It's go time! Update in pictures

Praying for the best results for you.  I believe it is vital to stay upbeat in order to deal with this disease.  That is not always easy as we all know.  Your humor is deliciously wicked.  You certainly add liveliness to this board.

By the way, I wish Val would send a couple of players my way!

Love you,

Karen

Alexandra said:

SOL

I am not Irish but I easily could be, seeing how things are progressing.

Last Tuesday I had the core needle biopsy. I followed instructions, kept the area clean, didn't wash it for 24 hrs, blah-blah-blah. For over a week I was watching the swelling at the biopsy site get bigger, harder and more painful. I figured that it was normal and kept an ice pack on it. This afternoon I finally lost patience and paged the nurse. She told me to come in immediately.

    Mad dash to see the doctor through downtown Toronto traffic.

Doctor was not there. Instead there was a female resident from France who was about 24 but looked 14, probably thanks to French meaningful anti-aging melons made famous by Cindy Crawdord's annoying informercials.

Drawing 7" x 14" outline of the swelling on my belly with a magic marker, 3 photographs, taking vital signs, an ultrasound and a blood test later I was told that I have an giant internal hematoma and it is infected.

I started on antibiotics 3 times a day x 10 days.  

Active infection disqualifies me from the PARP trial.  I am not a happy camper.

I am so bummed out for you.  Does this mean that you'll never qualify for the PARP trial or just not qualify for now?  What is next on the game plan for you?

Kelly

Alexandra said:

Thank you Kelly!

In 10 days they will re-evaluate me. If antibiotic kills the infection I will be back on track. By then hopefully results of the biopsy will be ready.

Road rage, multicultural edition. On my way back from the Cancer Clinic an angry old Italian man driving in the next lane in his black Cadillac yelled at me for smoking out of my car window. All I could understand was "a-puttana dis cancer-eh stick will-eh kill ya!" and "vaffanculo". For some reason “I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse” popped into my head and I quickly got out of there. True story.

 

Sending you lots of positive thoughts that the antibiotic does its job!

Hugs,

Kelly

Alexandra said:

Thank you Kelly!

In 10 days they will re-evaluate me. If antibiotic kills the infection I will be back on track. By then hopefully results of the biopsy will be ready.

Road rage, multicultural edition. On my way back from the Cancer Clinic an angry old Italian man driving in the next lane in his black Cadillac yelled at me for smoking out of my car window. All I could understand was "a-puttana dis cancer-eh stick will-eh kill ya!" and "vaffanculo". For some reason “I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse” popped into my head and I quickly got out of there. True story.

 

I'm sorry to hear about all that and having some strange jerk yell at you probably didn't help Hopefully these anti-biotics will do the trick and you'll be accepted into the Trial.  I'm sending positive thoughts your way.

Alexandra said:

Thank you Kelly!

In 10 days they will re-evaluate me. If antibiotic kills the infection I will be back on track. By then hopefully results of the biopsy will be ready.

Road rage, multicultural edition. On my way back from the Cancer Clinic an angry old Italian man driving in the next lane in his black Cadillac yelled at me for smoking out of my car window. All I could understand was "a-puttana dis cancer-eh stick will-eh kill ya!" and "vaffanculo". For some reason “I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse” popped into my head and I quickly got out of there. True story.

 

So sorry to hear about the infection. "Infected hematoma"? Never heard of such a thing. It's a direct result of the biopsy, right? Hope the antibiotics do their thing & you are soon on your way to the PARP trial. I'd wish you good luck, but I don't want to jinx it.

Carole

Alexandra said:

I got in!

Drum roll     Paperwork came back today from Clovis Oncology and they approved my enrollment into ARIEL2 trial.

I still have to finish antibiotics for the post-biopsy abscess and I will start taking PARP inhibitor Rucaparib a week from today, on April 23rd (5 x 120mg pills every morning and 5 x 120mg pills every evening). 

Most likely side effects are nausea, fatigue, low blood counts and elevated liver enzymes, but who cares! It's all good.

 

Alexandra, Congrats on your enrollment!!

Kathy

P S.  Sorry to hear about your post-biopsy abscess, but I am glad to hear its taken care of.

wholfmeister said:

Yeah!

I am so happy your perseverance paid off!  It is that "Never say die!" spirit that will see you through this trial with 100% success! (No pun intended!)

This is such wonderful news!  I have tears in my eyes and a big grin on my face.  You go girl!

We have all benefited from your unique way of offering us support,

information and humour, now we all celebrate your wonderful news.

You are  certainly an inspiration to us all with your tenacious spirit in

achieving your wish to be included in this trial.  I am sending a huge,

heartfelt hug across the sea!

Alexandra said:

Thank you so much for your support dear sisters and brother Ron

I am going to wrap this colorful thread up and start a new one with trial experiences.

Ahhh, that felt good. Now you can wrap up this thread (!).