My cousin Lisa is one of those take charge no nonsense type people that you either love or hate. It happens that I love her even when she drives me crazy. Right now as my head is swimming with dates, times, locations, tests, etc her take charge personality is helping me. She is planning out meals, etc. I mention getting my hair cut and she plans an appt for me. This is how she is and I love her for it especially now when most days I cant even remember what day it is. I have no sense of time, date, day anything. I sleep fitfully sometimes I pass out in utter exhaustion and sleep, other times I may catch little more than a cat nap and be up at the crack of dawn. I lay in bed hoping I'll fall back asleep but as my brain comes into consciousness the thoughts creep in and I'm wide awake and crying by 5 am. I guess maybe that's why I start this blog. So I can give myself time to focus on something other than the sad moments and to express all I'm going through and feeling. To share with you all what this journey is like for me. For now there are ok moments..ones where I can talk or laugh but mostly there are lots of bad moments. The moments where I can cry my eyes out for hours. Crying spells come on anywhere-in the bed, in the shower, on the train, in the hospital, in the waiting room, wherever. I dont try to make myself not cry..right now I dont care who sees me. If they knew what I was going through they would understand. So this morning I get up and finally start writing my blog. Telling what I've been going through and feeling each day. This is not easy. I have no script or nothing planned I want to say, I'm just writing. It is my therapy. I write as long as I can but I get tired easily now. I think all the poking and prodding just wears on me both physically and mentally and by the time I leave the hospital each day I've had enough. I dont want to keep talking to everyone. I leave texts and voicemails unanswered for days. I just cant find the energy to keep talking about it over and over. I'm mentally drained.
Today my dad picked me up and took me to the care center again. On the ride in I tell him about the blog and explain to him my thoughts about death. He tells me he understands and he would be surprised if I told him I hadnt thought about it. I tell him what's in the blog and what I want and he nods. I explain I understand how people feel at the end when they say they dont want to go through anymore treatment because all the tests, blood drawn, fluids pumped in, tissue samples, physicals, etc start to wear on you and you just cant keep going through it. I can tell he's starting to get upset so I stop talking. We arrive at the center by a little after 9 which gives me time to go to the breast care center and get a prescription for a sedative so I can handle doing the MRI for a 2nd time in 3 days. I get the prescription and go to the pharmacy to get it filled. I then call pre-registration who needs me to call before every major appt to provide all my insurance and contact info. I take my first sedative (1 taken an hour before 1 taken 15 mins before) and head down to the MRI dept. I check in and wait again for Ashley in the MRI dept. She comes out and hands me the same paperwork from the previous day and tells me to fill it out again. I do and I sit and wait. They take me back to MRI where unfortunately this time they will not allow my father in the room because I'm having a biopsy performed. I'm told to strip just from the waist up this time and have a seat while they search for a vein to put in my IV line again. At this point I pop the 2nd sedative and wait while it kicks in. Despite having remembered to drink fluids this time, the nurse cannot find a vein. After 3 unsuccessful attempts of poking me and making me bleed, she calls another nurse in who quickly finds a vein in my right hand puts in some lidocaine and inserts the IV line into my hand (these veins hurt much worse than the ones in the arms). With the line in, they walk me into the MRI room. The sedatives have started to kick in thankfully and they help me into the machine again. This time as I'm slid into the machine I fall asleep. The buzzing is far away now maybe in a dream. I come into semi conscious only when they pull me out and start to mark and biopsy my breast. I can feel the tugging but only slightly as I'm still heavily sedated. As they finish up I start to come around a little though I'm still tired. When they bring me out the machine I feel my back in screaming pain. I dont think I can lay flat on my stomach like that for that long because the pain is unbearable. It takes a while before I can move as the nurse is still applying pressure to my right breast and my back hurts too much to even bend my legs and sit up. The pain finally subsides enough for me to be able to sit up while they go get bandages. They remove the IV line from my hand and put surtures on my breast and a bandage. They then bring me out the room and bandage my entire upper torso. I imagine as the lidocaine wears off I'll know why this has been done. The only problem is now I have to figure out how to have my EKG with my torso bandaged. I leave MRI and go to mammography to have more shots taken of them post biopsy. They take 2 shots and then I get dressed and grab my dad so we can head up to radiology.
I get to radiology at 12:50 which means thankfully I made it in time for my 1:15 appt. They take down all my info again and I sit in the waiting area waiting for the radiologist to call me. 10 mins later he calls me and brings me to an exam room. I proceed to show him my bandages. He looks shocked. I explain I can get them off but would he be able to help me get them back on after. He says sure. So I take them off and we do my EKG. Now one good thing about me is I have a strong heart. I workout on a regular so it is healthy and normal. I watch it on the screen as it beats. I dont like the EKG though because he presses so hard on my chest so he can take clear pictures. After 15 mins he is finished and we proceed to try to rebandage my chest. We do a horrible job but oh well I want to get the hell out of this hospital. The week is over and I'm done with my appts for this week thankfully. I get dressed and leave with my dad. My dad and I go to breakfast and afterwards I want to just go home and sleep. The week ahead is going to be even more difficult than my first one has been. I only pray that I'll be ready for it.
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