Various appointments

Last Friday was my bone scan. The injection went smoothly and so did the scan even though I was an hour late for the scan. I have no idea how that happened; for whatever reason, even though I knew exactly what time the second appointment was supposed to happen, my brain added an hour to that time. And even though I showed up exactly an hour late, it was another twenty-five minutes before they came and got me. I didn't know that they were looking for me so I was just waiting for the nurse. Fortunately, the scan is still valid. 

Today was mammogram day, which also went smoothly. Because the morphea has deformed the left breast so much, the technician couldn't get a good view of the scars on the mammogram. Breast cancer often comes back in previous scar tissue so it's important to get a good view of my old scars. So they did an ultrasound of the scars, which was apparently quite difficult as the first scar is big and meanders a bit.

My CT scan is scheduled for next Friday and I get the results from all these scans on December 14.

We also had our physical exams with our family doctor on Tuesday. Both our cholesterol numbers are down to more acceptable levels so our diet (and Ian's pills) are working. Yay! My family doctor also asked how I was doing. I'm doing fine - well, better - and I told him that my psychologist and I had thought that volunteer work would be good for me and that I was thinking of looking for some volunteer work in the new year (depending on my test results, of course). My family doctor doesn't like the idea at all because he doesn't want me to get too stressed. I told him that understood that but that I was looking for meaning in my life.

His reply to that was that I should get meaning out of my relationship with Ian, that giving to other people is good but my relationships are the most important things I have. That's true, I guess, but afterwards I felt like I had traveled back in time to the 1950s and was being told to support my husband in his career. 

I know that I need to be careful with doing volunteer work; I tend to have an all-or-nothing approach to things that can be overwhelming. And I know that while the cancer is one reason why I haven't been working these last six years, another reason - perhaps the main reason - I haven't been working is my struggle with depression. I guess you could say that I'm mentally ill. I know that I will never again be the person I was when I was working (and that's a good thing in many ways), but I'd like to think that I can aspire to more than making Ian happy and focusing on our relationship. It's frustrating to be told otherwise.

Tumour marker results

Today was visit the oncologist day. My CA 15-3 tumour marker has crept up to 39.9 from - what was it? about 33? The marker has been at 40 before so we wouldn't worry about it at all, normally. However, it is a bit of a jump up... and my sternum (where my mets are) has been hurting a LOT for the last five weeks, since I got back from Chicago. Also, I've lost about ten pounds in the last 10 weeks or so. And my face broke out and took longer than usual to heal.

Now, all of these things have perfectly rational explanations. For example, my sternum started hurting right after I got back from Chicago. While I traveled, I wore my carry-on bag across my body over my sternum and it's very possible that I damaged the bone somehow. After all, the bone is fragile. As far as the weight goes, we have been on a low saturated fat diet since Labour Day. Not having any cheese at dinner or ice cream or anything could definitely make me lose weight. I didn't expect to lose as much as I did but it's possible that my body was poised to lose the weight. The weight I'm at is where I've been most of my adult life so it's natural that my body would want to be there, given the opportunity. Regarding the breakouts, I'd tried a new cream on my face which probably caused me to break out. And if I didn't pick at the breakouts (and Gozer didn't lick my face) they'd heal faster.

It is also possible that my lucky six-year run of cancer stability is over and that I have progression for the first time since I was diagnosed with mets. Therefore we need to do some scans and check things out. They'll be scheduling a bone scan and CT scan and I expect to get the results the week of December 10th. My oncologist will be at a conference during the first week of December or else I'd get my results then.

I'm not looking forward to having to wait for results over the next few weeks but the time will pass one way or another. While I need to be aware that I might be facing progression of my mets, it's too soon to panic and I don't want to spend my time worrying unnecessarily.

Sewing room getting done

A couple of weeks ago we went to IKEA to look at furniture for my sewing room. The idea was that I would figure out the floorplan and then order the furniture to arrive this week, when Ian will be on vacation for a curling tournament.

Unfortunately, I didn't get my floorplan figured out until this weekend and I didn't put the order in until late this morning. For some reason I thought that IKEA could deliver the next day, but I think that's only true if we were to go to the store, pick our entire order, and then ask them to deliver it. As it is, the delivery is tentatively scheduled for next Tuesday. So much for being able to put the furniture together while Ian was on vacation.

