The future of this blog. . .

So if anyone is still seeing updates to this blog on their RSS feed or something…

I hadn’t logged into the site for a few years now. Two things I noticed:

1. I had several posts sitting in “drafts” pertaining to my radiation treatment, that I apparently wrote on my phone but did not successfully publish. Oops. I survived radiation, though.

2. I had several hundred fake comments trying to sell me drugs or porn.

This site is struggling with its upgrade path due to my neglect, and may not survive the process. I am posting this, and then sometime soon I’ll force the upgrade through and see if it makes it or not.

If it does survive, it will find itself renamed to no longer be about my battle with breast cancer, which is now old news. Instead, I may port over some of the contents from my new blog which is currently on a temporary domain but will eventually reside at https://katerosenberg.net/ (it’s parked there now.)

The contents of the new blog pertain to my newest hobby, which is writing romance books. Yup, that’s what I’m doing when I’m not working now. I just published the first one and connected it to the other blog, which is what made me decide to clean this one up (if possible.) It also has pictures of my dog.

If you don’t want to hear about that process, I suggest you unsubscribe from whatever brought you to this post today… Don’t worry, I won’t know, so my feelings won’t be hurt!

And if you only care about the cancer journey – all’s well. I finished a two-year course of a research drug and I’m now just on routine protocols for lowering my risk of a recurrence. They’re not the best, and my hair is falling out from the lack of estrogen, but they’re definitely acceptable.

If you want to see the romance book, it’s here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BBBFW57C/

And if this blog dies next time I log in to upgrade – thanks to everyone who read it, it was a great source of distraction and support when I was doing through a difficult time!

Kate

The Mappening and the Plan

One of my co-workers came up with the title for this blog post, but chooses to remain anonymous on this public forum. 🙂

I’m behind on the blog, so let me catch everyone up!

Friday last week was the Mappening – when my radiation oncologist mapped my insides with a CT scanner, so that they could design a treatment program for me that maximizes the amount of radiation to the places we’re targeting, and minimizes the amount of “scatter” hitting my heart and lungs. Here are some of the interesting portions (at least to me):

* Getting me perfectly lined up with the machines the same way each time is really critical. So they placed four tattoo dots on me, and then use lasers that are mounted in the ceiling to draw the straight lines to connect them. So I have my first four tattoos! They are all lame. One is smudgy and looks like dirt.
* I am not good at staying perfectly still. The mapping session took about an hour, and I hated it.
* They make a mold to help make sure you stay in the same position each time. It’s not comfortable.
* How you hold your breath impacts the position of your heart within your chest. So part of the program is to find the amount of air I should hold in my lungs to minimize that scatter to my heart. Once this is set, they mount a little device in my visual range that keeps track of my breathing – when I breathe in, a ball goes up on the screen, when I exhale, the ball falls down. They mark the perfect amount of air with a line, and my goal is to hold my breath at that amount. It’s like the world’s stupidest video game. Probably also the most expensive.

Anyway, that was Friday of last week.

Today I had my first actual radiation session and meeting with the oncologist to discuss the plan. But first, I waited a long time in the patient-only waiting room. That’s where I found this:

It’s a knob for setting your mood! Note that I have turned it way down, to reflect my mood after having to wait a long time. (It actually controls the harpsichordy new agey plinky music in the room, which I disliked, and since I was alone in the room, I felt okay about turning it off.) Please note, the MOOD switch is apparently trademarked…

Then there was a long time where I was forced to lie in the machine and stay very, very still again, while they did all their QC checks and imagery to make sure that the program that delivers my radiation was correct before they ran it. Then they ran it. So I’m all radiated now!

A nurse spent a bunch of time talking about side effects. Although I mostly focus on the fatigue that may take me out of work or otherwise impact my life, the nurse mostly focused on radiation burns. These sound dreadful. I was taken aback when she said the burns would likely continue to get worse for several weeks AFTER my last treatment. This seems a bit unfair. But okay, noted. They gave me a ton of samples for skin care products and instructed me on where I can buy more of whichever I like best. (Yay, shopping.)

They also want me to consume a ton of protein, because my body will be working to replace all the healthy cells that are killed by this process. That also surprised me, because as a vegetarian who doesn’t get much exercise, protein hasn’t been a huge factor lately. So if you see me drinking weird protein drinks, this is why.

