PAPER GOWN SUPERMODEL

Chunky Tomato & Pea Sauce

2012-02-10T07:52:00.002-05:00

I know this looks a lot like the salsa from yesterday's post, but I promise it's not! Like canned black beans, I also buy LOTS of canned tomatoes - especially in the winter, when tomatoes aren't in season and the ones in the store are a little suspect. The thing I like about canned tomatoes is that they're versatile, you can buy lots of different textures, and best of all: they're CHEAP! At some point, I'll do a post on the pros and cons of different types of canned tomatoes, but for now let's focus on this chunky sauce.

I actually made this a few nights ago with some spaghetti and the end of a triangle of parmesan, but last night it was perfect for a pre-bed snack with a generous hunk of toasted semi-stale baguette...

Chunky Tomato & Pea Sauce

Serves 2

INGREDIENTS:

1/2 box spaghetti (or pasta of your choice)

1 can petite diced tomatoes

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 clove garlic, finely chopped

1/2 yellow onion, finely chopped

1/2 cup frozen peas (do not thaw!)

1/4 teaspoon cumin

salt & pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS:

1) Heat olive oil over medium in a medium-sized pan. While oil is heating, prepare water for pasta (follow directions on your pasta box!). Once oil has heated enough to form VERY small bubbles, toss in chopped garlic & onion. Cook until onion is translucent, about 5 minutes.

2) Add frozen peas, stir to coat with oil. Cook until peas are completely thawed. You'll probably notice some extra liquid accumulating in the pan.

3) Add in tomatoes - feel free to drain the tomatoes a bit if you like your sauce thicker. I left the juice in mine, it was thin & chunky that day, but thickened up a lot in the fridge.

4) Cook until tomatoes have warmed. Add cumin and salt & pepper to taste. Let simmer for 10-15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Like I said, this can be served over pasta or rice or whatever you want. I think it would also be a great topping for bruschetta as an appetizer or snack!

In the summer, canned tomatoes can be replaced with fresh blanched & skinned tomatoes. In that instance, you'd probably want to use 4-5 roma tomatoes and add a little extra water. Honestly, it's better with the fresh guys.

In case the cumin weirds you out, 1/4 teaspoon isn't really enough for the sauce to have a "cumin" flavor. I added just enough to give some of the depth that a meat sauce might have. I don't like my sauces to taste to "tomato-ey" and I usually find that a touch of cumin helps cut that just enough!

Black Bean & Veggie Sautee for One

2012-02-09T08:09:00.000-05:00

I've developed a recent love for black beans. I've been eating lots of them, like two cans in the past week. I put them on salads, in tortillas, with rice, with chicken, and with veggies. Here is one of my absolute favorite ways to have them - sauteed with veggies, and served with dollops of plain yogurt, hot salsa, and avocado. Mush it all together and put it on a chip! Jump through for the "recipe" (if you can call it that...)

Black Bean & Veggie Sautee

INGREDIENTS FOR SAUTEE:

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed

1 small winter squash, cut into bite-sized pieces*

1/2 red bell pepper, roughly chopped*

1/4 onion, finely chopped

1 clove garlic, finely chopped

1 tablespoon olive oil

ground red pepper, to taste

salt, to taste (I never salt but you can if you want)

EXTRAS:

1/2 Avocado

favorite salsa

tortilla chips

hot sauce

plain yogurt or sour cream

DIRECTIONS:

1) Heat olive oil in pan over medium-low heat. Finely chop onion and garlic. Add onion and garlic to olive oil.

2) Once the onion is cooked until translucent (about 5 minutes), add bell pepper and squash. Cook for another 5 minutes until squash begins to soften, then add red pepper powder and salt to taste. Stir to coat.

3) When the squash is cooked through (5-7 minutes) add drained and rinsed beans. Stir occasionally, until squash is very soft and beans are easy to smash. At this point, feel free to smash up the beans a bit - this time I left them whole, but sometimes I like a different consistency.

4) Remove from heat and garnish with avocado, salsa, hot sauce, and yogurt (or sour cream). Mix, scoop up with tortilla chips, and enjoy!

This made me enough for last night's dinner, as well as today's lunch! I'll pack up the other half of the avocado, some salsa, and chips - perfect!

*This recipe is EXTREMELY flexible. I hardly ever use the same veggie combination, because I'm always buying whatever produce is available in the reduced section. Sometimes, I'll throw in carrots (which require pre-steaming or microwaving), asparagus, peas, whatever I have on hand. It's also delicious over rice or used as a filling in a burrito. I probably have this once a week.

Sorry for the Break!

2010-03-20T23:30:00.000-04:00

Hey Guys,

I'm so sorry I've been out of touch! I'm presenting my thesis a month from today (well, either April 20 or 22) and the final draft is due in to my department a week or so before the presentation, so I've been working around the clock to get that finished! I'm 99% sure my draft will be done by tomorrow evening (I've got one more section to finish up) and then I'll start on the editing, which I hope won't be too bad!

Anyway, not much has been going on - I've been growing my hair back, and I absolutely LOVE having it short. I'm going to let it keep growing until I get back home, but I might see if I can get a trim over Easter to get rid of the dull ends. I've been experimenting with headbands & gel, and I gave myself a fauxhawk the other day that my friends loved.

I've got a couple pieces of really great news - I haven't found a full time job yet, but I'm interning at the website Girlfriendology (I'm not writing as often as I'd like, but that will definitely change as soon as my paper's finished). You guys should all check it out & join the community (if you're a girl!) I'm also writing a piece on dating after chemo for the website The Frisky, which I found through CNN and sent in a proposal. I didn't really expect to hear anything back, but they responded within a few hours. Now I'm trying to figure out all of the contract stuff - I think I'm going to have to give my dad a call for some help with the tax form!

