Shift, Return

It’s Thursday morning and we’re back from the wilds of southern California.  We had the cold caps in the car at the airport, so on our way home from the airport we stopped at PraxAir and dropped them off with JJ in the deep freeze.  We’ve already picked them back up this morning (along with the dry ice de jour) and had breakfast, both while Deb was on a conference call and a webinar.  That’s OK, though, since I do most of the dry ice portioning and prep on a usual basis anyway, and Deb had already told me what to order for her for breakfast.

Deb weathered the trip to the House of Mouse well, all things considered.  She didn’t really have any neuropathy to speak of, but that usually only becomes noticeable when her hands are cold and that wasn’t a problem in Anaheim.  Nausea was a slightly different story, but it didn’t really hit her at any times when we were moving about or possibly being jostled (either while on a ride or just trying to move through the madding crowd). Mostly it affected her when she was hungry, so we have found that smaller, more frequent meals tend to help with that.

Speaking of side effects, we don’t know whether what she’s had over the last week are enough to make Dr. Ahmed decide to forego Taxol again or not.  We should find that out when we see her officially at 11:40.  Deb did see her briefly while passing in the hallway a few minutes ago after Deb was up in the infusion area to have her weekly blood-draw, but they didn’t talk about anything more than the cold caps and making sure that they have the literature on them so other patients can know about them.  We will have to wait and see.  I will update this post accordingly.

And yes, I did actually attend sessions (and present during one of them) at the conference instead of spending all of our time at the parks.  Deb even got to meet one of my favorite professors, Dr. Schneider, and also have dinner one evening with Dr. Schneider and one of my classmates and his wife.  Not to say that we didn’t get to ride all of the rides we wanted to ride.  I think Deb will be happy at any park that has a roller coaster, and one that has four or five is even better.  But the fact that I had sessions to attend allowed us to hop over to the park for a little while and them back to the hotel so Deb could rest while I was busy at the conference.

I did find her a little something, though.  I stepped into one of the plethora of shops and happened to notice, among the variety of different mouse ears they sell (there are hundreds), one particular set I hadn’t seen anyone else wearing.  But they are just the right shade of Breast Cancer Pink, so I snapped them up right then.  From then on Deb was only allowed to take them off while on a roller coaster or to go to bed.  I’m thinking she will have to wear them over the cold caps today if she gets taxol.

Isn’t she adorable?

One last note.  We saw Deb’s plastic surgeon last week before we left.  He seems pleased with Deb’s progress recovering from the mastectomy and we have set a tentative date for her restoration surgery.  More to follow as we go along.

:::: LATE BREAKING UPDATE ::::

We have seen Dr. Ahmed and she feels that Deb's side effects have improved enough that she will receive Taxol today in addition to the Herceptin, which is what she is getting right now as I type this.  The first cold cap is on her head and she's chilling out (ha ha) while checking her email on her phone.  Chemoday 10 of 12 has begun (remember that we skipped 8 and 9, and that I'm only counting the Taxol weeks and not the Herceptin weeks, which will continue every three weeks after the first 12 for the remainder of a year (so around March 2017).