Hair today, gone tomorrow

I haven't really been thinking of myself as a cancer patient. Since I got over the initial shock of the mastectomy, healed from the surgery itself and got fitted with a prosthesis, I have felt and looked more or less like my normal self. However, things are about to change.

On Thursday evening, I noticed that my hair was starting to fall out. It wasn't all that much, just about the amount that would fall out on a normal day post-pregnancy (for those of you who can relate to that). So I've been extra gentle with my head/hair in the hopes that the loss would be slow. However, my scalp has been tingly and itchy and irritated, like I can almost feel my hair follicles dying off. Each day more and more hair has been falling out, and today it was giant handfuls. It was really quite shocking.

I saw the doctor today for my pre-chemo check. She said that the rest of my hair will probably fall out quite quickly after the upcoming treatment. Her guess was within a week all my hair would be gone! So, although today I don't look so different from my normal "me," the change over the next week may be pretty radical. Without any hair, I think I'll look and feel a lot more like a cancer patient.

As I mentioned yesterday, I've been trying not to think or complain about my ailments in the hopes that I'll convince myself I feel fine. However, I really don't feel fine. I don't want to moan and groan about it all the time, but I decided it's time to share what it's like so that hopefully people might understand a little how I really feel. Plus, if I explain it here, I won't have to repeat it to every person who asks, which saves me from feeling like I'm dwelling on it.

Thankfully, the first round of chemotherapy was not as terrible as I anticipated. I had a few really, really bad days, but the most difficult side effects have been getting slowly better since the treatment. The lesser side effects are annoying (especially when having to deal with them all simultaneously) but survivable. Although I have less energy than normal, I have still been able to be active and do many of the activities I would do if I weren't undergoing cancer treatment. However, some of the chemo side effects are supposedly cumulative so I'm not looking forward to feeling worse after the successive treatments.

Basically, for any of you who have been pregnant, many of the chemo side effects mimic how one feels during pregnancy and/or breasfeeding but to the extreme. On the worst days following the treatment, I was completely, totally exhausted- so tired I felt I could sleep for days. I was horribly thirsty. Despite drinking water constantly, I couldn't quench my thirst. Of course, the follow up to that was that I was also peeing constantly. (Sound familiar, pregnant friends?)

There were days when I didn't really feel like eating anything and others when I thought I could eat an elephant. I've been craving all kinds of comfort food and sweets. Unfortunately, the chemo numbs your entire mouth so nothing really tastes like anything. So, even if I'm full, I sometimes keep eating because I haven't really tasted what I've eaten. That, and the fact that the chemo messes up your whole digestive system, means that I've been gaining weight. As if I needed something else to worry about right now, I have to think about how to prevent myself from having to wear my maternity clothes again just for something comfortable to wear!

Then there's the heartburn. I had it during my pregnancies, but this is much, much more painful and constant. I basically cannot function without heartburn medication, which luckily my doctor prescribed for me. The other gastrointestinal problems are there, too, but I'll spare you the details...

Chemo brain is worse than pregnancy brain. Ordinarily, I'm organized and know where things are and what I'm doing. On the worst days post-chemo, I could barely remember how to walk. Every movement and every thought took SO MUCH EFFORT, which added to the exhaustion, and I couldn't remember a damn thing. It was shocking to me that I just couldn't get my brain to work at all. I guess it's probably part of the body's defense mechanism when it's going through such a systemic assault- just shut down so we don't have to think about what's happening to us. It's gotten slowly better as days go by, but I still feel like I'm walking around in a fog.

My whole body is dry- my skin, my hair, my scalp, my nails, my mouth, my lips, my nose. My nose was so dry that I was getting nosebleeds some days. I'm lathering on lotion constantly, applying lip balm, nail and hair conditioners and using products (toothpaste, mouthwash, faux saliva) to try to combat the dry mouth. However, nothing really does the trick. It all lessens the dryness a bit but doesn't eliminate it.

During the days when I had the biggest strain on my immune system, I had all the symptoms of a cold or flu- sore throat, runny nose, watery eyes, earache, headache. I also got sores in my mouth, which were awfully painful. Luckily, those symptoms all passed within several days, but I was pretty miserable with those on top of everything else.

In addition to the fatigue, my other biggest challenge has been the joint pain. To boost my body's white blood cell production to make up for some of the ones the chemo is killing off, I'm taking a drug called Neulasta. It super charges the bone marrow to make more white blood cells, and, in the process, makes every bone ache. The day I had the shot the pain started in my knees. On the following day, it was my knees and elbows. Then every single joint and bone in my body- even ones I never really noticed were there. The pain was manageable with medication but still exhausting. It's been getting better as days go by so I'm really not looking forward to going through it all over again in a couple days.

So that's the laundry list in a nutshell. If you ask me how I'm feeling, I'll probably just say "Okay." It's just easier than explaining every issue I have, and I don't have to listen to myself complain about it all again. However, now you'll know the REAL story.