Finally, I had my scans this past Monday and everything came back clean! My mom and I had a little bit of an adventure (NOT a good one) when they misread my forms and didn't do my neck CT (which is the most important part!) Debbie got me another CT for 8:30 on Wednesday morning, and when we got back to the hospital, the new computer system at Children's had deleted my appointment. We ended up having to wait an hour and a half before I could get in, and we were not happy. When everything finally got started, it went really fast.

Last of all, I keep getting bronchitis. I've had it TWICE this semester already, and it just won't go away! I have to see the ENT when I get back to Cincinnati so they can do something like scrape my sinuses (which sounds really unpleasant...) I'm on my second round of antibiotics, so hopefully that will clear everything up.

Lots of Love,
Lauren

New Hair!

2010-03-19T23:33:00.000-04:00

Check out my new hair!!!

Curlyish...

2010-02-18T18:53:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

My hair's been growing pretty fast! The cowlick on the right side is kind of making my hair grow in an Elvis 'do, but I guess it makes things a little interesting!

it's also starting to just get long enough to curl a tiny tiny bit - I can't wait til it gets long enough to really start curling! It's still pretty thing, but I'm still crossing my fingers that it'll thicken up eventually... I think right now it kind of looks like little down feathers...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Uh Oh...

2010-02-12T17:07:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I ended up back in the ER on Tuesday morning... My cough had been gone for a few weeks, but it started up a little bit again on Sunday. By Tuesday I had a sore throat and a fever, and since I was 4 hours away from Dr. Adams and the clinic, Lisa told me to head on over to the urgent care near my apartment. I had a little bit of a breakdown in the waiting room, and I was crying while I was checking in and getting my BP done, so my pulse was SUPER high. They were all really nice to me, though, and immediately brought me back to my own room since I'm still "immunocompromised." I had come prepared with a bunch of magazines, so I was pretty comfortable in my room.

The doctor (well, med student/intern guy) came back pretty fast - and he was SO cute. Definitely the cutest doctor I've ever had, and definitely Grey's Anatomy/ER worthy. I was wishing I'd fixed myself up a little for the trip (dumb, I know!) and it made me feel a little better!

I ended up being there for about 3-4 hours, so it was such a bad visit. I had a chest x-ray and bloodwork done, plus an H1N1 test and a strep test. It turns out I have bronchitis that had gotten pretty bad pretty fast, so I got send home with a Z-pack of antibiotics and some more codeine for my cough.

I spent the rest of Tuesday and all of Wednesday in bed, and drove home Thursday morning, which is where I am until early Monday (I have a French class on Monday and can't afford to miss another class, it's SO HARD!)

My hair's coming in pretty well, and I'll post some more pictures soon! We're going to a Gala for my old high school drama department tonight (Brian's singing and some of my friends will be there) so I'll definitely have pictures!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

I Think I Scare the Freshmen...

2010-01-31T22:31:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I was talking to my mom on the phone the other day, and I was telling her something that I've noticed since I've been back. I think I scare the freshmen in the conservatory. Not in an "AHHH!!!" terrified kind of way, but more like a "WTF is going on with that girl?" kind of way. I mean, I've got this super, super short haircut, triple-pierced ears, and I'm generally either wearing a big faux-fur coat my mom gave me for Christmas or a black wool trench coat and some kind of crazy hat. Also, usually I'm wearing giant earrings that are down to my shoulders. AND I wasn't around last semester. AND people still get excited every time they see me - professors, kids, accompanists - people are constantly shrieking & hugging me when I walk down the hall (which, by the way, is kind of nice haha). So, basically, I think I'm really freaking the freshmen out. Oh, well...

Anyway, I've been cooking LOTS of really good food for myself - I'm trying not to eat/buy anything processed... as much fresh, organic food as I can get, and I'm trying to make a lot of it myself at home instead of eating as often as I used to, and lots and lots of fruit and iced green tea. I want to try to make sure I've gotten ALL of the chemicals out of my body before I let myself eat too much junk again!

Also, I've been noticing that some of my arm hairs are doing weird things... like... getting really long & curly?!?!? I'm guessing those are the ones that clung to life during my treatments so they're all weird. I'm glad they're blonde & hoping they'll fall out and be normal, because if they keep growing like this it'll be really bizarre. My leg skin seems to be reacting weirdly to having hair again - I've been having to exfoliate my legs A LOT because the hair on my legs keeps growing in just under the top layer of skin, not so much like an ingrown hair, just like it can't quite make it through that last teeny bit. It's really annoying.

Check out my hair! Haha, the back is kind of growing into some weird swoop in the back. I bet it always grew like that but I just could never tell. I also kind of have a little bit of a cowlick on the front right side. Not sure if that was always there, either, but it's popping the front of my hair up in a funny way. I guess this means no bangs for me (not that I'm really disappointed by that). It looks thicker in these pictures than it really it, it's still pretty thin, maybe a little bit thicker, but you can definitely still see my scalp somewhat. Not as thin as I thought it would be, but still not particularly thick. And fuzzy. As fuzzy as 1/2" long hair can be... I kind of like it this short, but I definitely want it to get long enough to see what kind of a curl it has! I'm considering getting a trim over Spring Break in March, but we'll see how much it grows before I make an appointment!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

More Hair, More Hair!

2010-01-26T13:41:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

It's my third week of school and I'm starting to feel a little better. I went home this past weekend and hung out with some of my friends from my internship last summer - it was REALLY good to see them, I've been missing them a lot while I'm at school. It's been awhile since I've updated, so I wanted to post up some pictures of my hair, which has been growing really well! It's almost long enough to style some way, and it's messy when I wake up in the morning. It's finally gotten thick enough that it looks like a buzz cut (although it's still thinner than it used to be) and it's really soft & kind of fuzzy. I stopped using the Nioxin and started using Herbal Essences shampoo & conditioner for chemically-treated hair (haha) at the recommendation of my mom, who used it when my little brother was growing his hair back from chemo. I think I'm going to make an appointment for Spring Break (about 1.5 months away) to get the gross ends cut off, and maybe it'll even be long enough to get it trimmed up into a style.