We did tape out the furniture locations in the room so we did figure out how we're going to light the room and we'll be able to get that done this week. That's something, at least. I'll also be able to spend some time going through my fabric as I think I might not want it all. I also know that I don't want to keep all of my vintage patterns.

I'm not quite sure what to do with the fabric and patterns that I don't want. Apparently Value Village will take both fabric and patterns for a per pound rate. I'm not sure that I want to give them any of the really good-quality fabric because I'm not sure that's where they'll get the best use. At the same time, I don't want to be the hoarder who hangs on to things because no one else can give them as good of a home. If anyone has suggestions about what I can do with the fabric - some vintage cottons and many, many nicer fabrics - let me know.

As for the patterns, I could sell them on etsy or I could contact one of the vintage pattern stores and offer the  m the patterns for a flat rate. I'm kind of leaning towards the latter option because I think that would be the best way for my estate to dispose of my patterns when it comes time for that and it would be better if there was already a relationship with a seller. I figure it would just be easier for whoever has to deal with my estate to know who to go to and what to expect. I do have some valuable patterns in my collection, after all.

I figure I'll have my sewing room functional before the end of the year and I'm quite excited about that. I've been wanting to do some sewing for a while but my current setup just isn't comfortable; I can hardly wait to be in my new and improved, comfortable sewing room.

Hello again

Wow, I've really let things go here, haven't I? I don't have a good reason for not posting, I'm afraid. I'd been feeling sort of depressed over the last little while but I'm starting to feel better.

Interestingly, when I last saw my psychologist she suggested that I might be slightly bipolar. If I am, that would explain how I can have so much energy and need less sleep sometimes and no energy at all and need hours and hours more sleep other times. Thinking back, I have noticed that when I'm more energetic, I want to create more things and I also see things as brighter and more colourful. When I'm less energetic, things look dimmer. I think the way I process sound differently as well.

I haven't tracked any of these changes so I don't know if I actually exhibit any bipolar-type symptoms or if I'm just fitting these observations into this framework. It would be a good idea to keep track of how I'm feeling, how much sleep I get, how things look, whether my ears hurt from sounds, and so forth to see if there's a pattern.

If you live in North America and aren't living under a rock you'll know that today is the US election. US election nights remind me of the night I found out that my primary breast cancer had spread into three of seven dissected lymph nodes and that I needed more surgery because the margins weren't clear. That night in 2000 I remember sitting numbly watching the election results come in while trying to process the news. Even though I knew that things were bad - I'd seen the mass on the mammogram - I had hoped that the cancer would be confined to the breast.

The US election night is a strange anniversary to remember, in a way, especially since now I have mets. But for me, that was the day that everything really changed because I finally knew what was going on. Had the election not been so close and had it been resolved that night, I might not feel the same association with it as I do. Things changed for the US that night, too, although no one knew then what would be coming.

In today's election, I hope that Obama is re-elected. I don't trust Mitt Romney because he doesn't seem to have a single point of view on things; he seems to say whatever others want to hear. I'm also concerned at the power the far right has in the Republican party and what their influence would mean for women's rights, immigration, and the working class. Hopefully the election will be resolved tonight in Obama's favour.

Gozer's diet

We received Gozer's weight-loss information sheet earlier this week. It says that we're going to turn Gozer into a supermodel :) Her last weight at the vet was 11.8kg and the vet wants her down at 10kg. Gozer is to lose the weight over at least nine weeks; losing it more quickly would be bad.

I know 1.8kg doesn't sound like much weight but it is 15% of her body weight and that's a significant amount. Imagine if you had to lose 15% of your body weight - it would take a while! It's also important that the weight come off slowly so that she stays healthy.

To lose the weight, Gozer is allowed 440 calories per day of which at most 10% of the calories can come from food. Therefore, Gozer is now allowed only 3/4 cup of her food twice daily. That's down from about a cup of food twice daily and I think we were actually feeding her even more than that. When packed tightly, her food used to completely cover the bottom of her food dish and now it doesn't cover the bottom at all. Packing her food tightly leaves about one-third to one-half of the dish exposed.

