Doxil Round #9 in the Books!

Well another 4 hours done at the hospital this morning. I will be getting scans done before I meet with my medical oncologist in 4 weeks for my next treatment. It will wait until after Thanksgiving, unless they call me and schedule me prior. I will also set up another remote appointment with my sarcoma specialist from the Mayo Clinic after the scans are done. My local oncology dr said my echocardiogram looked good, so that is great news. Doxil starts attacking your heart once your body has decided it has had its fill of it, and then complications happen quite quickly, so I will remind him to keep on top of that. I have had more side effects the last round especially, so he decreased my dosage by a little….about 8% decrease, to see if that would help with the hand-foot syndrome. So today was dose #9 of 12…I should have my last dosage before going on a chemo break the week of my birthday in February. Today marked a year of taking some form of chemo. My body is getting tired of the poison. I am very fortunate…but it is still dragging on me. I don’t think I can just do nothing when I am on a chemo break so I think we’ll be trying hormone therapy, as my tumors tested estrogen and progesterone positive. It is scary though….I could go on this new therapy and it kick my cancer’s patootie…or the cancer could just explode everywhere. There is no way of predicting what will happen and everyone is different. Talk about a leap of fate. Either way, I will be getting scans every three months, so I will hopefully find out quickly if my chemo break is going to need to be cut short. But that is early next year. Today I am just happy to have gone through chemo with grace (which I literally write in my day planner on chemo days – go through my time at the hospital with grace).

A quick follow-up about my contacts. I haven’t been able to see very well and have been forced to wear my glasses almost all the time. I finally called the Pearl Vision I went to twice this past summer. They had drastically changed my left eye. Twice. Changed my right eye once. Well, when I finally picked up my contacts, the worker in the store placed the RIGHT eye sticker on my left eye contacts. No wonder I could see well out of either eye! I switched them around today and life was much better. I have been wearing my contacts all day…..a first for the last several months. I think I will be looking for a different optometrist and shop. Oy! They were having computer issues both times I was in there and I never got a copy of my prescription, otherwise I would have figured this out much sooner. Another happy moment today.

When I came home I was greeted with a card from Lois & Jim Doyle…thank you so much for your awesome cards and letters. I love them! I got gorgeous flowers delivered from Fiona Macklon, my fellow warrior queen. Thank you so much for being in this battle by my side. I adore you! Both of these folks are from the Houston area! And I talked to my brother, Craig Neitzke, last night and my parents, Walt & Karen Neitzke today. All from Houston. Yay Houston folks! You guys stepped up to the plate these last 24 hours!

Last but not least…I finally filled out a photo frame I have had for a couple of months now. It is hanging by my desk in my home office, where I spend most of my time. It has the wedding photos of my paternal grandparents, my parents, Rich and me, Rich’s parents, Rich’s paternal grandparents, and Joe & Michelle. Four generations of wedding pictures. I just adore it. As I told a friend, it just pushes all my happy buttons!