I put up that last picture because Katie & I were trying on my large collection of stretchy headbands since she might be borrowing a diamondy one for her recital. I've decided my hair's still too short for headbands & that this one makes me look like one of those baby girls whose parents put headbands on their bald heads to show that they're girls. Haha...

Also, a belated thanks to my friend Gretchen, who has an amazing pixie cut, for recommending some good short-hair products for whenever I'll need them!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Cropped Hair Inspiration

2010-01-16T12:36:00.001-05:00

Hey Guys,

Here's a quick hair/scar update - my hair's getting significantly longer and somewhat thicker. Once it finally starts thickening up a lot, I think I'm going to keep it pretty short. I'm really liking how fast I can shower and the fact that I can wear cute hats and big earrings without worrying about messing up my hair or covering up my earrings...

Look how much my scar has faded - you can just barely see it now. The necklace that I wear every day usually falls just over it anyway (I moved it to get a better view)

Finally, I wanted to share this photo with you, courtesy of Garance Doré's street fashion website. I love the haircut!

I have sunglasses & a dress similar to that ( the back isn't so low cut) - too bad I don't live near a beach...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Whoops...

2010-01-15T14:48:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

As I mentioned in my last post, I've been having LOTS of anxiety since I got back to school. I can't describe it exactly, but mostly I just feel unsettled a lot of the time, and I feel like I don't belong. I miss my friends in Cincinnati a lot, and I'm hoping to come home next weekend to see everyone.

Yesterday, I had my first appointment with my new counselor at the BW health center, and he's a really nice guy - I think it will help a lot to have someone to talk to, and I hope that the anxiety calms down soon, because it's really frustrating!

I also found a Young Adult support group about 25 minutes away from campus, but I misread the calendar - the meeting was last week, not this week! I had been so excited all week to go to the meeting and get to know some people, but I totally showed up at the wrong time. Hopefully I'll get it right in February!

Classes are going well, the only thing I'm slightly worried about is my piano class - everyone in my class is really talented, and I can barely remember some of the stuff we're studying. Plus, a lot of the class is based on improv, which I'm not very good at at all (mostly because it's hard for me to figure out what notes are in each chord very quickly) but hopefully I'll get better as the semester moves on.

Lots of Love,
Lauren

First Day of School

2010-01-11T23:36:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

Today was my first day back at BW. I've been having a LOT of anxiety about moving out of my parents' house and back to my apartment in Cleveland (even if it is only four hours away & temporary). I keep having this irrational fear that I'm not going to be able to handle going to class and living on my own, even though I've done it for four years!! I had a little bit of crying on Saturday and Sunday, and a little bit this afternoon. All in all, though, the day went pretty well. I don't have class until noon on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and not until 10 on Tuesday and Thursday. It's nice to know that I don't have to wake up early every day. One more semester of sleeping in until I (hopefully) find a job.

Tomorrow I'm meeting with my advisor to go over the bit of work I've done on my thesis and to make a plan so I can get the rest of it finished as efficiently as possible. I'm hoping that I've got enough work done on it, but if not, I'm only taking 12 credits this semester, so I'll have plenty of time to work on it. I'm also taking my first (and only) night class - it's a class I've been wanting to take, but it only meets once a week so it's 2.5 hours long!!! Tonight my professor went a half hour over, so I didn't get out til 9:30 - I hope this doesn't happen every week!!

I'm off to bed now, but I hope everyone who's starting school is having a good back-to-class!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps check out the hair - it's getting a little thicker!!

Merry Belated Christmas!

2010-01-07T21:43:00.001-05:00

Hey Guys,

I keep forgetting to post these pictures of my brothers & I at Christmas! My mom keeps reminding me, but I keep forgetting... anyway, here they are! I think we look pretty good...

Finally, my mom decided to put a rubber snake on my head Christmas morning - it was a gift one of my brothers got (they each got one and later decided to hide them both in my bed...)

Lots of Love,

Lauren

More Hair?

2010-01-06T20:41:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

So it's getting longer, but I can't tell if it's actually getting thicker...

...Opinions?

Lots of Love,

Lauren

New York Photos

2010-01-05T15:39:00.001-05:00

Hey Guys,

Here's a slideshow of most of the pictures I took in New York with Tyler!

Enjoy!

More about the trip will be up later, but I'm doing lots of laundry and packing!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

Happy New Year!

2010-01-04T00:09:00.001-05:00

Hey Guys,

More tomorrow (including pictures!) but I wanted to wish everyone a happy new year since I'm back from New York!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Six Weeks Later...

2009-12-28T15:52:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

So remember how my last hair post I said that it was thin but I was assuming it would thicken up soon? That hasn't happened yet. It's probably close to 1/2" long, but still not any thicker than before (with the exception of a few random patches). I'm starting to get nervous because by this time in Brian's recovery, he had SO much more hair!!! I am, however, starting to sprout tiny baby hairs on my arms and legs (the arms is good, the legs... well, I was hoping that might miraculously stay gone!) My eyebrows and eyelashes have mostly come back in as well. My eyelashes are still pretty short, but I noticed yesterday that they were suddenly so much thicker! Maybe that'll happen with my head as well...