The goal we've been given is to give Gozer only 30 calories in treats each day. Currently we give her a small amount of peanut butter in the mornings which we figured to be about eight calories. I know I've given her up to a full teaspoon of the peanut butter but at 33 calories per teaspoon, that can't happen any more. We also give Gozer a treat when she goes into her kennel in the mornings and evenings. We checked and each one of those treats has 22 calories (or 29 for the other flavour). Therefore, Gozer doesn't get a full cookie any more when she goes into her kennel.

Because Gozer's current food doesn't have any flexibility for things like getting a bath (when she would normally get about two liver bits at eight calories each), we need to re-work what treats we're feeding her. We have room to cut down on her kibble when she gets more treats so we can always do that. We're also going to do some investigation into other treats with fewer calories (including things like carrots and apples; the vet also suggested cat treats) so that we have more flexibility in what we give her.

I'd also like to be able to give her more volume of treats for the same calories, if possible. Gozer has been on her diet for a couple of days now and I think she thinks she's starving. When she sleeps on the chair in front of the tv she almost always has one of her squeaky toys in her mouth. When she's not up on the chair with me, she's looking for insects to eat. Poor girl. I know how she feels, being hungry all the time. I figure if we can give her treats that are more filling and have fewer calories, she'll be happier.

I am looking forward to seeing our little fluffybutt becoming leaner. Already she seems to have more energy on her walks and when playing so I think that she'll like being leaner, too.

MBCN Chicago conference

I had the best time ever at this weekend's conference in Chicago. The conference itself was hit and miss as some sessions were extremely informative while others offered nothing new or relevant. Of course I didn't go to the conference for the information; I went to connect with my friends on our online board. I haven't seen them in a year and I've missed them. Seeing people online is no substitute for meeting and hanging out with them in person.

I really connected with people this weekend in a way that I haven't done in a long time. There have been times that I've come away from these things feeling a bit like I don't fit in. Somehow, this time I felt like I really belonged. Maybe it's because I made a couple of real friends - not just people that I know and talk to, but people that I feel like I could (and will) stay in touch with outside of the board and facebook statuses, if that makes sense. I already knew one person and this weekend we got to know each other much better. Another person and I just clicked, and another couple of people and I got along super-well (if we'd talked on our own, we'd have clicked, I think).

Another reason I felt like I belonged is that people came up to me and told me that they really wanted to meet me. I want to meet everyone but I haven't always felt like other people want to meet me, you know? I've also struggled with feeling like I haven't got much to contribute on the board because my cancer is so stable and I was so happy when people told me that they wanted to know how I was doing, that they followed my updates, and that they did want to hear from me.

The only down side to the trip (aside from the fact that I had no time to go shopping) was that my sternum has been aching since yesterday and I've been in agony. My painkiller patches are up to date and working well so I don't know what's going on. I suspect it has something to do with flying and the pressurized aircraft but I don't actually know. I'm taking supplemental painkillers and taking it easy.

Sternal pain aside, I can't help but notice that the last two trips I've taken have been the best ever and that I've come back feeling happy and connected to people. I think that the work I've been doing with my psychologist over the last year has been making a huge difference in the way I'm approaching and thinking about these trips. I love love love this change.

I'm so happy that I had such a great time on this trip. I'm can barely wait for the next one.

It's been a while

It's been a while since I've written anything, hasn't it? My sister has moved to to the UK; she arrived safe and sound and has been exploring her surroundings.

We spent some time with Ian's parent's for Thanksgiving. I enjoyed visiting with Ian's parents especially because I haven't seen them for any length of time in quite a while. We ate delicious pumpkin pie after a very satisfying and also delicious meal. We decided to allow ourselves to eat what we wanted in moderation because we figured that easing up on our new diet restrictions would be ok for one day. We're on a low saturated fat diet while also trying to minimize the amount of fat in our diet. I have no idea what our cholesterol levels are like but we've both lost weight.

On Friday I'm headed to Chicago for a conference on metastatic breast cancer. Mostly I'm going to see my friends. Hanging out with them is what makes going to the conference worthwhile for me. I guess the information presented at the conference might be useful but because my mets are so stable, the information isn't as relevant to me.

