Monday, September 10, 2007

Day Fourteen

Running late this morning

As i was showering i thought about how i was grateful for the hair in my drain catch. Seems like an odd thing to be grateful for right? If you go for months without much, if any, hair and if you are used to pulling out hair from your water drain then suddenly you dont, you tend to notice when all of a sudden the water is building up in the tub. It was only a small amount of hair but hair still. My life seems to be coming back to some sort of normalcy. My eyebrows and lashes are filling in, theres even hair on my arms and legs, not much, but some. I know women out there would say that they wished they didnt have hair to shave weekly. I thought i'd be the same. I know I saved money on shampoo and take short showers and all that, but i have to say i'm glad to have some hair back. It means my body is still working and regenerating cells, its still alive! I know that some people have had so much chemo and other drugs over and over that their hair may never grow back, so i feel lucky that mine is coming back, even if it took a while to do so.

I took a bus to the hospital today due to running late. When i got there the nurse wasnt at her usual station and one of the techs, miss V, was looking a bit frantic. She told me that she had had a crazy morning already. people calling in and things happening. oh boy..... When i got into the chamber i noticed another man i hadnt met before, Mr J, he seemed nice, said he was bouncing from other hospitals. R wasnt there again today, doctors appt, and Mr L wasnt there. Mr. J had on some strong body spray or cologne, my throat was closing up. I wanted to say that he may want to not wear so much due to some peoples allergies and when you are on chemo you can get especially sensitive to smells. I'm sure i'm not the only one who is super sensitive. But i didnt say anything.

I really noticed the loud buzzing today. Sometimes I can just tune it out, but today the noises were especially bothersome. I just reminded myself of the MRI machine and how much worse that is.

I saw a new Radiologist today and first saw a new nurse, i'd seen her around but never had dealings with her in a professional way. She was very nice, i was pleasantly surprised. I asked her if the one man doc i had seen was the one that was leaving , i had heard one of the radiologists were leaving the hospital....and she said no, that it was the woman i was about to see, Mrs. T, She said everyone is upset about her leaving. I got the feeling it was more personal and maybe she would have preferred the man to leave as much as i did. When the woman doc came in she seemed rushed and a bit stressed, but i liked her much better than the other two docs i have met. Of course i find a doc i like and they are leaving. With any luck maybe she wont leave for a month, then i'll be finished with my treatment anyway. She noticed that i was red and was starting to have a rash on one area. She told me to use more gooey ointment and that the redness and swelling would get worse. Great. The swelling and healing from the treatments wont be better for one to two months after treatment is over. So by thanksgiving I may be feeling better. I'll have something to be grateful for. One of many things. This doctor explained things to me without me having to ask and she was very professional, didnt treat me like a number or like i didnt know what i was talking about. Nice change. It wasnt like she was all smiles or warm and fuzzy, in fact she didnt smile once, but the fact that she spent some time with me and treated me with some respect is huge right now. Too bad shes leaving. When I left, i noticed nurse C was at the desk, I said goodbye to the other nurse as i walked by and nurse C said a annoyed "oh bye" without even looking up at me, but the other nurse looked up and smiled. What a difference.

I ended up walking home since i hadnt walked there. It felt good to do so, even though i had the hill to climb. I was still thinking how lucky i was to be able to do that, to walk uphill at a fast pace. So many times i wasnt able to do that.

On my way home something magical happened. At least i thought it was magical. I noticed a feather come down from the sky, pointed end going downward, spiraling towards the ground. Not floating or blowing in the wind, it was dropping down. I realized that the feather had just left the bird it had been attached to. If i had thought quick enough i could have reached out and grabbed it out of the air. i could have had this feather that had never touched the ground. I dont know why but it was a lovely moment, to see the feather appear in front of me.

Only 19 more to go!

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