Still Have Eyelashes

Hi All--

It's Tuesday, June 19, 2012.  The good news is that I haven't lost my eyelashes, well a few 'cause they're rather brittle and one has to be very careful, and they haven't grown since I started treatment, so looking a bit lacklaster, but I still have eyelashes!!  The bad news is that eyelashes, if they fall, usually fall at the 5th/6th treatment, and I'm going in for round #5 this Friday.

Round 3 has been the worst so far, meaning that round 4 didn't grab me so hard.  Yeah.  However, round 4 did affect my nails, especially my fingers.  Every finger, yup all 10, look like they've been caught in a door with reddish marks underneath the nail, plus the nails are very dry.  When I met with the PA last Friday during the Nadir blood draw (and I give an accounting of how the last couple weeks have been), when I mentioned that my nails got nabbed (because I've been asked previously how my nails are faring), the response was, "you might lose your nails."  Ee-gads!!  No, I already knew this, had been warned.  Hopefully not, though.  The nails are not painful, just sore.  I read a blog of a lady whose nails went black on the first time out of the chutes.  Poor lady. 

The cumulative effects have been in full force these past several weeks meaning that I have that awful metallic/off taste with food that doesn't relent, well it did the day of round #4.  I can eat, which is always a good thing, but food, especially sweets, taste yuck.  We made raspberry ice cream, yes made, as in homemade, last night (round two of Father's Day, since poor R didn't get any dessert on Sunday) and I had a bowl, but can't say that I enjoyed it, as there is a bitter taste.  I've been drinking lots of OJ lately with lots of crushed ice, and that too tastes bitter, more like grapefruit that has had its rind ground up with the juice. 

since I've last posted, Tony has come home, which was wonderful.  I made it through that weekend, exhausting, but wonderful, too, and then the following Monday took two (2) three-hour naps.  In fact, I've been napping every day.  Seems like eternal tiredness is my constant companion. 

I hit an emotional brick wall recently, cried all weekend long, and was too down to even go to church ('cause I was a crying machine).  R and T gave me a blessing, which truly helped to calm my troubled heart.  As R says, I'm simply having a hard time seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.  People all around me keep trying to buoy me up with the "you're almost done," but then I think, ya trade places with me and see if you see that light.  Pessimistic, I know.  People have been very good to me and I need to remind myself of that simple fact.

In fact, this post just was interrupted by a friend who works at a dental office who brought some more baby soft brushes and fluoride-strength paste, as I need to change brushes with each round and the chemo drugs are really hard on the mouth/teeth.

Well, I'll take my tired body to go recline on the couch and watch some tv, which is about all I do any more in the evening, not terribly motivated to do much more.