All that doesn't really explain why I haven't been writing anything lately... and I guess I don't have much of an explanation. I've been tired, and I've been having what might be described as panic attacks. I have no idea why that's been happening; I don't think I'm all that stressed, but maybe I am. I have been feeling a bit more depressed (and bored?) than usual, too.

One of the things that's come up in therapy is that I have a lot of anger and rage issues. I'm not quite sure where they're coming from so I'm trying to identify how I feel right before the rage. I wonder if shining a light on that rage is bringing up some of these other feelings. Or maybe I'm feeling the way I do because I haven't been doing much of anything lately - sitting in front of the tv surfing the internet doesn't count as an activity.

I am looking forward to going to Chicago although I'm nowhere near finished getting everything ready! It's going to be a fun trip.

Edmonton family events

My youngest sister is moving to England tomorrow. She's been planning this move for a long, long time and the day has finally come. I'm very excited for her because moving to England has been a dream of hers for years and years and I'm thrilled that she's realizing this dream. Of course I'm sad, too, because this is such a big change and I don't think I like big changes.

Selfishly, I'm sad because it's a big change and I don't like changes so I'd love for her to stay in Canada, but I want her to be the happiest she can be so my selfish wants have to take a backseat here. Besides, I know that she'll come back to visit - in fact, I think we're going to co-ordinate a Christmas visit - and I'll be able to go and visit her.

Because I wanted to see my sister before she left, I was in Edmonton last weekend. I didn't tell anyone other than my family that I was going there because I wanted to focus on spending time with my sisters. To my friends: we'll get together next time I'm in Edmonton.

I was there for four days and saw both my sisters as much as possible on each of those days. I had the best time I've ever had with my sisters over those four days and my sisters said they had the best time ever, too. We really connected and didn't fight and had the biggest giggles ever :)

One of the things we did was look over old photos that each sister had scanned or developed from slides and negatives. We saw parts of our childhood that we hadn't seen before as well as parts of our parent's and grandparent's lives that were eye-opening to us. It was fun to look back and ourselves and see how beautiful we really were and how great those pictures were... and the silly things that some of us may have done to our hair.

I love my sisters so much and I love that we had such a great time and were so comfortable together. I'm sending good thoughts to my youngest sister that she'll have safe travels and that she'll love it there more than she thinks she will. Have a great time, seester! I love you.

Gozer's visit to the doctor

Gozer has gained quite a bit of weight quite quickly: over the last four months she's gone from 9.3kg (20.5lbs) to 11.8kg (26.0lb), an increase of more than 25%. When anyone - human or dog - adds 25% to their weight in only a four months, it's cause for some concern. Gozer's walk time has decreased by a third to half of the pre-summer levels due to the hot weather so it's likely that her weight gain is related to her decreased activity. The vet also thinks that Gozer might be a bit older than we had thought - closer to four years old rather than two - because that's when dogs naturally gain weight

The vet thinks that Gozer is a bit chubby but isn't obese and says that Gozer does need to lose weight - but not too quickly. She's going to draw up a chart showing how many calories Gozer needs each day and from there we'll figure out how much to feed her and how much exercise to give her.

While I was there I inadvertently became part of an issue they're having. Way back when, Gozer was given flea medication that we'll need to start giving to her again in December (she's on Trifexis for the summer to protect against other parasites). Unfortunately, the medication expired in August of this year and there's no way that I'll give her expired medication in December. When I took Gozer in for her grooming a couple of weeks ago, I brought the package to the office. They checked and all of this medication was expired; since they had to order more, I took my package home.

After Gozer and I left the groomers, one of the groomers came running out with a new package of medication. When I got home I noticed that the medication was for larger dogs. Gozer is chubby but she's not that big! I brought both packages in with me today and explained what had happened. The vet was very upset because whoever set up the box just reprinted the label and didn't get the vet's signature, meaning the vet didn't know that this had happened - a major violation of protocol. This didn't cause any problems for me or for Gozer but if the staff is doing this kind of thing at other times, some pet could get hurt and that's not good.

We'll get Gozer's ideal calorie intake next week and then we'll be going back to the vet in a couple of months to see how much weight Gozer loses. We'll also need to pick up her flea medication - one that the vet has signed off on!