Has anyone else had really thin hair regrowth?? If so, what did you do about it? Did it eventually thicken up?? I've been using the Nioxin 3-step program every day, as well as taking prenatal vitamins (which are supposed to make hair & nails grow faster). I've got a lot of length, but no thickness! If it weren't so thin, I'd be totally happy with the buzz-like look...

this is how much hair I had after my buzz (and even after some of it had fallen out!) it's SO much thicker!!!

new Christmas hat - it's handmade from Peru (bought by my mom at Ten Thousand Villages - if you haven't been, you should check it out! it's an amazing fair-trade shop with locations all over!) I got another hat also, but it's in my bedroom & I have a sleeping cat on my lap... pictures of that will come soon!

let me know if anyone has any hair advice!!!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

No More Port!

2009-12-22T21:17:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I FINALLY got my port removed! The surgery was pretty quick, only about 30 minutes, but I had to get to the hospital an hour and a half early for check-in and vitals and all sorts of paperwork. When I had the port put in, I was really glad to be given full anesthesia, but I wouldn't have really minded being awake for the removal. Instead of putting me all the way under, I just got gas and was in kind of a "twilight" state. I don't remember anything, but I woke up really fast! When I woke up, I was moving from the operating room to the "wakeup" room, and I totally thought I was on my couch at home - I was so confused because the couch was moving so much!

My surgeon was really young and nice - she came in beforehand to introduce herself and make sure I didn't have any questions. Mostly I just wanted it out as soon as I could!

The worst part by far was having the IV put in - I hadn't been able to eat or drink for about 12 hours prior to surgery, so I was pretty dehydrated by the time I got there, and they couldn't get the IV in my vein. It hurt more than any needle I've ever had, and they stuck me four times (plus wiggling... eugh) before they finally gave me the gas and I fell asleep before they got the IV in. They offered to give me gas before they tried to IV me, but I said it was ok. I wish I'd taken the gas! When I woke up, my hand hurt way more than my incision!

So far, I haven't really had much pain - I'd say it's comparable to the scrapes I'd get falling off my bike as a kid. It's painful, but it's definitely not hindering me at all, and it's WAY better than the incision from my biopsy or when I had the port put in. One thing that I wasn't expecting was the empty space I can feel where the line was under my skin, and the squishing sounds that occasionally come from my chest where it's filling back in the areas where the line was running. It was really unnerving the first time it happened, but now it's not as bad.

The coolest part is that my surgeon let me bring my port home! My little brother wasn't allowed to keep his, so he was totally jealous when he got home from school and saw that I'd gotten to bring mine home!

My port! The round part was under my side (where they accessed me) and the tubing ran under my skin from my ribs into my heart... it's so weird to think that was under my skin for seven months!

On the hair front, it's getting much longer, but still extremely thin. It's filling in a bit more in some places, but not a whole lot. I'm crossing my fingers that it'll start to thicken up by New Years...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Good News!

2009-12-19T00:02:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I had my post-treatment scans this past Monday, and I'm THRILLED to report that everything is NORMAL!!!! I had a little bit of scar tissue in my lungs (probably from living in the Ohio River Valley for my entire life) and I have to stay out of bars with lots of smoke (i.e. Newport) because of the potential for lung damage from the drugs I was on, but other than that, I've been given a clean bill of health!

I'm having a little issue with an extremely extended cold - lots of sniffles and coughing that's keeping me up at night, but otherwise I've been feeling really good! My counts are basically normal (on the low side of normal, but normal still!) and I have to take Bactrim (an antibiotic to keep away a chemo-specific pneumonia) for the next six months, but other than that I'm off pills and back on my vitamins in the hope that my hair will grow back more quickly. Once the incision from my port removal heals, I can't wait to start doing Pilates again. I want to get a little back into shape before I start my classes up in the spring, because I'm planning on taking Pilates and possibly aerobics at BW.

I'm also SUPER happy to be able to be back on my normal diet. I had my favorite salad from First Watch the other day. I hadn't been able to eat it since June because it has spicy dressing, bacon, avocados, and a few other things I haven't been allowed to eat. It was just as delicious as I remembered! I've also lost about 7lbs of what I'm assuming was water weight from steroids - not that I ever really felt like I gained weight, but it just kind of went away. I haven't been trying to lose anything, but it's nice to be back where I was when I started treatments and be (mostly) rid of the bloated stomach I've been sporting since the steroids kicked in (for awhile I felt like one of those little kids with the skinny limbs and big tummies)

My hair's sort of still coming back... it's getting a lot longer and has a little bit of a reddish cast, but it's still SO thin. I'm getting a little worried, but I guess it hasn't even been six weeks since I finished treatment. If it's still this thin at New Year's, I'm going to start to get seriously worried...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

I Forgot to Post This Earlier...

2009-12-06T19:32:00.001-05:00

Hey Guys,

I've been meaning to post this for a few days, but I kept forgetting! My mom got this video in an email from a friend, and forwarded it to me... It's hilarious, so I hope you enjoy it!

***UPDATE***

hopefully THIS LINK will work better...

Lots of Love,
Lauren

Hair Today, More Tomorrow

2009-12-06T15:39:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I'm stealing the title of this post from Kaylin at Cancer is Hilarious. I've started to get a little bit of hair in, and underneath the dark hair you can see is another layer of baby fuzz where the rest of my hair is starting to poke through. The fuzzy stuff is coming in very fair, and the rest is SO dark! I have no idea what color it's going to end up, but I don't really care as long as it's still curly. I hear curly isn't usually a problem... I'm hoping that by New Year's I'll have a pretty good amount of hair... We'll see! I've been using a few different things to help my hair grow back in - Nioxin, which is a three-step program for thinning hair (shampoo, conditioner, and a weird mousse thing that you leave in) and I've been taking pre-natal vitamins (the over-the-counter ones, not a prescription...) It seems to be helping, because it's been about three weeks since my last treatment and I'm already getting a little poking through. Monday should be my next chemo, and since I'm not getting it, I'm hoping my hair will really start coming in in the next couple of weeks!

