tension is on your head 24 hours a day.
Chemo head makes sleeping difficult as resting your head on a pillow aggravates the pressure of the tender scalp. Cancer patients are advised to buy satin pillowcases to ease the pressure points that come with a tender scalp while in chemo treatments. I am now on a mission to find this luxurious bed linen.
My oncology nurse warned me that there would be a tingling sensation that comes with chemo when your hair is starting to fall out. There is tingling to be sure, but this throbbing coupled with an extremely dry and tight scalp are different than what I was expecting.
I knew that this was the precursor of chemo side effects that would lead to hair loss. It certainly is. I have been losing my hair everywhere for the last three days. So much so, that they tell you in the cancer care "Look Good, Feel Better" program that once this starts it's wise to put on a head cover so that your hair doesn’t fall everywhere you go, particularly around food and kitchen prep areas. My hat wardrobe has been deployed.
Coping with a chemo scalp condition puts you in a quandary. You know you’re going to lose your hair and you debate about holding onto it as long as you can knowing that you’re moulting everywhere.
Cancer survivors have said that when the scalp throbbing starts they get a set of electric clippers and cut off what remains of their hair. The end result is that the clipping minimizes the throbbing sensations you feel as your brittle hair breaks off and comes out in clumps in your hands whenever you wash or handle it.
It seems counter-intuitive to get rid of your hair before it falls out. I did it anyway. There is something liberating about having control of how you lose your hair. With cancer little else is in your control. After three days of a throbbing scalp, I bravely took out the clippers and shaved my head. There was immediate relief on the old noggin! Amazing. I had a great sleep last night because of it.
Today I greet the day with a new “hat-itude”. I don my caps with a sense of satisfaction knowing I had a say in how I would lose my hair. I’ll shed what is left of my hair these next few days and continue my fight against cancer with Strength, Courage, and Determination.