Finally, I saw my doctor and she showed me all the imagery of the inside of my body with the radiation mapping in layers on top. That was kind of neat. And the good news, I’m in the five-week protocol instead of the six-and-a-half week protocol. I can’t remember (and I’m too lazy to look) if I blogged that I didn’t qualify for the four-week protocol, but that was already known. So five weeks.

I’ll be going every single weekday, and my schedule is a bit of a mess for the first two weeks. Then it will settle into the same time every day, which will simplify planning.

I think those were the highlights and lowlights. And even though I have no idea how I’ll feel through this process, one thing that I am excited about is that there’s an end date. I will finish radiation therapy on May 1st. And after that, it’s just oral drugs – one to keep the estrogen fairy away, and possibly a research drug if I am placed into that study group. That seems pretty simple compared to chemo or daily radiation. 🙂

As always, I continue to appreciate all the warm wishes, unicorn magic and support I get from everyone. Could not do this alone.

Kate

Finished my last chemo treatment!

Just a quick note, because it’s been an eventful week.

On Tuesday I finished chemotherapy! It was a little bumpy, and didn’t finish until 6:00 p.m., but two nurses and my doctor all agreed to stay late so that I could finish after hours. Thank goodness, because I’m quite sure I would have burst into tears if I’d had to come back on Wednesday.

I was put into a private room this time, because of my schedule complications, and that worked out really well for me to get visits from all the nurses and staff who I’d met along this journey. When you’re out on the main floor, you have to be aware that some people are never going to get to finish chemo, so I’d have been reluctant to make a big deal about it – but it wasn’t an issue in the private room. I’d brought the team cookies and punny snacks, which made it feel celebratory.

On Wednesday, I immediately called the surgeon’s office about getting my port removed – I know that having the port made my chemo a lot easier (and less dangerous), but the truth is that I hated the thing. I could feel it all the time, and I wanted it out.

And the scheduling fairies smiled on me (along with my surgeon) because they fit me in on Friday afternoon! Before I did that, though, I did my Neulasta shot on Thursday, and I went to the Beaverton clinic for the first time. So a quick note on that!

The Beaverton clinic is closer to my house, but isn’t where my doctors practice, so I’d never had occasion to go before. But because by now we don’t really worry about my allergic reaction to Neulasta (we know how to handle it), my regular clinic was okay with my doing this last one there. It was interesting in a couple of ways – for one thing, the waiting area isn’t uniquely used by the cancer clinic, so there were coughing people in it. This scared the daylights out of me. Other than that, it’s bigger, and has more sunlight and windows. And it was cheaper for me to get to/from by Lyft. (Did you know you can add a stop to your Lyft ride? You totally can, which made it easy for me to get my daughter on the way home.)

By Friday, I was feeling pretty lousy with the expected chemo side effects, and started to get nervous that they wouldn’t be willing to do a surgical procedure on me. My blood pressure tends to skyrocket during the nerve pain, and the nurse informed me that my pulse was also “weak and thready.” (For some reason, I found this insulting, like I was being accused of not being tough enough… )

Luckily my surgeon wasn’t spooked by my heart rate, and having been through this process herself as a breast cancer survivor, she really knows what a big deal it is to get your port out. Which still didn’t keep me from being surprised when the nurse asked me if I wanted to keep it. Um, what? Apparently, a lot of people actually do ask to take it home. I have no idea what I would do with this thing – put it on my unicorn table? Gross out the children by explaining where the tubes had been? Make really ugly jewelry? I declined to take it.

The procedure itself wasn’t a big deal – it was surprisingly easy to remove, considering it had been stitched into my neck vein and chest wall. I’m sore, but it’s significantly less pain than my chemo side effects. I do have the 10 pound weight restriction again, which is annoying. Luckily, I have plenty of single-portion meals on-hand and the kids are off doing other things.

On the kid side, my daughter and her best friend went to see Cirque du Soleil with her dad, so I expect to hear confusing stories about the performance tomorrow. 🙂 And my son had his first robotics tournament of the season. And no, it didn’t go well. His team took a huge hit at the start of the build season when all the seniors left the team (for a variety of reasons), as did some juniors. They ended up very far behind on the build schedule and short on people who were certified to use the machinery – so it was touch-and-go whether they would even have a robot to compete with. So the fact that they’re competing at all is a small victory. I’ll get more details on that tomorrow, too.

