Linda/ Update?

lindaprocopio said:

Just checking in after a couple of days of Missing in Action
I don't want any one to be worrying about me, so I popped in to let you all know that I am not staying awy because I am feeling sick or sad or anything. I have just been so CRAZY buzy that I can't even SEE straight! I have a December 31st deadline for a federal grant proposal for a municipal client and so many key players will be off for the holidays that I have to get it done NOW or all my efforts thus far will be for naught. Thrown in to that is my friend Carol and her car accident, and her daily calls to see if I can get her something to eat or pick her up and take her to the doctor, insurance agency, car rental.....and I want to be there for her when she needs me. And I had a Christmas breakfast with the bank board I sit on, followed the same day with a Christmas lunch with my longest standing client, and the end of the year is when so many contracts must be re-negotiated and presentations made to Boards of Directors. Presents to get wrapped, cards out, TONS of holiday company coming, many staying 4 or 5 days. And then, the biggest time-killer of all: chemo every Monday, nutritionist appointments, port surgery and follow-up, CANCER eating up my valuable hours!. I have NOOOOOO TIME!!! About 5PM every day I could simply lay my head down and cry because I get so tired. But instead I lay down for 20 minutes and then get back to work until about 10 PM. I feel so guilty to not have baked a single Christmas cookie with my grandchildren. I won't die of cancer; I'll die of exhaustion!

But I'm okay. Back to work. I'll pop in when I can. Love you all.

lindaprocopio said:

A little bit of GOOD NEWS to share: my CA125 dropped 30 points!
I finally took a minute to call and get my CA-125 from last Monday's blood draw. It dropped from 145 to 115, still much higher than the 35 or less it needs to be, but a good drop for having just 1 weak chemo dose in me when it was taken. If my CA-125 continues to drop each week, perhaps I can stay on this 'easy chemo' (1/3 strength taxol, weekly). The only bad news in the call is that the chemo nurse said that Dr. White mentioned wanting me to start getting Neupogen if my white counts drops further at Monday's labs. I asked about getting Neulasta instead and she said you have to have at least 2 weeks between chemos to get Neulasta, since it is time-released over a period that long. So with weekly chemo, I woud need to come in and get a Neupogen shot daily for 3 to 5 days after each chemo. With a weekly chemo infusion schedule, I'd be there all the time!!! I'll have to see if I can get the Neupogen and learn to give myself the shots. Apparently, whether I'd be allowed to do that has to do with how my insurance coverage is, as some insurances only pay when the shots are administered by a clinician. I sure hope my WBC stays okay!

Peggy, I hear what you are saying, and I love you for it. I promise after January 1 to get this insanity under control. I have so many obligations I need to extract myself from. It sounds like I'm going to be FORCED to back off, if I have these daily doctor visits coming up. I'll let you all know how I make out on Monday. I thought you;d all be interested in why Neupogen is subscribed instead of Neulasta sometimes, as this was new information for me. ((((HUGS))))

california_artist said:

Deanna and Linda
Deanna,
I didn't know that about the effect radiation had on the bone marrow. Might mention to your doctor that that would be a great thing to mention prior to the radiation treatments for future patients.

Ah, oh yeah, about the diet, I put a book recommendation on another thread that is fantastic not only for diet advice, from a doctor who had brain cancer and did oodles of research, but also for a whole life modification plan that can and did make the cells in the body that fight cancer increase immensely. I am just in the beginning of reading it and have thus far only skimmed other parts, but it looks really hopeful for getting your body involved in fighting the cancer with all the chemo and radiation that you are already doing or not doing. He talks about being on the long end of the median curve as far as living a long life goes. I can't give any advice on it, would just like to suggest that everyone read it for themselves and make decisions about what might they be able to incorporate into their lives and life styles to live a longer fuller life. Amti Cancer diet --It's the middle of the night, I'll go find the rest of the title and put it up later. Anyway--

I wish for us all to live a longer fuller life than we may currently feel we have. All of us.


Here is an odd suggestion coming from me, as am not quite able to feel I am smart enough to answer the question of whether there is or is not a God outside of our internal one, I do believe in the power of communitive thought, (I may have just made that term up, but I think it aptly conveys what I mean) and think that everyday we should take a few minutes to think about one another, and focus on each wishing the others to get well and live long happy, productive lives, without cancer. With a heartfelt amen at the end.

My love and gratitude to you all,

claudia

Linda,
while I realized you were doing more towards the end of the year, I also knew that due to recent developments, you were gearing up for you sons,plural? to take over your business with the coming of the new year. I believe that you are brilliant and will take excellent care of yourself, as you would not want to do anything to make the time spent with those that love you shorter than it might be. Love and kisses little red haired girl. Here's my healing thought for you.

It's here, you just can't see it.

california_artist said:

Deanna and Linda
Deanna,
I didn't know that about the effect radiation had on the bone marrow. Might mention to your doctor that that would be a great thing to mention prior to the radiation treatments for future patients.

