Healing Finally!

Flexibility is returning.  The area under my arm healing up now, it is still pink but with new skin that isn't tender any longer.  Unfortunately, other areas are blistering up as others are healing. I am moving the Poly Mem material around from healed area to new blister areas.  I am just glad to see healing happening rather than continued deterioration.  Don't get me wrong, I am still tender and pangs and twinges still occur but it is so much better than it was a few days ago. 

On the energy front, I am still exhausted and difficulty breathing off and on.  Hopefully all that will heal quickly so that I can do things without getting short of breathe and coughing randomly. 

Phase 2 complete

I spent the weekend taking pain meds and laying around.  I hurt so bad.  My skin under my arm is the most severely burned currently.  The area directly under my breast is looking better - doesn't say much because it was so badly burned however, it looks like it is trying to heal.

Phase 2 is complete; radiation of the entire breast. Now, I am in the boost phase. The last phase before the end.  Harry, the mad scientist behind the curtain who I like to talk to because he cracks me up and is so nice, told me today that my scar will probably flare up with this but the other areas will begin healing.  He said "as soon we stop messing with you, your skin will begin healing within 10-14 days I would be surprised at how it looks."  I look forward to it!

Here is a picture of my underarm yesterday.  The blue and red marks are where they are doing the boost.  As you can tell a piece of the burned area is within that field of treatment. I am not looking forward to how that part is going to feel within the next week.  This picture does not show the nasty peeling skin or express the pain I have with it but at least an idea of the severity of my burn and discomfort now. 

Normally, a 40lb bag of dog food does not cause me issues, but I picked up a bag today at the grocery store and thought my skin my implant was going to explode out of my skin. So, I asked the nice gentlemen at the grocery store to pick it up for me and then let Chris bring it into the house. 

Today was the first day I haven't taken pain meds to get through so maybe it is healing now.  I am going to take one now, since I tried the dog food trick. Obviously, not ready for 100% back to normal duties yet. 

I finish up on Monday, Aug 20. 5 more to go!

Adjustments and the beginning of the end...

The skin that is currently blistered and exposed, is healing well per my doctor.  She is very impressed with the healing and happy with the way they are looking. They are still painful and I ended up seperating some of the tender skin this morning while trying to remove some tape on the healthy skin. Unfortunately, it is right under my arm and hurts so bad right now.  The pain meds barely take the pain away on that spot but that was my fault.  Grrr....

A quick update of what's happening...

The blisters came up and escalated farely quickly so she removed 3 sections from the radiation field; under my breast, small area under arm (inside my arm pit), and the tip top corner on my chest.  This was to perserve the skin that was so badly damaged.  As of yesterday, they stopped treating the top part of my chest.  This is normal and only set to receive the small dose of radiation.  I have 3 treatments left for my entire breast and then 5 more after that of a "boost" to the recurrance site.  The recurrance site is under my arm pit... which is currently one of the badly burned areas so that might get a little interesting.  I'll end up taking my last day of radiation on 8/20. A day of celebration I will say!!

Discussed the hormone therapy with my medical oncologist which is a different doctor than my radiation oncologist.  I will start that and see how it works beginning in Sept.  I told him I wanted to wait til after radiation and give my body some time to recover from the radiation before changing my hormone levels.  We will start with the easiest form which gave me migraines the last time I tried it however, I'd rather try that first than go to shutting things down completely and it "should" kick back up after you end the Rx in a few years. Yeah, from the people I've talked to, the "should" didn't happen. So, needless to say, I don't believe the doctor on this point.

Skin removal day!!!

I wore a patch since yesterday that helped to wick away the oozing from blisters.  They went to pull them off today and they had attached themselves to my blistering flesh.  Needless to say, my blistered skin decided to pull away from me.  They gave me PolyMem which is a non-adhesive pad which does the same as the other but in different ways.  So I now have 2 pieces of that which costs $27.50 for one 6.5"x7.5" sheet.  If it works though, it's worth it.  We shall see. 

This was by far the worst pain so far with this treatment while they peeled those patches off today and then the air touching it and burning more. 

The top part is right in my arm pit.  If you see me walking around holding my arm out from my body.... that would be why. The second pic is under my breast. That shiny stuff isn't cream, it's the exposed flesh under the now removed blister.  These pictures were taken when I got home after today's treatment. 

They did adjust my treatment so that those burned and severely blistered areas don't receive any additional radiation.  My doctor said that it should start to look a lot better next week.  The nurses said they had seen worse burns but it is normal to have these type of burns.

"Decimated Skin"

Went in today for my radiation treatment and see my Radiation Oncologist.  Last week, my skin looked bad - so red it turned brown.  Over the weekend it began to blister up, stick together easily, and no longer itch just hurt.  When I move it pulls the skin and stretches it and it feels as if my skin is pulling apart - which it is since it is blistering...