And lastly, I had previously reported that I’d take a few weeks off from treatment before going to see the radiation oncologist, but that plan has changed. There’s a research study open that I’d like to participate in, but it will require me to finish my radiation therapy sooner than currently projected. So I moved my April appointment up to Monday, to see if the radiation oncologist is willing to accelerate her plans. The oncologist who supervises my chemo (and will eventually supervise my endocrine therapy) thinks I’m up for it, but will defer to the radiation oncologist if she has concerns. She also may not be able to fit me into the schedules the way we’d like, so it’s up in the air for now.

No one who reads this blog is likely to be surprised that I am keen to pursue the more aggressive schedule. The idea of being done with this whole thing sooner is much more appealing than giving myself time to recover – screw that, I’ll recover for realsies when I’m done with this. And the research study is interesting. More on that later, if I get in.

That’s it until I see the oncologist on Monday! As always, thank you all for your support and warm wishes. 🙂

Tomorrow should be my last chemo infusion!

Instead of waiting for chemo to knock me down, I decided to draft a quick post tonight instead.

Because tomorrow should be my last chemo infusion! Granted, there are no promises – every time I go in for treatment, they take blood and there’s always a chance that I’ll be told I have to reschedule to give myself more time to recover. If that happens, I will be devastated, because even though I constantly remind myself that there are no promises – I absolutely have my heart set on tomorrow being the last one. I even have gifts for the team of caregivers who make this whole process bearable. It’d be very awkward to take them back. . . (just kidding, I promise to leave them.)

So tonight, I thought I’d blog some Frequently Asked Questions. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. What comes next?

Radiation therapy. I get a few weeks off to recover a bit, and then I’m going to have daily radiation therapy for 4-6 weeks. Yup, daily. But radiation therapy does not come with nausea or nerve pain, so bring it on.

2. How are the kids?

I get asked this a lot. And the truth is that this whole cancer thing has definitely started to take its toll, especially on my younger child. I’m tired far too much of the time, and it’s changed our time together more than I’d like. Luckily, her dad/stepmom and her best friend’s family bring lots of energy, and everyone from her teachers to her child care providers has been very supportive.

Still. We miss being normal together.

My son is much more independent, because he’s a LICENSED DRIVER now. I think I may have already blogged that, but it still slays me that my little baby is taller than me and has a car. Anyway, the cancer situation impacts him, too, and he’s been a trooper about things like playing with his sister when I’m worn out.

I have great kids.

3. Did your eyelashes fall out?

Why, yes, they mostly did. And you might be wondering why people have to ask this to my face – my glasses hide this new feature pretty well, and I have one rogue eyelash on the bottom of each eye trying to hold down the fort by stubbornly hanging on. They mostly just call attention to the fact that they are alone, but they think they are helping. And I do miss my eyelashes, as everything seems to get into my eyes these days, but I miss my nose hairs more.

4. What’s with the unicorns?

I don’t think people who read this blog actually need me to answer this question, but I do get asked it at the office by people who don’t read the blog. And it’s maybe a little harder to explain than I thought. “Well, I decided to theme my cancer around unicorns,” just makes them look at me like I’m crazy. Which is fine. Clearly, I am aspiring to being that crazy old lady with a china cabinet filled with unicorns.

Meanwhile, I have a side table completely covered in unicorn items (and a pig-icorn, but he doesn’t know he’s a pig, so don’t tell him), and it makes me happy to look at it and feel all the good thoughts and unicorn magic that are attached.

5. Do you need anything?

I don’t think so, but it’s a great comfort to know that if I do need help, I will get it. It is very likely that I will need help again near the end of radiation therapy, as I’m told the fatigue will become overwhelming, and I won’t be able to work or do much. Not sure exactly when that will be yet, though.

That’s it for tonight, I need to work myself into a nice anxiety-riddled state now, because that’s what I do the night before treatments.

Thanks again for all your support – it means the world to me.

Kate

Finally, an update!

I’m sorry I’ve been offline. With the new chemo kicking me so hard, I find it very hard to write updates when I’m home recovering, and on work days I’m just pretty wiped out by the time the kids and I are fed. I’m writing this now because I’m in the window between one Benadryl wearing off and the next one kicking in. Once the Benadryl is onboard, I go into a foggy, sleepy state.

The last chemo round (my second with the one that gives me nerve pain) was different than the first one. For one thing, I got a terrible head cold, which was just unfair. Worst head cold of my life, no doubt because of my compromised immune system.

