HI all - 

Good news!  I just came from my oncologist's office and she is pleased with the progress thus far.  So she is going to see about reducing my Kisqali pills to taking two a day versus three a day.  Hopefully this will help reduce the side effects while still working to decrease the cancer!  Yay!  Second piece of good news today was that my favorite nurse (Elsie) is finally permanently stationed on the breast cancer floor.  I missed her so much when they had her floating between the different floors.  She always makes me laugh.  Today she was warming up my Faslodex shot and asked me to continue doing it so she could run and get something.  She came back into the room and said - "See we are switching places."  I asked - "So I'm going to be giving you this shot in YOUR butt?"  We laughed.  It's always a good appointment when she is around.

They have told me I'm the only patient that complains about the taste and smell from this Faslodex shot - and that these issues last for several days or even a couple of weeks.  I guess I'm "special."

My brain fog, fatigue, and weakness have been increasing - which is maybe why she is willing to start lowering the dose of my meds.  I've been going through the process of handing off my previous church responsibilities to new people the past several months.  Soon I will just have Sunday school teaching and since I have two teammates that also teach our class, this will hopefully remain doable.  Even before the cancer diagnosis, I knew God was telling me to pull back - although at the time, I didn't know why.  Now I definitely know why!  While I have no anxiety about the treatment or the future, I do get anxious when I feel like I have a deadline or people are depending on me for something.  So the less responsibility I have, the better for my mental and emotional health!!  This is funny because when I took the Gallup StrengthsFinder Assessment (https://www.gallup.com/cliftonstrengths/en/252137/home.aspx) last year, my number one strength was "Responsibility."  And yet now I can't handle responsibility.  I'm literally treading water on a day-to-day basis.  Some days I can't do anything at all - I can only sit and listen to music or an audiobook or the TV.  Apparently my little girl Husky must be feeling like I'm not fulfilling my playtime responsibilities with her as I just found her playing by herself with a dryer ball!  It's sad to watch a dog throw and fetch her own ball.  I promised I would play with her later today - after my nap.  

The only other news is that I hope to start with my new Emory gastroenterologist this Monday.  The process for getting a records request from Emory to my former gastro to get her to send records to the new one was not exactly easy or efficient.  It took a few phone calls, messages, and a trip to the UPS store to get everything sorted.  Seriously, haven't they been working on electronic records processes since the 1990s?  I told Emory that they would have driven me to drink if my stomach could tolerate alcohol right now!  Alcohol is a no-no as well as fish and cruciferous vegetables.  Every time I think about real healthy eating, I can feel my stomach laugh and almost say "Sure - you can try it,  But you'll regret it."  So then I grab a Pop Tart.  It does say they have "real fruit filling."  My sugars are up and that's probably because I've been drinking more classic Coke lately to settle my stomach.  I've tried ginger but it only works slightly and only for a short time frame.  They told me this morning to try and take Pepcid 30 minutes before eating and if that doesn't work, they can try to find another drug to help my tummy.  I'll ask the new gastro on Monday as well.

Hope everyone is enjoying this Spring weather!!

Blessings,

Laurie