My skin thing has a name

The changes to the skin on my left breast are definitely morphea, a type of scleroderma. The biopsy sample was good: it was 0.5cm by 0.4cm and went down into the fatty tissue below the derma, or skin layer. There were areas of sclerosis in the derma that went all the way down into the fat so the changes are quite extensive.

No one really knows what causes morphea. It's thought to be an autoimmune disease and it shows up as a long-term side effect of radiation. The cases I've seen have shown up much sooner than 11 years after radiation like mine did. I can imagine a scenario where my immune system was wonky because of the cancer and sarcoidosis and the denosumab just added enough strain to my already-weird system for the morphea to take hold.

There aren't really any treatments for morphea; pretty much everything is done off-label on an experimental basis because nothing really works. The best treatment is a systemic one - I think it's cyclophosphamide, a type of chemotherapy, and it works by suppressing the immune system - but my system is fragile enough that we don't want to introduce a new systemic treatment until or unless we have to do it.

There's another topical treatment I could do but I'd need to see him every two weeks and there's no guarantee it will work. I don't think he thinks it's worth trying, partly because I'd have to travel so far. If I lived in Oakville, things would be different. Before I make a decision one way or another on whether to try this treatment, he wants me to talk to my oncologist and family doctor to get their thoughts. So we'll see. I'm not convinced that it's worth trying to get rid of it, especially since it's not life-threatening or anything. Besides, if chemotherapy clears this thing up, it'll get cleared up when I'm the "lucky" recipient of chemotherapy for the cancer - whenever that happens (which hopefully won't be for quite some time yet).

Oh, and the dermatologist thinks that the incision is healing up quite well. He told me that sometimes infection will take hold and be tough to get rid of so if there are any signs that the infection is returning, I need to get to the ER right away. I'll definitely do that: I don't want to wind up in the hospital with IV antibiotics.

Healing but tired

I think the anitbiotic is working. There's still some fluid draining from the holes where the stitches were but it's lessening and looking less infectiony. The redness is also fading and the swelling is going down so the area doesn't look quite as angry and swollen as before. I'm happy that it's getting better and that I don't need to go back to the hospital for IV antibiotics.

I am finding that I'm extremely tired since I started the antibiotics. I feel like I'm so tired all the time and the slightest activity leaves me exhausted. I assume that the antibiotic is forcing my body to heal and that's what is making me so, so, so tired.

Tomorrow afternoon I see my dermatologist and hopefully he'll agree that the biopsy site is healing well. I also hope that he'll have meaningful pathology results so that we know what's going on with my skin. I'm not looking forward to the drive tomorrow but I'll sleep in, load up on caffeine, and take it easy so that I'm not too tired. I don't know what we'll do about supper, exactly, but I'll deal with that tomorrow.

Adventures in (non)healing

For the last few days my left arm, underarm, and breast have all felt heavy, achy, and sore and I was having a hard time lifting my hand up high because it hurt in my underarm. I figured that the biopsy and my previous surgery taking out lymph nodes caused a buildup of lymph fluid in those areas so I massaged them. I'd been taught how to do the use massage to move the lymph fluid and get it flowing better way back when I had the lymphedema in my arm. I'd noticed that the area around the stitches was a bit warm and a bit red but I figured that this was related to the swelling and buildup of lymph fluid.

Imagine my surprise when I was having a bath and I noticed that the area around the stitches was bright red and there was that particular yellow crust around the stitches that signifies infection. My dermatologist had told me to call if anything looked strange and so I called right away. He would have liked it if I could have gone to see him this afternoon but he was leaving in an hour and it would have taken at least an hour and a half to get there because Ian had the car.

He told me that in this case, I should go to the emergency room and have them look at it since he couldn't prescribe something over the phone. I asked if I could go to a walk-in clinic and he reluctantly said yes but preferred the emergency room.

I called Ian right away, told him what was going on, and he came home to take me to the emergency room. I was worried that I'd end up there for at least six hours... and I almost did. The main treatment area was not moving at all and was really backed up. They were able to get me into the minor treatment area where I was seen by a nurse practitioner. She took out the stitches, gave me a prescription for Keflex, and we were on our way in just over two hours.

