Rotisserie Chicken Anyone?: Friday, August 14, 2009

Well, it's the end of another week, which means it's another week closer to the end of the treatment phase of my wellness campaign. Hooray! I just returned from my morning walk with loaner dog and don't have too much on the agenda today before 3 p.m. -- just a bunch of birthday party calls/errands and a little house cleaning. At 3 p.m., I'm meeting one of the co-captains of my wellness campaign, Michelle, at the J. Crew store in Georgetown (I am willing to face the horror of Georgetown driving/parking for good friends!) to help her try on their collection of...drumroll please...wedding dresses! Michelle and her fiance, Jim, got engaged one week ago today and are already busy planning an early December wedding (no time like the present, right?). I couldn't be happier for the two of them and am thrilled to add another non-cancer-related festive event (events, actually, since every wedding comes with other fun pre-wedding events) to my social calendar. And I'm really honored that Michelle has asked me to play some yet-to-be-determined role in her wedding ceremony. Oh, and in case you're wondering, after a quick search of the J. Crew web site, here's my early pick for a great dress candidate for Michelle's petite frame and the smart, sophisticated look she wants to achieve:


So, that's today but before I go, as promised, here are some of the photo highlights of my first IP treatment. Unfortunately, though, I don't have any pictures of the aforementioned rotisserie chicken action that happens at the very end of each IP treatment. What the heck am I talking about, you ask? Well, it's like this: The point of IP chemo is to literally coat a woman's intraperitoneal (IP) cavity with poisonous anti-cancer drugs (in my case, Taxol and Cisplatin) so that every microscopic floating cancer cell is, uh, roasted? fried? You get the picture. Another way to think of the process is that it's like pouring maple syrup into a glass jar and trying to make sure that the top, bottom, and all of the sides are thoroughly coated after the pour. How do you achieve this for the IP cavity? You make the lady spend 15-20 minutes laying on each side of her body, including the left, right, back and stomach, to make sure the drugs make it everywhere. So, you feel like a big old oven stuffer roaster while you spend an hour doing this activity -- hence, the rotisserie chicken label. Yummy, huh?


Okay, chest port numbed so here we go! Needle in!


A close-up of my nurse, Anh, shooting pre-meds into my chest port.

Anh suiting up for next steps...

Here we go! Round one of Taxol via chest port...

Later that afternoon, Edith helped insert the needle and get the Cisplatin going into my abdominal port, which sits on my rib cage, as you'll see.

Sterilizing my numb skin for the abdominal needle insertion...

In it goes!

Beautiful, isn't it?

All sealed up and ready for action!

As you can see, I'm having trouble loading veritcal shots again. Anyway, here's a crooked view of ALL of the fluids that went into my abdomen during cycle 1. Work your magic, baby!

Back at home post-treatment with River dog...

FYI - this is how we "share" the couch.