On top of that, the pain was different. Instead of being only in my legs, it moved around a bit – but it was also less severe. I never felt like just laying on the bed crying like I did the first time. I will say, having nerve pain in your teeth/jaw is not enjoyable, though, so I was glad when it migrated back to my legs on Day Two.

Yesterday I had my third treatment. The pain hasn’t kicked in, but because I have an allergic reaction to it, I’m doped up on Benadryl pretty endlessly to keep my throat from swelling up. If the pattern stays the same, the nerve pain will arrive tomorrow.

But when I see my doctor, he likes to say, “you are tolerating chemo really well.” He says that every time, and I have learned to interpret this not as, “you are handling your side effects with strength and graciousness” (because I generally spend my time with him whining about them), but instead as, “your labs show that your internal organs are not experiencing undue stress.” 🙂 So things could be worse. 🙂

Also, although I am having some neuropathy in my fingers/toes, it’s still within acceptable limits for me to stay on my current high-density dose schedule. Which means I should only have to do this ONE MORE TIME after this week. The difference between neuropathy and nerve pain is that the neuropathy can be permanent, so they watch this closely. I’m still spending my chemo sessions with my hands in ice, which is either helping or just a way to make an unpleasant experience much worse. . . Either way, I’m committed. I just want to get through this phase.

And then it’s on to radiation! Daily radiation for 4-6 weeks, depending on a few things that will be finalized next month. The radiation typically only has two side effects – skin burns and rashes from where the radiation hits you, and an increasing level of fatigue. The radiation oncologist says it’s unlikely I will be able to work during the final two weeks of this treatment, as the fatigue becomes overwhelming. But, since it doesn’t come with nausea or pain, it still sounds easy compared to chemo.

I do try not to mention anyone by name in this blog, because it’s public and people are private. But I do have to say, the support I’m getting from everyone is really amazing. Last treatment, when the head cold layered on top of the nerve pain, I’d have probably been living on microwaved popcorn if people hadn’t decided to trigger my meal train for me instead of waiting for me to ask. Don’t worry, this time I’m much better prepared for things to go wrong. 🙂 But it’s a huge comfort to know that if I need help, I will get it.

Plus, my house is still a unicorn heaven, which brings me great joy, because it’s all symbolic of the people who are supporting me. This blog is being written while I’m wearing a unicorn hat and I have a unicorn blanket across my lap.

But I’m getting very sleepy, so better sign off. Apologies for any grammar breakdowns, I’m fading… Thank you again, for all the warm wishes and support.

Kate

Chemo Kicked My A$$

Optimism is for suckers.

The day after my Taxol chemotherapy, I felt pretty good – I was able to eat normally, which was a big deal. I did end up flushing red and breaking out in itchy hives, but honestly? Was pretty much OK with that, compared to the nausea thing. It made the nurses a little nervous when I showed up for my Neulasta shot (which also gives me hives), but we forged ahead and I got my shot. Lots of Benadryl.

I went to work on Thursday, and started out feeling good – but as the day wore on, I developed a lot of aching pain. It skyrocketed at the end of the day, especially in my legs. By the time I reached my daughter’s child care, I was genuinely unsure of my ability to walk in and get her. I managed it, but when we got home, collapsed on the couch with a pile of painkillers.

Which didn’t seem to make any difference, as the pain peaked overnight Thursday. Not going to put the brave face on this one – I was up all night, and in tears for a good chunk of it. I had to take Friday off, because even as the pain started to back off, it was still endlessly achy with no relief.

I did make it to the radiation oncologists on Friday, although I had to get Mike (Boyfriend) to drive me. We talked through how my radiation therapy will work, and I got some literature about a study I should qualify for. The gist of the study is to see if a higher dose of radiation over a shorter amount of time is as effective as the current 5-6 week regime. It’s been successful in Canada, and this is the U.S. version of the same study. One piece of good news – research completed in January on a methodology for reducing the amount of radiation to the patient’s heart, and that method will be useful to me.

Then, because the day was just not awful enough, Mike’s truck broke down on the way home. When it rains (which it did, on our heads, while we waited for a Lyft to fetch me) it pours.

The oncologist’s office recommended I take an Ativan to force myself to sleep Friday night (along with the endless painkillers). It wasn’t particularly effective – I still couldn’t sleep through my legs aching, and when I was lying in my bed awake, I couldn’t focus on my book. Instead of just having pain and insomnia, I had pain, insomnia and stupid.