If the Keflex doesn't work I need to go back to the ER and they'll put me on IV antibiotics. That's one outcome I'd like to avoid but if it does come to that, it's actually a good thing that I went to this ER - the one associated with the cancer center. As much as I'd wanted to go to a walk-in clinic, going to this ER meant that they had more information about me and my cancer treatment. Ian was right to make me go to the ER even though I was whining about having to be there for six hours.

I see the dermatologist on Monday. He expects that the infection will be cleared up and I hope he's right.

Streams and rivers and frogs, oh my!

The person who cleans our house had to bring her kids with her today. They're 10 and 7 and both boys and I offered to take them and Gozer for a walk. We ended up out there for about two hours.

Mostly the walk went well: we went through the woods and down by the river... and by a stream and through the stream and beside the stream. The boys decided that they wanted to look for frogs so that's what we did. Unfortunately, all of us got our feet wet... including Gozer. She was doing ok walking through the streams - it was when she stepped into much up to her chest that things were bad for her. She became a little panicky after that because she wanted out of that area right that second.

When Ian found out that Gozer smelled like fish and was absolutely filthy, he gave me a choice: keep her outside until he got home, or give her a bath myself. It turns out that I can bathe her all by myself. I thought I did a good job but I detected the faintest scent of fish when she came in from her short evening walk so I think I'll have to bathe her again tomorrow.

I don't think my cleaner was too, too upset that both her boys came back with filthy, wet socks and shoes (and two frogs). If there's a next time for this, we're not going for nearly as long and we're going to go frog-hunting closer to home. Preferably without actually stepping into a stream.

A whole lot of work

With my cholesterol higher than it should be I know that I need to make some changes. Diet-wise, we're looking more carefully at what we're eating and making healthier choices that involve more fruits and vegetables. However, changing my diet isn't enough: I need to exercise more.

With it being so hot this summer I haven't been walking Gozer during the day and I haven't been getting much other exercise. Weeding is some exercise but it isn't cardiovascular exercise so it isn't helping my heart at all. Somehow it does seem to be increasing my flexibility, however: for the first time ever I can bend at my hips, keep my legs straight, and put my hands flat on the ground. I used to have to strain to touch my fingertips to the ground.

Today I got more exercise than I'd bargained for because we decided to seed some of the bare patches on our front lawn and the top of the back lawn and overseed the rest of those lawns. We - by which I mean I - de-thatched these areas first which was a LOT of work. Using the rake doesn't just involve my arms but my upper- and mid- back, core, shoulders, and legs. Fortunately, by using my core and upper back, my lower back didn't hurt while I was working and it's still feeling good..

I haven't done that much work since I was paddling! Unfortunately, because I haven't done much exercise lately, I wasn't able to quite finish de-thatching everything and Ian had to finish. Even though he only worked for an extra 20 minutes or so after I stopped, I knew that if I hadn't stopped I would have crossed the line into overdoing it and I would have paid for it for the next week. I'm proud of what I accomplished today. Afterwards I had a lovely long, hot bath to soak my muscles.

It's going to be nice this week so I plan to take Gozer out for an afternoon walk. It'll be good for her chubby bum as well as mine. And maybe next weekend I'll be able to do some physical work in the yard again - after fully recovering from this weekend, I expect (ok, I hope) to have more stamina.

Everyone gets a new diet in our house

For the last couple of months we've known that Gozer had gained weight. We were feeding her the recommended amount and she still gets two walks per day but for some reason her weight has been increasing.

How much has it increased? She went from just under 20 pounds in the spring to 25.8(!) today. In other words, she's increased her body weight by over 25% in just a few months. That's a huge weight gain for a person, let alone a dog. I knew she was bigger but I didn't know that she was that much bigger. I don't think she's obese because I can see her waist from the side although I can't see it from above and I can't feel her ribs without pressing hard into her sidess.

Gozer is going to be groomed on Friday and because she's over 25 pounds I think she'll be considered a medium instead of a small dog as 25 pounds is the cutoff. Of course it costs more to groom a medium-sized dog because they require more handling.

Tomorrow I'm also going to call and make an appointment for Gozer to see the vet. Clearly she's going to need to reduce her weight and I need to get some hints for that. I also need to be sure that she doesn't have some condition that's causing her to gain weight. She's gained the weight so fast for no real reason that I can see that I'm a bit concerned.

