Saturday May 19th

It has been a long, but successful, day. We held the garage sale for Relay for Life today at my parents house. I am happy to say that we raised $1000. I can't believe it! Thanks so much to everyone that donated items or their time to make this a success! The rest of this week has been pretty challenging.
On Wednesday afternoon I walked down to the mail box with Olivia. Our mail box is only 1/2 a block away so I didn't think to much of it. It was about 75 degrees out so not too warm. On the way back I had to stop and sit down at least 4 times because I was getting so dizzy. After I made it back to the house I had a headache for the rest of the day and tried to take it easy and drink a bunch of water. I had a radiation appointment in the evening since I was the parent helper in Olivia's class on Wednesday morning. I had them look at my skin because it is starting to break down and peel off on the couple areas where I have scars from my surgery. The nurse gave me some aquaphore with zylocain in it to keep on my scars. When I told her about my symptoms with being dizzy she took my blood pressure and it was pretty low so they told me to go home and go to bed and make sure I keep up on drinking my water.
Thursday morning I had to go right back in for radiation treatment in the morning. The nurse took my blood pressure again and it was still very low. I had to go in for Herceptin that afternoon and she told me that I really needed to stay for hydration. I still was feeling dizzy every time I stood up after sitting down for any amount of time and still had the headache. She also told me that I needed to take it really easy and try to rest as much as possible. Jon's parents were nice enough to stay for most of the day while I was at my various doctors appointments. I went in for hydration and Herception. My blood pressure still had not improved very much. It did get a little better after I received the hydration but they still wanted me to come back the next day for more. They just said that the radiation can effect everyone differently but it wasn't uncommon to get dehydrated with treatments. I think I do pretty well on keeping up with water but some times it just isn't as beneficial as IV fluids can be. My parents came over on Thursday night and helped me out until the kids went to bed.
Friday I did radiation again in the morning and had to stay and see the doctor about my skin. It is defiantly RED now. The scars are all peeling away so they are a little concerned with that. The doctor wants to see me again on Tuesday before treatment, since I am scheduled to have another "bolus" treatment that day. This is the one with the wet towels on my skin that brings the radiation dose closer to the surface of my skin and it the one that most effects that damage on my scar tissue. They gave me these soaks to do that I keep gauze on my skin for about 20 min. and I am supposed to keep that aquaphore on my scar to keep it moisturized. Back in for hydration at 1 on Friday. I felt a little better as far as the dizzy spells went on Friday but was still VERY tired. After I did 1 liter of hydration my blood pressure was still at 84/63 which is low even for me that runs low. Unfortunately they took the tap out of my port before they took my blood pressure and then wanted me to stay for another liter. I said that I would try to take it easy and drink lots of Gatorade this weekend and then go in to the hospital for more fluids if I felt bad. I just hate for them to have to re-tap it again right away. Not very much fun. Jon's parents took the twins for me last night and so I was just left with Olivia. We stayed the night at my parents house so we could sort through the garage sale stuff and be there bright and early to get things going. There was SO much stuff to go through, much more than I thought we had. Between about 6 or 7 of us working from 5pm to about 9pm we still hadn't gone through all the stuff. But by 9pm I had to go to bed. I was spent and pretty useless at that point.
We were up bright and early at about 6:15 getting everything set out in the driveway and set up. I spent most of the day sitting at the cashier table taking money. Like I said before though it was a HUGE success and I think we all were a little surprised at how much money we raised. I was so tired the rest of the day though. I left my moms with Olivia at about 2pm and the twins came home and napped for a few hours. My mom came over this evening to help me with dinner and the kids again. I know I wasn't sitting in bed the last 2 days but I did think that I took it pretty easy. I just can't believe how tired I actually am. It is funny to feel exhausted all the time. Even when you wake up in the morning and you should be raring to go....still tired. Hmmm. Hopefully this doesn't stay this bad for the rest of my radiation treatment. Well, I can't say thank you enough times, so THANKS AGAIN, to everyone that helped with the sale. I have an awesome family and group of friends!