Inside the pinball machine

This morning Peg felt good enough to help put sheets on the bed, crawl around hooking up the electric blanket, and go for coffee with our friend Mary. She worked in a visit with Suzanne, her office partner. We took a brief walk before dinner.

And wham, it all caught up with her.

She said after dinner her legs felt like cement. She's watching "Mad Men" on DVD right now, which is all she has energy for... her short-term memory does short-circuits on and off during the day. She gets weepy and profoundly sad, seemingly out of nowhere, then she's fine a few minutes later.

And yet we laughed really hard today thinking about lines from the movie "Baby Mama," which we saw as a family last night. She loved feeling the breeze and the sun on her clothing on our pre-sunset walk. We both delighted in seeing our daughter being a teenager, skipping through the house and yakking about homework with her friends.

And so it goes inside the pinball machine. Chemo is not a trajectory, as we had thought, where you can predict your "good days." It's all over the map, like some bizarre gizmo with the seven dwarves, three stooges, the four horsemen of the apocalypse and Pee Wee Herman pulling the levers. Surprise!

Big thumbs up from Dr. B

Just got back from seeing Peg's oncologist, who was delighted at her progress. Peg's up to 128 pounds, still no nausea, and all the numbers are headed in the right direction.

She's starting to feel some of the odd side effects of the chemo, like numbness on the balls of her feet. Mornings are good for her these days... late afternoon, not so much. Her belly bothers her a bit then and she feels kinda lousy.

Dr. B said not to be too concerned about fluctuations in how Peg feels. Part of the gig. She did say, though, that the effects of chemo are cumulative, so as we head toward November there could be some rough days. There's also a possibility of a 7th round of chemo, since the first round in the hospital was abdominal and didn't distribute properly in her abdomen. It was loculated. (Now you have a new scrabble word to try out).

Tonight Peg's going to meet with her women's group for the first time since June. They've met every other Thursday for almost 20 years. She may be too poohed to stay the whole time, but it's a big step for her just to be out. Yay!

Good numbers, but still a hard day

Peg's CA-125 markers (indicators of ovarian cancer) are down from a high of 178 to 11.  20 is considered baseline normal.  Three weeks ago they were at 33.  And her blood tests showed her red cell levels are approaching normal, up from being very anemic.

Yesterday was still a hard day for Peg... it really hit her hard that she's not able to wrestle with Zoë, swim with her or be as present as she was before she was diagnosed.  

Zoë runs for her

Today,  Zoë ran a 5k to raise funds for ovarian cancer research and awareness, along with her friends Stephanie and Colette and about a thousand other folks.  She came in sixth in her age category and number one in our hearts.

Peg needs a lot of encouragement these days.  It's a tough road emotionally on top of the physical symptoms.  She took a short walk today and said her legs felt alternately like cement and rubber.  What weighs on her more is having endless down time without the capacity to fill it with enjoyable or fulfilling activities.  Too spaced out to read a lot, not enough energy to do much besides eat and rest.

She needs your companionship right now.  When a friend comes by the house and spends an hour or two just keeping her company (talking, reading to her, rubbing her feet) she just seems to soar out of whatever funk she was in. This is her life's blood-- the love and support of her community of dear friends, made all the sweeter by being close by.

The best thing you can do for Peg right now is to write to her, call her and visit her. Several friends have expressed some hesitation around "disturbing" or "bothering" Peg.

Please... proceed to disturb and bother.  And we'll load you up with homegrown tomatoes when you leave.

And now for something completely different

We all have turkeys in our lives... although in our case, they are actual toms and hens.  They roost in the oaks behind the house, root around the garden, then fly onto the roof and into the front yard every afternoon.

Then they play poker and smoke cigars in the neighbor's yard until he calls the cops.  Actually, I don't know what they do after they leave our yard.  All I know is that they scratch up mass quantities of bark onto the pavestones, which Zoë and I then have to sweep back into the yard. This is nature's way of keeping us busy.

Charming of one of the little beasties to leave a souvenir on the deck just prior to launch...don't blink or you'll miss it.

Four down, two to go

Peg feels pretty good tonight... a little hyper from the steroids, a little itchy from the chemo.  Her red cell count was up enough they didn't give her anything to boost it, and her white cell count was good as well.

She was more apprehensive last night than she'd been for the last round.  No specific reason.  I think there's always a question mark around side effects and fatigue-- no way to know until symptoms appear.  Knock on wood, but she's had no nausea and her appetite is good.  She keeps meticulous track of her calorie intake each day to keep it between 2,600 and 3,000.  I was pretty shocked to learn how calorie-packed some common foods are.  Good for Peg--for the rest of us, not so much!

She thought she had enough oomph to attend "back to school night" at Zoë's high school tonight, but wisely decided against it at the last minute.  Huge campus, almost two thousand students, total chaos and (literally) running from class to class for an hour and a half.  

We've found, even before Peg was diagnosed, that a good philosophy is "one less thing."  Many sighs of relief have accompanied not trying to cram in just one more errand/activity/commitment. To quote Nancy Reagan, "Just say no."  Especially since these days we're looking pretty carefully at Peg's energy reserves and how best to expend them.

Peg's stronger this week

She took a half-hour walk by herself two days ago, and this morning our friend Katie took her to Target to buy some comfortable pants.  It's the first trip somewhere besides a doctor's appointment since the surgery.

Peg's been getting in, through herculean effort, 2,600+ calories a day-- mostly protein powder packed smoothies.  For some reason, she won't go for an Ultimate Cheeseburger from Jack in the Box (910 easy calories!)  Her appetite is pretty good; the tough part is having to eat every two hours or so to build her weight back up.  She's up to 126 from her lowest weight of 119.  Her walk is stronger and more confident than it was even two weeks ago.

Next Wednesday is Round Four (of six) for chemo.  Her nickname is chemo-sabi– she's the "paleface" from being inside all day and I'm the "red" man from bicycling in sizzling Sacramento.

Dr. B. eyeballed her yesterday and is really pleased at where she's at in her treatment.  They run a CA-125 chem panel after chemo, so we'll know Peg's new numbers about a week from next Monday.  Stay tuned...