Notice all of my pills (plus my pill organizer) - I don't have to take ANY of those anymore! The only pills I still take are my antacid, an antibiotic called Bactrim on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and my vitamins! I still haven't gotten around to cleaning out all of those prescriptions, though...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Back to Children's

2009-11-30T23:14:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

It finally happened - I ended up with an infection while my counts were low :-(

I woke up on Friday feeling REALLY crappy, with a little bit of a high temperature (99.4). I went to a piano lesson, and then spent the rest of the day on the couch with the hope that my temp would stay below a fever (100.5), but, alas, by 11 pm I'd hit around 101. I wanted to wait until the morning to go in, but my mom packed me up and her & Andrew took me into the emergency room. By the time we got there, my fever had reached almost 102. They hooked me up to a bunch of machines to keep track of my pulse & blood pressure, but the machines kept going off because my pulse was so high (over 130!!!) because of my fever... We talked to a bunch of different doctors, and they FINALLY admitted me onto the Hem/Onc floor around 6 am - we'd let Andrew go home around 3 or 4 (spending the night in the emergency room is the worst thing ever. My mom and I basically didn't sleep for 24 hours, which is especially crappy when you're sick or your kid is sick)

I was really, really upset to have to spend the night in the hospital - I'd gone my entire 6 months of treatment without having to spend a single night, and as soon as I was finished I had to be admitted.

Tom Jaworek was in hospital at the same time, but he'd already been in a lot longer - he'd been admitted about a week ago, also for an infection (but I'm pretty sure his was a lot worse) and is staying until this weekend getting his chemo - he'll be done before Christmas, and I think both of our families will be relieved when we're both finished with everything!

I had hoped that somehow my doctors might let me go home in the morning, but when they came in for rounds on Saturday morning, they told me that I had to stay in for at least 48 hours until my blood cultures came back negative for blood infections. They also wanted me to stay in until my counts started going back up, because even though I'd started recovering from my last round of chemo, the infection had knocked my counts back to neutropenia (very low).

Saturday, Andrew came back to relieve my mom so she could go home and sleep, but later in the evening, my mom brought Brian by to visit, along with some movies. We had a little movie night and ate some DELICIOUS roast beef that my dad had made in the crock pot (my dad couldn't visit because he had a cough). Saturday night, I stayed by myself, but I called Tom in his room and we talked for awhile. We weren't allowed to visit with each other because we had both been admitted for infections (if we'd been in for chemo or something, we would have been allowed to visit with each other, but since we'd both been sick, they didn't want us passing anything back & forth)

Sunday, my mom came back a little after 9 so she could be there for rounds, and my doctors told me that I could go home at the 48 hour mark - which would be around 1 am, but they would let me go home since we live so close to the hospital. That afternoon, my mom went home for a little bit and I did some studying and read a bunch of magazines that she bought me. When she came back before dinner, we went down to the gift shop and to get some coffee so I could get out of my room and walking around a little bit (there's not much space to walk around in the rooms). We wanted to invite Tom, but his light was off so we thought he was sleeping - later on we found out that he always keeps his light off, so I felt a little bad since he has to spend a lot of time alone in the hospital since his sisters are away at college & both of his parents work.

After my bloodwork came back, my nurse came in to tell me that she'd talked to the on-call doctor, and they were letting me leave a little early - I could be released at midnight instead of waiting until 1 am (since my fever had been gone since early Saturday morning, they were figuring I didn't have any blood infections) - I was SO happy!

My mom took a couple pictures on our adventure down to the gift shop & cafeteria:

Apparently, there are a lot of irresponsible/semi-unfit parents at Children's. So many, in fact, that they post signs around declaring that Children's Hospital is a "no-hitting zone." At first, I thought this meant that kids weren't supposed to hit doctors & nurses during procedures, but when I read the sign more closely, I found out that it's actually telling parents not to hit their sick kids... In retrospect, I probably shouldn't be smiling so much about that...

This Santa is really creepy - it sings REALLY, REALLY loud. If I were a kid, I'd be scared of it. Actually - I was scared of it. I went up close to take a look, and it started singing, and I SCREAMED! I screamed so loud that a guy walking by started cracking up... Notice the lovely pole with IV antibiotics and fluids that I had to drag around with me everywhere... Very stylish...

In better news, I talked to my nurse today and they're so confident that I'll have clean scans that they've already scheduled my port-removal. I'll be de-ported (haha) on December 21st at 2:15 pm. I'll be done with EVERYTHING before Christmas!!! I can't believe it! I'm so excited to be done with all of this nonsense before the new year. By the time I go back to school, I should be all healed and it'll be all behind me!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Getting Back to Normal

2009-11-25T01:07:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I hope you all had a great weekend! I was soooo excited to be feeling better for the weekend, because I had a lot to do!

Friday night, I went out with a group of people to have drinks and celebrate the end of my treatments - it was interesting because I invited a mixed group of people that didn't know each other (mixing my "worlds" for the sake of a celebration!) I had a few friends from high school and a few friends from the opera, as well as some friends-of-friends that I didn't know well (it's always great to meet new people!). I had planned on going to see the movie Precious with a few people, but when we got to the theater there were two big problems: first of all, it was opening night of Twilight (whoops), so it took FOREVER to find a parking spot.... and then the movie was sold out! I was really surprised, but then I remembered that Precious has been all over the place being backed by Oprah, so I guess I should have expected that the first weekend it might be hard to get a ticket! We ended up going to Hofbrauhaus briefly, but the live music was SO loud, and the only available tables were right by the speakers, so we ended up moving to Bar Louie (where we generally end up). I was really excited to be able to have a drink, and ordered something that I'd been eyeing on the menu for MONTHS but hadn't been able to order. It had all of my favorite things: champagne, strawberry liqueur, strawberry puree, and some other fruity vodka... how could I go wrong?? Unfortunately, I forgot to take into account that the chemo always changes my taste buds for a week or so and it tasted HORRIBLE! I was so disappointed... but I'm definitely going to try ordering it again once I'm back to normal, because I'm positive there's no way it's not delicious!

