Cancer Update

We have been busy here at the Gressman house. But I am finally feeling like things might slow down a little so we can have a peaceful summer. I need to play catch-up on some past events - things like Kearyn's 2nd birthday :-).

Anyway, just a quick update on the cancer stuff. I met with the doc again today and everything seems fine. He set my next scan for September. He said I passed with an A+ today and that made me happy. A's always made me happy in school and I guess life is no different. Jason calls me a nerd and says a B would not kill me but in the case of cancer - I am going to stick with being a nerd and continue to try to get those A's. ;-)

Hope you all are well.

Blessings,
Andrea

P.S. Please keep all those who are currently battling in your thoughts and prayers. I have recently been made aware of several people going back in a 2nd, 3rd, 4th+ times for treatment again. It breaks my heart to see them having to go through that and I pray for them so often. Please join me in prayer for them and for all of those we don't know by name.

I am Now Port Free :-)

As mentioned in my last post, I got my port out today. :-) And it was one of the creepiest experiences of my life. I was obviously all numbed up. The doc was really good at giving me more numbing stuff the couple of times I did feel pain. That was nice of him. But it was still very weird.

The best way to describe it was like when you run your nails down a chalk board and grind your teeth at the same time. Yeah, creepy huh? It was just super awkward and very strange to be awake during the experience.

He of course could not get the port out of the original incision so he had to cut a bigger one. The procedure took about an hour. Evidently you have to sew the port to the person when you put it in. I did not know that because I was knocked out when he put it in. He apparently did a very good job at attaching it to me because it took a great deal of time to un-attach it from me.

I am now super sore. I had forgotten how sore I was when they put it in - until now. Now I remember. My cute little precious baby girl is not helping much either. She still views me as her own personal jungle gym and is completely unaware of any hardship that I am enduring at the moment. The story of being a mom. :-) I wouldn't trade it for anything.

I will share more about my day tomorrow. Including some photo opportunities. :-) No, not of the port removal. That would be what I like to call an "over-share".

For now I am all doped up on Tylenol and ready for bed. Yeah, I go straight for the hard stuff. ;-)

Be blessed!
Andrea

A Big Day Today....

During my update of my last scan results I mentioned that I would be getting my port out.............. Well, today is that day!!!!

I almost missed the boat on this one - at least temporarily. Since I wasn't feeling well I waited a couple of days before I called to make the appointment. So when I called last week they informed me that the doc was going on vacation for two weeks and Tuesday (today) was the very last appointment that I could get or I would have had to wait until he got back. Waiting wouldn't have killed me. After all, I have had this thing for 13 months now - what's 2 more weeks. But it is something I want done pretty badly and I was happy that they had one last appointment for me. :-) 

So, 3:30pm today I will be saying goodbye to my port and will finally be free of all foreign devises in my body. Fortunately they can just remove it from the office and it is not necessary to be admitted into the hospital like when they put it in. Pretty excited about that. Pretty excited about the whole thing actually. :-) 

I hope you are all having a very blessed week this week. 

Blessings,

Andrea

I Now Have Shingles....Awesome

I noticed a couple of red bumps the other day on my back. There were maybe 4-5 of them - no big deal but still weird because they were in this perfectly straight line. I mentioned it to J and that was it.

The next day there were a couple of more. I thought it was something I wore that caused a reaction. I don't use anything but natural cleansers in my house so I knew it couldn't be anything like that. But again dismissed it.

This morning I woke up and itched my back and realized that they were still there and now there were like 15 of them. Then it hit me. I bet I have shingles.

Why my mind would go there or even know to go there - I don't know. I researched it once upon a time and remembered that they always occur in a strip on one side of the body. (Yes. Evidently my brain does remember things like that. Could be helpful in a trivia game someday - you never know.) So, I immediately Googled "shingles" cause that is just what I do. Big mistake.

They were the most frightening pictures ever. My little 3 inch x 1/2 inch section looks like nothing compared to what others deal with. But this did prompt me to go to the doctor immediately because I did not want to turn out like those pictures. Yikes!

Sure enough, I do have shingles. I was like the 3rd patient in 2 days that the doc has diagnosed so evidently it is going around and because of the cancer and my weak immune system of course it throws me into a higher risk bracket to get it. Oh the perks of cancer. They do not cease to amaze me.

The good thing is that I am not having the severe symptoms that a lot of people have. Thank you God. I think this is because I paid so dearly when I had chicken pox when I was a kid. I was a late bloomer getting the dreaded red bumps. I was 10 - practically elderly.

Then, everyone knew the only good thing about getting them was that you got to miss school, right? Wrong. I got mine over Christmas break. My Christmas Eve was marked with a record high fever and Calamine lotion. Then I was all better by the end of break. I begged my mom to let me miss one day just so I could be one of the cool kids. But she said no. Thanks Mom. Still hanging onto that one 22 years later.

Anyway, the doc put me on a heavy duty antibiotic. I have to take 16 pills a day. I didn't even take that many during cancer treatment. Oh well. If they work it is is worth it. :-)

Stay tuned... I have a "Funny of the Day" that I will be posting in a while. I could post it here but that would ruin the suspense.

What's Next with the Cancer Treatment Plan

I have been getting the question...."What's next?" quite a lot lately. I realized that I had not given a "formal" update on what the next steps are for me and my cancer treatment. So here you go...

They do not do any type of testing of any kind for a minimum of two months after radiation.  Evidently they need to make sure that all of the swelling and stuff has gone away or that can make the results come back wonky. (Yes, wonky is a technical term - at least in my world.)

So, my scan is scheduled for December 28th and they will be doing a PET scan then. I then have my doctors' appointments on January 4th where I will meet with both my chemo and radiation oncologists. That is when we are hopeful (and when I say hopeful I really mean HOPEFUL) that I will get a clear report.

If I get a clear report I will then see my main oncologist every 3 months with a scan every 6 months. They will gradually move my check-ups further and further apart as I get clear resutls. If I can hit the 2 year mark without it coming back then my risk factor goes way down - at least for the Hodgkin's. If I can hit 5 years without it coming back then it goes way, way, way down!

If for some unforeseen reason my scan does not come back clear on the 4th of January - I have no idea what will happen. They really don't discuss those types of things with you in advance. Really, there is no point because you would then just worry about it and you don't need that.

How am I doing with it all? FANTASTIC! I am so ecstatic to be done with treatment right now - life truly could not be any better. I am just adoring all of this time that I have with my family and I am soaking up every second of it. I just feel truly blessed.

Some have asked how I am doing with the wait for my results and honestly I don't even think about it. It is what it is and there isn't anything I can do about it - so why worry about it?

I think when you go through stuff like this you just get so use to all of the testing and waiting that you don't pay that much attention to it anymore. You enjoy the times that you aren't in a doctors office or aren't being tested for something so much and you realize that is what is important. It seems pointless to take these precious minutes of life that I have been given and spend them worrying. Life is too short for that.

So, there you have it. I won't find out anything until January 4th. We are praying that God will bless us with a clean bill of health in 2012! (All prayers are welcome!)

Blessings and Love to All!
Andrea