Two days before my surgery to remove my colon cancer, or what's left of it. Here's an update of my symptoms:
1. That weird vaginal wetness/drainage has stopped.
2. My fingers are completely back to normal and never crack or peel anymore.
3. My face has stopped peeling.
4. My feet and toes are still peeling but not as much now. I still use the emery board to smooth the top layer, then put on foot cream. I found a good one I use it a few times a day. It seems to be working!
4. The fatigue has lessened and I'm not quite as mentally tired nor clumsy anymore.
5. The pain is either full on or not there, and comes and goes, but overall it's definitely not as bad as it was before I started chemo and radiation.
6. My sciatica and foot cramps suddenly cleared up about four days ago. I just woke up that morning and was back to normal.
7. The hot flashes (heat waves!) continue, all day, all night. If I'm already warm, I'll get hotter. If I move too much, I get hotter. Being embarrassed can throw me into a hot flash. Having one of my mental-clogginess and struggling to find my words can throw me into one. Hot food, spicy food, a racing heartbeat, even turning over in bed. More and more things are causing me hot flashes. I seem to now be having hot flashes more often than not having them! They still wake me several times a night, followed by extreme chills. Only twice now have I woken up in a sweat. Glad that doesn't happen with every one of them.
8. The "vicodin rash", that red itchy spot on my chest, is completely gone. I knew the cream would work.
On Friday I visited one of the ostomy nurses at the hospital, and she stuck an ostomy bag on my where she thought the best place for my ileostomy would be. Of course it's in a totally inconvenient spot, but I'm not complaining. It is what it is. I'm ok about all of this.
She told me to wear the bag this weekend to become used to it and to see how my clothes fit with it. It sits right where my waistband goes, so the only real way to wear the bag is to tuck it inside my pants. But then it rubs on my leg. So far I'm not used to it, and it's not even in actual use yet!
I've been enjoying eating what I want and when I want it, but today is the last day for that. It's the middle of the afternoon and I don't plan on eating much of anything the rest of today because tomorrow I have to start the Miralax cleanse for my surgery.
One thing I'm going to miss is salad. Since moving into Mom's house and using her King Soopers, I discovered her grocery store has a lot more to offer than mine did. I never did get around to the Chinese food bar, but have enjoyed the olive bar, the soup bar, and the salad bar. Oh that salad bar! Yum! Oh well.
There is only one thing I'm afraid of most of all about surgery in two days. I'm afraid of coming out of the surgery with a migraine. I hope that won't happen. I plan on sipping black coffee or diet soda up until the time I have to stop having anything by mouth the night before surgery. Surgery is first thing in the morning. I doubt that when I wake up they'll let me have coffee, but it would be nice if they did! If they even just let me swish it around in my mouth maybe the caffeine will soak in through my oral mucosa.
And for my final update tonight, the letter from my landlord came. They actually did deduct the work from my deposit, as I thought they would. I still don't understand why my landlord stood there telling me they were keeping it. I guess he just felt like being mean that day. The letter also claimed that the dishwasher, stove, and freezer were not working and they are therefore charging me $600 for repairs! Everything was working while I lived there, so it's quite amazing and hard to believe that three major appliances all went kaput the day I moved out. I won't got into more detail here. I just thought I'd include it in my updates since I ranted on about it in my last post.
