Friday, March 18, 2011

Feeling Good; ROund Two Chemo

On day 3 of my second round of Chemo and feeling pretty good.


  • It has been almost 5 years since I was hit with a baseball that led to the discovery of my brain tumor.
  • It has been 4 years and 7 months since I completed External beam radiation.
  • It has been 4 years and 7 month since I had a partial resection (more partial than we realized at the time)of my grade three tumor.
  • It has been approximately 13 weeks since my second resection, shunt insertion, and the start of a month of chaos.
  • It has been 2 months since I had surgeries to have a shunt revision and second shunt inserted.

Medically - Both shunts appear to be working and my bone flap appears to have healed now so hopefully I will not have fluid issues again. :) I have not had fluid under my scalp since the shunts were revised. I am on round two of Temodar chemo and so far so good. I have improved a lot the past few weeks. I almost feel human again. LOL

Emotionally - Doing well and improving with each passing day. Biggest emotional issue right now is that all the manufacturing employees at the site I work at have been released and I know some I may never see again. :( I'm still hoping to get back before the last person is gone. (Probably the plant manager.) It's kind of bittersweet knowing that I should still be at the company but can't be because of leave. I've spent 245+- days a year there for 11 years and now it's just gone.

Mentally - I'm actually sharper on my brain games than I ever thought I would be. Mental stamina continues to be my biggest issue. About the only thing I can sit and do for more than an hour is watch TV and even that I can't do for too long.

Chemo - A new category for your enjoyment. I am currently on Day 3 of my second round of Temodar (a brain cancer chemo that is quite effective). At this point, I am doing very well with it. In my first round of chemo, I had some serious nausea issues on day 4 (I couldn't keep anything down). I've been journaling how I feel each day so that I have record of it as we go along.

Family - My son is FINALLY doing well in school so I am pretty ecstatic about it. John is still taking my last health dip hard but he's slowly doing better. It's been a wild few months. My Grandma appears to be developing Dementia/Alzheimers. She seems to be worse each time I see her. My mom is running herself crazy trying to take care of her and I am helpless to do anything since I can't drive. *sigh* My son turned 14 last month and I turned 32 this week. John will be 36 next month so we are in the middle of our birthday crazy time. Not sure there is much more going on.

Huggles,