Doctor's appointments

Today we got to visit some doctors.

Both Ian and I were called in to see our family doctor about our cholesterol results. Fortunately, the rest of both our bloodwork was fine but he has issues with the cholesterol levels. My HDL (good cholesterol) was 1.92, my LDL (bad cholesterol) was 4.81, and the ratio of my total cholesterol over HDL is 3.7. Because my dad had a heart attack at 39 and died after surgery to correct serious vascular issues in his legs I'm considered to be at high risk for heart problems and a ratio of 3.7 is getting to be too high. I think that the ratio should be under 4.0 - which mine is - but it's gone up since the last time I had the cholesterol tested.

Ian has different numbers and other factors and his cholesterol has to come down, too. Our family doctor gave Ian some new medication but he doesn't want to give me yet another medication. Therefore, we have to make some dietary changes: more fruits and vegetables, no more ice cream (including Blizzards and McFlurries), no more high-fat foods, no more fries and chicken fingers for dinner.

We'll be getting our cholesterol checked again in about six weeks to see if the steps we're taking are having an effect. I hope that the change in diet works that quickly.

After seeing our family doctor I had a biopsy done on the the skin on my breast. A new spot has actually shown up at the end of my collarbone on the left side; he looked at it but he decided to focus on the breast skin. As he was looking at the area to figure out where to do the biopsy, he asked if I had any kind of implant. Ummm, no - if I did, I'd have made that breast bigger to be more like the other one instead of walking around with one normal boob and one mini-boob. Apparently the changes to the skin have somehow made the breast feel like I've got implants.

The doctor was really good especially when it came to dealing with me. I'd been nervous all day and when I laid on the thingy I started to get a very woogly back and had trouble staying still. Mostly it was the thought of feeling him do the biopsy and put in the stitches that was making my back all woogly so I tried to do some breathing and focusing on other senses. It mostly worked and I was able to stay more still. I did not think about beetles crawling on my skin, as Ian suggested afterwards, because that's kind of what the woogly feeling is like.

The doctor put in two stitches which will come out in two weeks when I go back for the pathology results. If the results are inconclusive then he'll do another biopsy. I don't exactly know what kind of biopsy he did but he was worried about puncturing an implant (hence the question about implants above) so I think he took a fairly large sample.

Great news.. and sad news

On Tuesday I saw my oncologist and got some great news: my tumour markers are steady at 33. Yay for low tumour markers! My blood counts are all normal although my calcium was a little bit low (but still within normal). She cautioned me to always, always take calcium because two people have died while taking it. One person had low kidney function and the other had never taken calcium at all. I have a good supply of calcium pills and I'm taking them in the mornings.

I wanted to write about my oncologist's appointment but when I got home I discovered that four of my friends had died since last Wednesday and I was alternately in shock and grieving. I knew that two of the women were close to their end because they were in hospice but I was terribly shocked and saddened to know that the other two had died.

I'm still not finished processing these deaths. I slept until 3pm yesterday - I was tired before this terrible news but I didn't think I was "sleep all day" tired - out of the shock and grief. Today I had metalsmithing class but when I was getting ready to leave I just started sobbing ... at which point I knew that I couldn't go out and see people. I needed to stay home and cuddle my dog.

How can I still be alive when so many have died? It's so unfair.

Dermatologist appointment

You might remember that I had a biopsy of the thickened skin on my left breast a while back and the pathologist thought that I had grannular annulare of the interstitial type, maybe. Well, I saw the dermatologist today and he thinks that I have morphea, a type of scleroderma, instead. This condition, which is also thought to be an autoimmune condition, is quite rare and can be caused by radiation therapy. Who knew?

I'm sure there are differences between the two conditions but I'm not sure what those differences might be. The dermatologist wants to do another biopsy to confirm his theory that I have this morphea thing. That's scheduled for September 4 in his office.

He warned me that whatever is causing my ugly breast syndrome, it's unlikely that it can be treated so I'll be stuck with it until or unless it resolves or fades on its own. I'm a little upset about that because I'm very self-conscious about how ugly that breast is. The thickening has also changed the shape and position of the breast it looks more like a bolt-on (or breast with an implant) and it's quite rigid. The rigidity means that I'm not able to pad it out in a bra anymore, which is frustrating. The breast also hurts and the skin itches like crazy.