Ah, oh yeah, about the diet, I put a book recommendation on another thread that is fantastic not only for diet advice, from a doctor who had brain cancer and did oodles of research, but also for a whole life modification plan that can and did make the cells in the body that fight cancer increase immensely. I am just in the beginning of reading it and have thus far only skimmed other parts, but it looks really hopeful for getting your body involved in fighting the cancer with all the chemo and radiation that you are already doing or not doing. He talks about being on the long end of the median curve as far as living a long life goes. I can't give any advice on it, would just like to suggest that everyone read it for themselves and make decisions about what might they be able to incorporate into their lives and life styles to live a longer fuller life. Amti Cancer diet --It's the middle of the night, I'll go find the rest of the title and put it up later. Anyway--

I wish for us all to live a longer fuller life than we may currently feel we have. All of us.


Here is an odd suggestion coming from me, as am not quite able to feel I am smart enough to answer the question of whether there is or is not a God outside of our internal one, I do believe in the power of communitive thought, (I may have just made that term up, but I think it aptly conveys what I mean) and think that everyday we should take a few minutes to think about one another, and focus on each wishing the others to get well and live long happy, productive lives, without cancer. With a heartfelt amen at the end.

My love and gratitude to you all,

claudia

Linda,
while I realized you were doing more towards the end of the year, I also knew that due to recent developments, you were gearing up for you sons,plural? to take over your business with the coming of the new year. I believe that you are brilliant and will take excellent care of yourself, as you would not want to do anything to make the time spent with those that love you shorter than it might be. Love and kisses little red haired girl. Here's my healing thought for you.

It's here, you just can't see it.

culka said:

Deanna
I got radiation too and my hemoglobin is 135g/l (range 120-160)
RBC 4.51 (range 3.80-5.20)
WBC 4.0 (range 4.0-11.0)

White blood cells are little low, but still OK. All my life I was little anemic, now with these green infusion or chlorophyll infusion (I mean lots of green smoothies and green salads and green whatever you feed your blood. Difference between hemoglobin in our blood and chlorophyll in greens is molecule of iron in blood and molecule of magnesium in chlorophyll.) my hemoglobin is excellent. This blood test I got 1 year after radiation.

More info about this you can find on www.greenfamily.com or look for Victoria Boutenko books.

And for Linda soak yourself with vitamin C. It save and easy and every cancer patient is vitamin C deficient. I was taking 12g after surgery and during radiation and 10g after. I stopped taking it about a year ago, now I am back with 6-8g a day. It is experiment with my radiation induce hips and tailbone pain.

Jana

lindaprocopio said:

CA-125 continues to drop on weekly taxol infusions.
I want to climb into bed before my Benedryl wears off, since I need to get some sleep before the steroids take over to keep me up all night. But I wanted you to get my GOOD news: my CA-125 dropped to 64.4! Under 35 is considered normal, so I’m getting there!
CA-125 history:
• was 11 when I finished my radiation
• was 155 when I had my 4 month checkup in November
• was 145 right before my 1st chemo, so 145 is my ‘baseline’ for my chemo treatment
• was 115 after 1st chemo
• was 90 after 2nd chemo
• was 64.4 after 3rd chemo
and I had my 4th weekly chemo today but won’t know what good that did for me until next Monday when I have blood drawn right before my chemo.

I am a little anemic but not enough to need a transfusion yet, and my platelets are holding up. My white blood count is better since I started getting the daily Neupogen shots (just 3 this week), and since this is again a holiday week, I will again have only 3 (tomorrow, Wednesday & Thursday) before next Monday’s chemo. The plan is to take that up to 5 Neupogen shots weekly once the holidays are over if my white count continues to drop with each chemo.

The oncologist said that I will stay on this taxol dose for 4 more weeks, as long as the CA125 continues to drop, and then will have a CT-scan after those 4 weeks to see what is going on with the size of those lymph nodes. Then we’ll make a plan based on what we finds out from the CT-scan. If my CA-125 rises 2 weeks in a row, we would cease taxol and do the CT-scan in 4 weeks, but Dr. White says 'that isn't going to happen!"

That’s my report! Naptime for me! ((((HUGS)))))

lindaprocopio said:

CA-125 continues to drop on weekly taxol infusions.
I want to climb into bed before my Benedryl wears off, since I need to get some sleep before the steroids take over to keep me up all night. But I wanted you to get my GOOD news: my CA-125 dropped to 64.4! Under 35 is considered normal, so I’m getting there!
CA-125 history:
• was 11 when I finished my radiation
• was 155 when I had my 4 month checkup in November
• was 145 right before my 1st chemo, so 145 is my ‘baseline’ for my chemo treatment
• was 115 after 1st chemo
• was 90 after 2nd chemo
• was 64.4 after 3rd chemo
and I had my 4th weekly chemo today but won’t know what good that did for me until next Monday when I have blood drawn right before my chemo.

I am a little anemic but not enough to need a transfusion yet, and my platelets are holding up. My white blood count is better since I started getting the daily Neupogen shots (just 3 this week), and since this is again a holiday week, I will again have only 3 (tomorrow, Wednesday & Thursday) before next Monday’s chemo. The plan is to take that up to 5 Neupogen shots weekly once the holidays are over if my white count continues to drop with each chemo.

The oncologist said that I will stay on this taxol dose for 4 more weeks, as long as the CA125 continues to drop, and then will have a CT-scan after those 4 weeks to see what is going on with the size of those lymph nodes. Then we’ll make a plan based on what we finds out from the CT-scan. If my CA-125 rises 2 weeks in a row, we would cease taxol and do the CT-scan in 4 weeks, but Dr. White says 'that isn't going to happen!"

That’s my report! Naptime for me! ((((HUGS)))))