Saturday night was a ton of fun - I saw Brian in Blood Brothers again at my old high school, and had a great dinner with my mom, one of Brian's friends, and her mom... and then I went to the Opera Ball After-Party. I obviously don't have $250 to spend on a ticket to the actual ball, so it was really great to be able to have the opportunity to get to the after party and enjoy the ambiance and the ballroom with my friends. I got to see a bunch of people that I'd worked with (who I hadn't seen since the summer) and I also got to say hi to one of Brian's doctors (his orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Crawford), who is a HUGE supporter of the arts in Cincinnati. I can't believe that I forgot about my camera, but somehow I did and ended up only taking a few pictures at the very start... I wish I'd taken more, because I got all dressed up, and my friends looked fantastic! Plus, the ballroom was so beautiful! The only downside was that the DJ wasn't so great, but towards the end of the night he started taking requests and playing much better music. The theme was "A Night at the Moulin Rouge," so we were kind of expecting lots of Edith Piaf and fun french music to dance to, but it was a lot of techno and club music, which is cool in that venue, but less cool when you actually want to dance and not just awkwardly jump around...

with Dr. Crawford

with Dina (Lauren's friend), Lauren (we worked together this summer), and Heather (a former opera employee)

Today was another fantastic day - it was my mom's birthday, so I got up early(ish) and made some breakfast - my first successful omelette (I was super proud that it actually turned out), and we had an AMAZING dinner at Carlo & Johnny's, a steakhouse here in Cincinnati. My dad ordered a really good bottle of wine, and I ate so much food! I told my mom I was glad that this is the week that the steroids really hit me, because I can keep eating and eating and not get full as fast as I normally do! Perfect timing for huge birthday dinners AND Thanksgiving!

I hope you guys have a fantastic holiday, and I'll be updating very soon! Most likely with Thanksgiving pictures...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

FINALLY DONE!

2009-11-20T18:34:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

Sorry it's taken so long to get this up, but my final treatment really kicked my butt! I barely got off the couch at all on Tuesday or Wednesday, and was in all day Monday because we had a meeting and then for some reason things kept getting delayed.

Instead of having my appointment at 8:30 am (which is when my appointments usually were), I had my appointment at 2 pm so we could meet with all of my doctors (and Brian's doctors) to kind of figure out a plan for the future.

Originally, they put me in the TINIEST room possible - an infusion room, which is usually used when a kid is just getting a quick infusion of something (an hour or less). Check out how crowded my giant brothers and my mom were in the corner of this tiny, tiny room (keep in mind I'm sitting in a dentists' chair barely a foot away from them!)

We had to fit my dad (who was out in the hallway waiting) plus three doctors and at least one nurse in the room for the meeting, so there's no way that was going to work! Fortunately, they were able to move me within a half hour so we didn't have to suffocate in the tiny room!

Part of being treated at Children's is that they have a great Child Life department that brings games and toys and gifts to kids for special occasions. For example, on my birthday they brought me a manicure set with hand lotions and really nice cream. And for my LAST CHEMO, they brought me a giftcard to Walmart so I can get myself anything that I'd like - I can't wait to go pick something out!!

I spent most of the afternoon reading a really fantastic book called Forever (I can't remember the author, but you should definitely try and find it... SO GOOD!)

My mom and I had eaten before we got to the hospital, but expected to be in and out pretty quickly (which didn't happen) so we ended up getting pretty hungry. My mom ran down to the cafeteria and brought back all kinds of "party" goodies that we wouldn't normally eat - chocolate covered donuts (my favorite snack) and cheddar chex-mix type stuff. I had to hurry up and eat mine before I started feeling nauseous, so I didn't savor it as much as I should have, but it was delicious nonetheless!

(yes, I am wearing a Where the Wild Things Are tshirt...)

As I was finishing up, Dr. Adams and Debbie came in to congratulate me - Dr. Adams even sang and did a little dance, but I totally wasn't expecting it, so I didn't have my camera ready, otherwise there would be a wonderful video of my oncologist doing her "Happy Last Chemo" dance!

(this picture was taken just post-dancing)

Starting to feel pretty sick from the end of the drugs, and totally ready to go home...

It was so amazing to get deaccessed for the last time - I think the only thing that will feel better will to finally get my port taken out. My nurse (Katie) was super-cool and just pulled the tape off as fast as she could (I've never had a problem with the tape hurting so I always get annoyed when it takes SO LONG for them to pull it off slowly!) and she also pushed the flush really fast so that it wouldn't taste as bad as long (the flushes they use make my mouth taste like rubbing alcohol and alway push me close to the edge of vomiting)

Monday night, I basically laid on the couch and slept it off - I was feeling pretty awful and not really wanting to go anywhere or talk to anyone. Apparently people were calling to see how I was doing, but I don't remember anyone calling!

Tuesday I felt REALLY awful, but I went to my piano lesson anyway, which was a little bit of a disaster. I played OK, but since I was on so much medication for the nausea, I couldn't quite focus on anything that my teacher was saying. I'm just practicing extra hard now to make up for it for next week!

Tuesday night I also noticed that my eyebrows and eyelashes started falling out A LOT! I'm hoping that they won't all fall out, but they're falling out more and more after each shower. The good news in, my hair will (hopefully) start growing back in soon, so there won't be much of a gap for my naked eyes...

Tonight I'm on my way out to celebrate a little bit downtown with some friends, so hopefully I'll be posting some pictures of that in the next few days!

Thank you all for all of your support!!!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

SO CLOSE!