I received my radiation with a painful squint on my face as they placed my arm in the arm holding thing.  It hurt to stay still for the short period of time but the feeling of your skin pulling apart is not fun - mind over matter and I stayed still.  As I make my way to the room to see my doctor which happens one time a week, all I want to do is curl up in a ball in the corner and just left alone.  When I don't feel good, I pull away from everyone and society.  I don't want to be petted or touched, I don't like people seeing me in pain or uncomfortable.  The doctor comes in and she sees my face, which is normally smiling, tense and my body moving slowly to pull the gowns sleeve off my shoulder with a low, deep growl.  She can tell I am obviously not comfortable or happy this morning.  I lie back and she examines my pink, red, brown blistering skin that stretches from the area under my arm on my torso, half way up my arm pit, across to my sternum, down my sternum to my last rib, across to the side and meeting the point on my back under my arm.  She examines it for about 4 minutes, tells me she will be right back and leaves the room with my chart.  Just with my experience over with the medical field over the last 5 years and my ability to be the 1% of everything that could happen, happening... I know this isn't good. 

The picture below is of the blisters... they are hard to see with this picture but this was taken on Friday so it isn't of this morning when it was slightly worse. The blue lines make sure the nurses line me up right with the radiation machine each day. 

I'm so tired at this point, I just can't get my mind thinking about what's going to happen.  I start to chuckle a little to myself, that she is going to come in and tell me one or multiple things, implant busted - need surgery, skin is dead - need skin graph and implant removal, or something that I can't imagine and some unimaginable crazy medical procedure needs to be done ASAP.  After about 10 minutes, she returns with Harry (a 6'2", salt and pepper hair and beard gentlemen that I met several times - very nice guy, easy to talk to, funny and evidently very smart because he plans out and makes the radiation machine do what it does behind the scenes).  They are talking business when they come in about my treatment plan and she looks at me says, "we are changing your treatment plan." They start talking techy stuff, measurements, and trying to find a way to change my plan and still be effective without killing my organs still.  She is obviously very concerned about the status of my skin as she begins to show him my skin she states "we've decimated her skin here, we can't continue treating this area."

They determine how they are going to change the plan and now he has to go back to his special room and begin adjusting the plates within the radiation machine and adjustments within the computer.  She is concerned the cream she prescribed the other week, may be making my skin reaction worse.  She states stop using the cream.  I let her know I stopped using the Vitamin E oil because it was burning when I put it on my skin.  She was thinking about options of things I could use on my severely burned skin that will not react with the treatments.  She found a sample of Mepilex Border with SafeTac Technology it is a self adherent soft silicone foam dressing for burns.  It works by wicking the nasty, oozing stuff from burn blisters.  She cuts it up and puts it on the two severest locations.  It did instantly help those areas I think mostly by supporting the skin so it didn't stretch and keeping it moist with burn ointment.

She asked if I was sleeping and unfortunately I haven't been sleeping well.  I've been taking Benadryl to help me sleep and control the itch but my fear being I might roll on my chest and rip the skin.  I told her I haven't been sleeping well and my concerns, she looked at me and said "the pain will wake you up and the damage is already done don't worry about rolling on it."  She gave me a Rx to help me sleep and control the pain. 

Today, I was out of it for the most part. Hard to stay focused and I had a severe headache most of the day. Got through the day and made some progress on the projects I'm working on and attempted to work from home tonight however my wonderful work laptop doesn't like my wireless internet so I can't capture screenshots I need.  I took one of my Rx pills and I am thinking at this point, it might not be a wise decision to try to build a training document at this moment.  I might just go to work early tomorrow morning since my radiation treatment is moved for tomorrow to the afternoon to give them enough time to make all the adjustments needed.  Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Disclaimer:  I apologize for the lengthy blog tonight and any mistypes or bad grammar...my Rx is kicking in and I'm relaxing more and more.

Blisters arise!!!

I am turning red/brown in a location and the blisters have started to come up. You can feel the skin pull when I move and under my arm the skin is getting tight, swelling, and intensifying the numb feeling that is there from the original surgery. Very strange feeling.  I have a Rx for some cream that helps the itching and tender feelings.  I have about 2 weeks left of radiation, just wondering what my skin will look and feel like at that point. 

My friend Kim T. know just the right thing to say and when I need to hear it.  Tonight, she reminded me that the skin will return to normal and just to push through this.  Thank you Kim for knowing what I am thinking and need to hear.  You have been more support to me during both these trips and I truly appreciate it.

Radiation Adjustments and Sleepiness

Saw my doctor today and she seemed concerned about the skin reaction I had going on under my breast. It is the most irritated area, itching and very red.  She is going to have them move that beam to a different angle to help reduce the amount of radiation pounding on that spot.  It is sitting right on top of my last rib also which makes me a little nervous because radiation can cause your bones to weaken making it easier to crack later. 

I am applying my vitamin E oil and the Prutect cream to help with the itch and uncomfy feelings.  At least we don't have kids or roommates running around, because I will later them up and let it absorb in.  Might be slightly embarrassing if we have others around the house. 

Other than that, I am doing well except for exhaustion.  Came home today and had to lay down for about 20 minutes before making dinner because I couldn't keep my eyes open.  I was talking to the radiation physics guy today and said it will get worse but he made me laugh.  We discussed the 50 Shades of Grey, the effects on the industry of products discussed in the book, and some psychology of the book.  Very interesting conversation but pleasant.