Things continue to improve – it’s Sunday, and now my legs only ache as much as they would if I’d exercised too much – ha ha ha ha! Like that’ll happen…

I’ll be checking in again with the oncologist’s office to see if there are other things I can be doing for next time – because this was pretty awful. It is a known side effect, unfortunately, just less common than the ones I was worrying about. I guess the good news is that I’m not having neuropathy, so let’s assume the ice worked.

Sorry to be a bummer. I’ll bounce back.

New Day, New Chemotherapy

So today was my first day taking a new chemotherapy drug. I have started referring to these as cocktails, because you never get just a single drug when you go to the clinic. It’s a mix of stuff.

The drug I’m taking now has historically caused moderate to severe sensitivity reactions in more than 30% of patients – which is a very anxiety-provoking number. To reduce the risk of this, they load you up on some old standbys before you get your main infusion – a double dose of Benadryl (which knocks me out) and the much hated steroid (which wakes me back up.) Throw in some anti-nausea drugs and some Pepcid AC, and you’re ready to have your Taxol.

Another extremely common side effect of this drug is neuropathy. This is when you experience pain, numbness or tingling in your extremities – mostly feet and hands. This side effect scares me, because it can take months to reverse, and is sometimes permanent. So my oncologist said that although there hasn’t been a clinical study in the United States about it yet, there’s been some early research in Japan and Europe that shows that icing your extremities during treatment may reduce neuropathy. In Japan, they did a fairly simple test with colon cancer patients – they had them apply ice to one hand and not the other. And some patients did indeed have less neuropathy in the iced hand.

So it’s not an official part of my treatment, but I brought a bunch of ice packs and iced my hands. I had not expected my treatment to take more than five hours (unpleasant surprise), so towards the end I ran out of ice – and “instant ice” things just aren’t cold enough. Next time, I’ll bring a lunch cooler full of things to ice my hands and do better. I can say with some assurance that sitting around for five hours with your hands on ice is not a good time, and is not recommended for your next party or social function…

Most people report the Taxol side effects show up 2-3 days after treatment, so I’ll be waiting to see what I get. At the moment, I feel better than I did after the last chemo cocktails. I feel into a hard sleep when I got home (Benadryl does that to me) and woke up able to eat a normal dinner. Well, a late normal dinner – I slept through the kids’ dinner, which my mother handled for me.

Tomorrow I go in for my Neulasta. This is the shot I’m allergic to, but which makes it possible for me to go to the office and be around other people – it boosts my immune system. It also comes with a bunch of Benadryl, so it’ll be another sleepy night for me.

And Friday I will go see the radiation oncologist again, so we can start making plans for the next phase of my treatment. Big week for doctor’s appointments.

That’s it for now – I’m happy that I avoided any severe reactions during treatment, as that was the big risk today, and I don’t feel too dreadful. I never blogged about it, but my last AC treatment actually knocked me down hard – I ended up taking more PTO from work and spent the entire following weekend at home, sick and fatigued. At this moment, I’m still optimistic that won’t happen this time. 🙂

Mostly because I have all your good wishes and unicorn magic.

Kate

Hello, from Chemotherapy

I know, I haven’t posted in ages and ages and ages.

The main reason I don’t post is that I’m back at work, so I feel like I communicate with a lot of people about how I’m doing. Plus when I get home, I’m pretty tired, and don’t want to look at my laptop. (Of course, playing stupid video games on my phone is totally fine.)

But I keep promising to post, so I’m posting. I’m actually sitting in the chemo clinic right now, getting my pre-medicines. Two anti-nausea drugs and the dreaded steroids. Then I wait for them to take effect, then I have the actual chemo. It’s a long, boring day at the clinic.

This is my very last one of these particular treatments. I’m pretty excited to move on to something else. I may later wish I was still on these, if the side effects of the next drug are worse – but at least it will be new. At this point, I dread my treatment days because I know I’m going to go from feeling good to feeling lousy, and the anticipation is extremely anxiety-provoking.

But I had a nice Christmas holiday with the kids, even if New Years was a snooze because I’d just had a treatment. I’m saving the champagne for when this is over.

As I’m typing this, I can feel the steroids kicking in. My attention span is drifting away… there goes the ability to focus… This is why I can’t really work on chemo day. I also don’t drive myself home, I’d probably forget where I was going.