2009-11-15T23:50:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

So I'm thrilled to announce that I just took my last dose of Procarbazine (my oral chemo) - the final four pills! I've got a week more of steroids, and then I'll basically be done with all of my pills... Tomorrow at 2pm I have my appointment for my last IV chemo, and that will be it for the "hard drugs" (haha)

I've had a really great weekend - I got to spend a bunch of time with some of my friends, and even got to hang out with a kid I haven't seen since high school (normally I don't particularly like running into some of the people I run into from high school, but sometimes it can be a lot of fun!)

Friday I didn't really get up to much, because I wasn't feeling so hot and James was pretty tired after work, but Saturday was a TON of fun! William and I went over to the Cincinnati Nature Center, which is this amazing park with old log cabins and abandoned buildings and ponds to explore. We spent a good amount of time running through fields and climbing trees (something I haven't done in SO LONG). I'm disappointed that I'd left my camera in my car (and Brian had to drive it) so I didn't get to take any pictures - it would have been the perfect day! The sky was so clear and it hit just above 70 - perfect weather! After I got back from the park, my dad and I went out and had some dinner - everyone else was out (Brian at rehearsal and my mom picking up Andrew from Bloomington), so we had a lot of fun at Applebee's (where I hadn't been in years, probably). I ordered the "small portion" of steak, and I'm glad I did, because I got a giant plate full of steak (well, a small steak) and SO MUCH steamed zucchini. I'm always happy when the "seasonal vegetable" at restaurants is steamed zucchini or broccoli or something, because then I can fill up on veggies and not eat so much bad stuff. Plus steamed or grilled zucchini is one of my absolute favorite foods. When I'm in my apartment on my own, I'm pretty sure I have zucchini cooked some way with almost every meal (I recently discovered via Food Network that you can shred zucchini into super-delicious pasta - one of my new favorite things to do!)

Saturday night after James got off work, I drove him, William, Stewart (James' roommate from college and someone we went to high school with) out to Newport to Bar Louie for drinks. I don't think I've really seen Stewart since high school, so that was pretty cool to get to hang out with him! I like going to bars with a bunch of guys - it's a totally different experience than going with a bunch of girls. It's always interesting to see the guys' perspective bar culture...

Today I woke up surprisingly sore from my jaunt in the park yesterday - I'm so out of shape, and hadn't realized it until I exerted a little bit of energy to run around! I'm actually pretty embarrassed about how tired I got and how sore I was this morning! I spent most of the day just hanging out, but this evening my mom & I went to see the show that James has been working on at Playhouse in the Park. It's called Three Sisters, and if you're in the Cincinnati area, you should definitely go check it out! I was kind of worried that it would be over my head, but I actually enjoyed it a lot! It's not too long, and it's pretty dramatic so there's a lot to pay attention to.

I'll update you guys tomorrow and let you know how the FINAL DAY goes! Hopefully I'll also find out when my scans are and when I can get my port out! Dr Adams said as long as the scans are as good as they were the last time, I should be able to get my port out within a week of having them done, which means probably sometime the week before Christmas (I'm waiting to have my scans til finals are over at school so I don't miss any more class).

Goodnight!
Lots of Love,
Lauren

Tired Tired Tired

2009-11-13T22:18:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I really, really can't wait to be done with all of this! I feel really bad because people keep wanting me to go out, but by the time the evening comes, I feel a little bit like I've been hit by a truck. My body starts to ache, my mouth and throat are sore from whatever I've eaten all day, and I feel a little bit like I'm about to fall over most of the time. Especially when I've been in class all day - I can't even seem to focus on whatever's going on! I can't wait for my body to start to feel normal again, because I'm getting really tired of missing out on things because I feel like I don't have the energy to get out!

My last treatment is Monday at 2 - I'm kind of disappointed, because usually I have early morning appointments, which means no one's behind AND that I can be done by lunchtime (especially on my short days!) However, they had to push this appointment back because we're having a meeting with Dr Adams, Dr Cripe (Brian's oncologist), a geneticist, and our entire family. The doctors couldn't meet that early in the morning (or something) and they wanted to meet during my treatment so that we didn't have to come BACK to the hospital. I kind of think I'm going to miss out on a lot of the meeting because usually I start feeling pretty tired and sick during this treatment, so hopefully I'll be able to stay awake for at least part of it.

I'm especially excited for next weekend - Friday, I'm trying to plan a get-together with some friends in Cincinnati to celebrate the end of my treatment and Saturday I'm going to the Cincinnati Opera Gala After-Party with some of the friends I made at my internship this summer. I found a really nice dress a few weeks ago, and I'm happy that I'll be able to have the chance to wear it! Last time I went to a big opera party, I was photographed for the party pages of Cincinnati's social magazine. My big, shining moment!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

Still Sick...

2009-11-10T23:23:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I'm still feeling pretty sick from yesterday, which is worrying me about next week's treatment. I think a lot of it has to do with me thinking about it too much, and maybe a little bit of a punishment for me being so excited about being finished!

Today my mom & I got to have lunch with our friend Sarah, who works for Children's. We've known her for a long time, and she had Hodgkin's when she was about my age (she's in her late 20's now) and just had her first baby six weeks ago! She brought him to breakfast with her, and he's so adorable and extremely well-behaved - he hardly made a sound the entire time, and basically slept (with a few little quiet wake-ups). He looks like her, too - his hair is strawberry blondish (what hair he has) and she thinks it looks like it might end up being curly. I love babies, but I definitely wouldn't be ready to take care of one full-time right now. Babysitting is always fun, though...

I got to go to class today, but I was feeling really drowsy, so I can't really remember much of what we talked about - I'm glad I always take really detailed notes, and that my final is going to be awhile after my last treatment so I can kind of regain my focus. I miss not having trouble remembering lots of details in my history classes! Although, I have been getting A's on all of my exams and essays in my French Civ class - I'm a little worried about my German Song class because the entire grade is based off of the oral final at the end of the semester. I think I'll do OK though. I really love history, so it's never too much of a chore to study for my history classes.