If the breast issue turns out to be a form of scleroderma, there's a research group in Hamilton for people with scleroderma. That's something.

What are the odds of someone having cancer and two separate autoimmune diseases? I wonder if there's something connecting all of these conditions. Where's Dr. House when I need him?

Another Olympics over

The Olympics is over again. I've spent the last two weeks watching various sports instead of working on this or that. Now I'll have no excuse for not getting something done!

I liked the coverage of the various events at the beginning of the Olympics but towards the end it seemed like they showed more and more commercials. For example, we could only see about two-thirds of the dives in the Men's 10m Diving Final because TSN aired commercials during the other third. I found this to be very frustrating. I was able to watch almost all of the Men's 10m Diving Preliminaries so why couldn't I see almost all the dives in the final? I know that the Final was on Saturday so presumably viewership was higher but I would have been happier if fewer commercials were shown. I might have even been a bit more tolerant of the coverage if they'd broadcast new commercials but they showed the same old ones that had been showing during the entire Games.

This Olympics was broadcast by CTV and its partners TSN, SportsNet, OLN, and other non-English station. CBC has the rights to broadcast the next Olympics and while I hope that they'll have as many partners broadcasting coverage, I also hope they show fewer commercials. I know they have to make money and all but there must be a better way to balance prime-time coverage with commercials.

The Closing Ceremonies, like much of the Opening Ceremonies, focused on music. There were quite a few live performances, including a surprising one by Eric Idle! He sang Always Look on the Bright Side of Life which was very well-received by the crowd: even Kate Middleton was swaying back and forth and whistling the whistling bits!

Rio, who will be hosting the 2016 Games, did a small segment to show the world what's coming in four years. As I recall, the London segment during the Beijing games was kind of lame. The Rio segment this year wasn't so much lame as it was kind of incomprehensible because it was so much like the rest of the ceremony except in another language. I'm sure their Opening Ceremony will be compelling in its own way.

Our long weekend

This past long weekend was very fun and productive for all of us. I met up with a friend and a couple of her friends for a delicious lunch at Yorkdale on Friday. When I'd said that Friday was better for me, it didn't occur to me that it was the Friday of a long weekend and that traffic might be bad with people heading up to the cottage for the long weekend. I've definitely driven through worse traffic but this was as bad as anything I've had to drive in for a long time. Normally the drive to Yorkdale takes about an hour and ten minutes or so and it took closer to an hour and three quarters each way.

Fortunately the trip was worth it. Lunch was delicious and I had a great time with my friend and her friends. I hit it off really well with one of them and we were in stitches laughing almost the whole time. It was great :) 

I also finally picked out a paint colour for my sewing room and we got the room painted this weekend! I chose Benjamin Moore's CSP-370 (Picket Fence). It's a light taupe colour, I guess. One thing I like about it is that it's a full-spectrum paint, meaning that it contains pigments from each colour in the spectrum and contains no black. Full spectrum paints read more like daylight colours and interact with the surrounding light and colours much more than regular paints do. As well, the shades are more luminous with subtle tones because all of the pigment colours are mixed in the final colour. 

We painted the ceiling and put two coats on the wall over the weekend. I love it! The ceiling has one of those california finishes with plaster scraped on and I think it looks so much better once it's painted. The shadows are softer. The wall colour looks fantastic even with the yellow subfloor and I know that once the floor is in it'll look just the way I wanted: welcoming and calming with some colour (but not so much that the colour would overwhelm the fabric).

Even Gozer had a productive weekend. We found her trying to eat a small rodent of some kind that had been dead for a while on Sunday. Then on Monday we found her with blood all over her face with a freshly dead mouse in front of her. I'm familiar with cats that kill and eat mice and birds but it never occurred to me that our cute little dog would kill them - especially since it seemed like she couldn't catch them. Apparently she has hunting skills we didn't know about.

In and around all of these adventures we watched the Olympics. I do love watching the different sports although I prefer watching gymnastics and diving. The timed sports like swimming and running are interesting but I like the sports that require some artistry. I'll watch just about anything, however.