Friday, April 15, 2005
It appears that the risk of recurrence is inherent in the tumour and stage and not affected by subsequent pregnancies.
ie, once we know my real prognosis in a year or two, we have to decide if we can have another baby with that risk, not if having a baby will increase the risk.
I have a checkup on May 12 and if that's OK, it's six months since diagnosis. I don't know how much chemo slows things down and if six months of being OK means anything. Also, I won't be going for any MRIs or anything like that until/unless there's a) a problem or b) we're about to ttc again, either with me or a surrogate.
have I mentioned that my oncologist has me on only 2/3 of the pill dose of my current round of chemo because of my white blood cell issues? I think he'd rather I got through the treatment without further delay than got a full dose. But I think for round two I'll be asking to try out a full dose. I really want to BASH this mother, y'know?
ie, once we know my real prognosis in a year or two, we have to decide if we can have another baby with that risk, not if having a baby will increase the risk.
I have a checkup on May 12 and if that's OK, it's six months since diagnosis. I don't know how much chemo slows things down and if six months of being OK means anything. Also, I won't be going for any MRIs or anything like that until/unless there's a) a problem or b) we're about to ttc again, either with me or a surrogate.
have I mentioned that my oncologist has me on only 2/3 of the pill dose of my current round of chemo because of my white blood cell issues? I think he'd rather I got through the treatment without further delay than got a full dose. But I think for round two I'll be asking to try out a full dose. I really want to BASH this mother, y'know?
as you can see, I'm not doing anything useful. I'm futzing around on the internet. reading both ttc and cancer blogs, like Cancer, Baby, who has pointed me to a book I didn't know of by Susan Sontag on the use of illness as metaphor. and yes, it really pisses me off when people say "it spreads like a cancer". after all, in the case of many cancers (and I hope mine), it should be "it flared up then fell in a big localised heap, was chopped out then never seen again like a cancer." I mean, here we are trying to be positive and we get this shit. it's like people telling someone ttc for the first time to give up and consider o/s adoption. it's just rude.
mothers' group friend not pg. she can't work out what it is then. we decided stress most likely, ovarian cancer least likely, so she has to go to a dr. (I'm allowed to say that stuff to her, she's cool, and of all people I have the right, surely?)
and getupgrrl is demonstrating yet again that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. It's a crime that we're getting to read her stuff for free.
five babies? now that's a dedicated surrogate. and while I respect their decision to go ahead and have them all, surely someone, somewhere in the United States will get a clue now about the practice of "implanting" huge numbers of embies, especially on first attempts.
post chemo 1.2 of type 2, I don't feel too bad really. much less bad than with the AC, and not as bad as with the nasty virus of the last fortnight. so we're actually going to Hong Kong and Thailand next week, it seems, with credit cards handed over for payment for our resort, a fine restaurant booked for Saturday night in Hong Kong, and a housesitter coming to look after our fluffy beast. and as A. is off at childcare today, I can do anything: garden, write, sleep. I considered the movies but really it would be gratuitous and I have had a big break from writing, about six weeks, so I think it's time to at least send some more stuff off, in order to keep that steady flow of rejection letters coming. if this keeps up I'll have to go back to work just in order to get the satisfaction of editors accepting my words. they're very different words, of course.
A has picked up more words: door, for one. and he can point to bananas, balls, birds and a few other things in his picture books. what a genius child, etc.
post chemo 1.2 of type 2, I don't feel too bad really. much less bad than with the AC, and not as bad as with the nasty virus of the last fortnight. so we're actually going to Hong Kong and Thailand next week, it seems, with credit cards handed over for payment for our resort, a fine restaurant booked for Saturday night in Hong Kong, and a housesitter coming to look after our fluffy beast. and as A. is off at childcare today, I can do anything: garden, write, sleep. I considered the movies but really it would be gratuitous and I have had a big break from writing, about six weeks, so I think it's time to at least send some more stuff off, in order to keep that steady flow of rejection letters coming. if this keeps up I'll have to go back to work just in order to get the satisfaction of editors accepting my words. they're very different words, of course.
A has picked up more words: door, for one. and he can point to bananas, balls, birds and a few other things in his picture books. what a genius child, etc.