In a few weeks I’ll see the radiation oncologist again, and we’ll make that plan. I’m hoping to qualify for a protocol that allows me to do radiation for 20 days instead of 33 days (it’s a daily treatment, M-F) but it will depend on some things that are outside of my control. More tests are likely in my future.

In other news, World Cancer Day is February 4th. Nike does a variation of this, which we call Meet Cancer Day – this is slated for February 5th. I was struggling to remember what happened on the campus where I work last year, and had to look into the archives to be reminded that last year the event was rescheduled and slimmed down due to snow. The Portland area does not do snow.

Anyway, with the help of some colleagues, we’ll be doing some awareness activities at the office to dovetail with the official event, which is mostly on main campus. For the non-Nike readers, Nike has a big, beautiful campus that looks like a college campus. It has amazing landscaping, goose dogs to manage the geese, and the new buildings are amazing and inspiring. I don’t work there. I work in a very generic office complex that’s technically in the next town over.

Well, the steroids have kicked in good, and I’m getting my actual chemotherapy now. Since I’m getting all kinds of twitchy now, I’ll sign off. I’ll try and do better about writing more frequently!

As always, I appreciate everyone’s good wishes and support. Unicorn magic!

Tomorrow is another chemo day

After a week back at the office, things were just starting to feel like they were returning to normal – but tomorrow is a chemo treatment.

It’s a strange thing, scheduled sickness. I feel okay right now, but I have to plan to be sick and squirrelly tomorrow. I’m taking the day off, and my mother is helping out again.

Last treatment, I felt kind of okay the day after treatment until the pod went off and caused an allergic response. So this time, I’m planning to work (possibly from home, if needed) until I go back to the hospital for my pod medicine. Which won’t be delivered by pod this time, because of the whole “need to see how bad your reaction is” thing.

Anyway, I’m dreading the return of the brain fog. The rest of it is acceptable, if not pleasant. I just really hate not being able to think clearly.

On a happier note, today I was given my first knit Nike hat, so I can stay on-brand after my hair falls out later this week. 🙂 Huge thanks for that!

I also got a little teary when I dropped my daughter off at her before-school program, and one of her friends gave me this:

(in case you haven’t already noticed, I try to keep people’s names off my blog, to respect their privacy. Even when they’re giving me gifts.)

And at my house, we are finding that we can meld our unicorn and Christmas decorations into a perfect holiday blend:

So overall, I think I’m in pretty good shape to face another chemo treatment. I’ve got hats, angels and unicorns – and a team of people rooting me on. Thanks, everyone!

Kate

An overdue update!

This is probably going to be shorter than it should be… But I’m sleepy.

Here’s some highlights from Kate!

Remember my pod medicine? Strapped to my arm, dispensing drugs into my bloodstream on a timer? That was neat, right? Except I broke out in hives and my throat swelled halfway closed… So apparently, I’m allergic.

Large amounts of Benadryl brought me back to baseline, but also turned me into a total sleepy zombie. I had to call for help, because couldn’t drive, couldn’t feed the kids… Wasn’t a great day, for me or for Mike (aka Boyfriend.)

So, that’s a new little problem to work on, with the extra complication of wondering if a second exposure to a new allergen will create an even more spectacular result… Stay tuned, because that’s the mystery for next week!

But in happier news, yesterday I WENT BACK TO WORK. It’s official, I’m no longer just a cancer patient, I’m back into at least some of my normal routines. (I don’t shake hands anymore, though – expect me to wave at you, as I avoid germs during chemo!)

It’s great to see everyone again, although I’m getting a little bored with talking about cancer. 🙂 But I feel very welcomed and supported and happy to be seeing everyone, and so far, have had no issue staying at work for full days. I’m not really very productive yet, though.

I’ll be in and out, with the chemo and the amazing pod allergy fun. I am lucky to be supported by a team of folks who didn’t even bat an eyelash when they realized that I wasn’t going to be coming back 100% as expected – they’ll continue to put in the extra effort to create continuity while I get through treatment. Not everyone who goes through a battle like this is as lucky as I am. (If they’re reading this, I hope they recognize their own awesomeness.)

I owe you all a longer update, and after two days at work, I can probably figure out what the Frequently Asked Questions should be. But it’s bedtime for the blogger. More soon, PROMISE.