Wednesday, April 13, 2005
have just had to email mil back telling her I will not let her grandson get molested by babysitters in thailand, as a child was in bali. didn't add "and if they did, I'd either personally or hire someone to rip their gonads from their body".
more people in my mothers' group getting pg, including probably my current bestie (who is also going home to NZ). I've offered her my other pee stick from last month's scare. humph.
was looking at A. yesterday as he munched into his impromptu sandwich in the sun at the market and pointed at birdies, and realised that if that first biochemical had stuck, I'd have a different baby and in all reality, A. might never have got to be born, and even less probably to me. and the weight of that biochemical lifted somewhat, because he's my boy, the one I want. have had a lovely morning babysitting above friend's kid, watching them play together.
more people in my mothers' group getting pg, including probably my current bestie (who is also going home to NZ). I've offered her my other pee stick from last month's scare. humph.
was looking at A. yesterday as he munched into his impromptu sandwich in the sun at the market and pointed at birdies, and realised that if that first biochemical had stuck, I'd have a different baby and in all reality, A. might never have got to be born, and even less probably to me. and the weight of that biochemical lifted somewhat, because he's my boy, the one I want. have had a lovely morning babysitting above friend's kid, watching them play together.
Saturday, April 09, 2005
post-virus, post-chemo, I am just a big sack of lethargy. A. is off at at childcare and I should be writing or landscaping the garden or something (finding a cure for cancer?) but I'm not. I'm just cruising the web and I don't even feel like that.
yesterday a third mothers' group person announced she was pg. she's older than me, I'm sure, and it seems to be a natural pg. congratulations, etc. I suppose if I'm going to hang around with women with small babies, I have to expect this. that's one born, one halfway and another just announced. if I didn't have cancer, maybe I'd be hiding my own little secret by now.
wish A. wasn't at childcare so I could go give him a big hug...
(much later, as blogger was down, and quite irrelevantly: cute baby stuff)
yesterday a third mothers' group person announced she was pg. she's older than me, I'm sure, and it seems to be a natural pg. congratulations, etc. I suppose if I'm going to hang around with women with small babies, I have to expect this. that's one born, one halfway and another just announced. if I didn't have cancer, maybe I'd be hiding my own little secret by now.
wish A. wasn't at childcare so I could go give him a big hug...
(much later, as blogger was down, and quite irrelevantly: cute baby stuff)
Thursday, April 07, 2005
I've changed my mind. I'm not going to go and have chemotherapy today. it's too nice a day. instead, we'll do mothers' group, then come home and continue with our joint gardening project (it's so cute the way he "helps" me by moving his sandpit contents around the yard).
:(
spose I've gotta go get chemoed. feeling quite grumpy today. and reading up more about pregnancy after breast cancer. damn I want that baby. now.
:(
spose I've gotta go get chemoed. feeling quite grumpy today. and reading up more about pregnancy after breast cancer. damn I want that baby. now.
Sunday, April 03, 2005
hat. I forgot hat. everything's a hat - bowl, scarf, dog, it all goes on the head.
a quick blog before bed, because it's 7.45 pm and the baby will wake up at 5 if we're lucky, 4.30 if we're not.
dh and I have both had a horrid virus the last week, him first, then me, complete with high temperatures, aches, nausea - you know the kind of thing, flatsville. luckily he was nearly upright again by the time I got it and I've been able to get a little rest. baby of course has had it too. there were blood tests and a boring visit to emergency on Thursday before my results came in and I was deemed safe to go home. infections in neutropaenic (sp?) people can be fatal. just like that. but my levels were OK.
but you know what? I'm tired of having this layer of death hanging over everything. I can't even get ill, dammit, without suffering the thoughts of being like that for months, then leaving my baby boy. I want to just be with him without that bittersweet wondering if this will be all, if he'll even remember me. I just want to be a normal mum. I'd been doing OK, basically in denial, for a while there. but being flattened by illness brought it all home. I just want it to go away - the fear, the guilt, the sadness for my little boy.
right, now that's off my chest (haha) I'm dropping a sleeping pill and lulling myself to sleep with some nice worthy Richard Dawkins....
dh and I have both had a horrid virus the last week, him first, then me, complete with high temperatures, aches, nausea - you know the kind of thing, flatsville. luckily he was nearly upright again by the time I got it and I've been able to get a little rest. baby of course has had it too. there were blood tests and a boring visit to emergency on Thursday before my results came in and I was deemed safe to go home. infections in neutropaenic (sp?) people can be fatal. just like that. but my levels were OK.
but you know what? I'm tired of having this layer of death hanging over everything. I can't even get ill, dammit, without suffering the thoughts of being like that for months, then leaving my baby boy. I want to just be with him without that bittersweet wondering if this will be all, if he'll even remember me. I just want to be a normal mum. I'd been doing OK, basically in denial, for a while there. but being flattened by illness brought it all home. I just want it to go away - the fear, the guilt, the sadness for my little boy.
right, now that's off my chest (haha) I'm dropping a sleeping pill and lulling myself to sleep with some nice worthy Richard Dawkins....
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