I had kind of a bad piano lesson - I hadn't practiced as much as I should have, and I haven't been practicing the way I should have been. We spent most of the lesson playing through just a few measures, and my teacher gave me a new way to practice that should make my practicing more efficient and productive. I have to play in a studio class in early December, so I really need to start practicing more every day so I can play well in the class. My teacher's assigned me a song I really like, so that's not too bad. I think we need to get our piano tuned, though, because (even though my relative pitch is very off) it sounds so much different when I play in my lessons or the CCM practice rooms vs playing on the piano at home. I used to practice on Brian's keyboard, but then he got the flu, so I'm not really supposed to go in his room much, and I prefer to play a "real" piano anyway - it's easier to make songs sound more musical (at least for me)

Hope you all are well with the beginning of flu season!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

Almost Finished!

2009-11-09T20:54:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

So today I had my second to last treatment, and it was pretty rough. I started getting nauseous on my way to the hospital - I think it was a psychosomatic thing. Just anticipating the treatment is starting to make me feel sick, so that makes me even more happy that I'm almost done.

For some reason, the IV kytril didn't work getting rid of my nausea, and I had hoped that if I ordered lunch it might go away, but no luck. It took a few different pills (including zofran and pill kytril) and some ginger tea before I started feeling relatively normal.

I got a little bit of a surprise today - when my dad stopped by to drop off some lunch for my mom, he ran into the dad of a girl I graduated from high school with. Her mom was diagnosed with breast cancer recently, and they were at Children's because their daughter who's Brian's age has been having migraines. Once she was done with her appointment, they stopped by to visit, which was really nice! We got to hang out for a little bit, and it was good that they stopped by because I had wanted James to visit, but he wasn't allowed since the flu restrictions were put in place.

Child Life (the program that supplies toys & things to kids in the hospital) has kind of stopped visiting me since I never ask for anything from them. However, we were in Kroger the other night and found the most AWESOME Disney Princess coloring book that came with 600 stickers. I'm in the process of coloring pictures for all of my friends... I forgot how much I love coloring!!!

This weekend I went up to Cleveland and had a really great time seeing all of my friends - Marina came over on Friday night and stayed in my apartment. We went out to dinner with some of the girls, and then watched The Proposal and drank wine with Erin. Saturday morning, Marina and I had brunch at First Watch in Crocker Park and visited the farmer's market. I ended up going over to Oberlin & hanging out with Matt for a little bit, but I didn't get to see him long since his parents were in town. That night, I FINALLY got to hang out with Josh - it was so wonderful to see him after so long! We ended up at the bar (where another drunk guy kept rubbing my head!) and then went back to my apartment with Erin and watched The Matrix Reloaded (which is a terrible movie). Sunday I got to have lunch with Gene and then drove home. We had dinner at my grandparents, which was SO delicious - ham with green beans, AND a roast, plus tons of veggies and an apple tart and a pumpkin pie.

I can't wait for the week to go by so I can finally be finished with all of this nonsense!!!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

Halloween pt. 2

2009-11-02T22:35:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

Here are the rest of the pictures from my Halloween at Home... Enjoy!

Our fall trees are so beautiful...

the bushes in our front yard grow fall berries and turn BRIGHT red... such a fantastic color!

my mom's hydrangea...

the only red flower in a bunch of green leaves...

holly! I can't wait for Christmas...

my mom's last rose!

so many birds!

wonderful Halloween sunset

Finally, two weeks from today I have my last treatment! Unfortunately, I can't bring anyone with me (except my parents) because Children's has instituted a "No Visitors" rule because of the flu, but we can all celebrate later that week! I can't even believe it!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Halloween pt. 1

2009-11-01T15:01:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys,

I had a pretty tame Halloween (since my counts are too low to actually go anywhere or have a party) but I took TONS of pictures of my mom's beautiful fall flowers and pumpkins and other things, so here they are...

pumpkins pre-carving: Brian's on the left, mine on the right!

my curly stem - I always try to find one with cool stems!

I went for a classic pumpkin look...

We tried to put Lily (Brian's cat) into his pumpkin. Cats don't like being put in pumpkins...

Brian's pumpkin - he found this design online and then drew it on his pumpkin freehand... I'm impressed.

Getting ready to pass out candy

Pumpkins at night... Brian's is really scary....

Stay tuned for more Halloween pictures!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

Cupcake Masters

2009-10-29T22:36:00.001-04:00

Hey Guys,

Since I'm still housebound, nothing particularly exciting happened today, but James did come by for a visit (finally he didn't have to work ALL DAY!) and we made some master cupcakes for his family mine. We had originally planned on baking a pie, but obviously you can't split a pie in two (at least not easily) so I made the executive decision to bake cupcakes from scratch - icing and all! We found some awesome cupcake papers with glow-in-the-dark ghosts on them (ideal for finding them in the dark when sneaking into the kitchen for a late-night snack) but for some reason couldn't find Halloween sprinkles ANYWHERE! Maybe because Halloween's only a couple days away...

We used the recipe for white cake from the Joy of Cooking (my favorite go-to cookbook - the copy I have in my apartment is such a mess, full of spills & post-it notes from previous experiments) and the recipe from cream cheese frosting. Yum! They were PERFECT!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Flu Flu Flu

2009-10-28T20:20:00.000-04:00

Hey Guys,

Sorry it's been a couple days! We've been pretty laid up here - Brian ended up HAVING H1N1, so we're both on the lovely Tamiflu. I got a cough and a sore throat a couple of nights ago, but fortunately it's started to go away since being on the prescription.

We've been trying to get out of the house a little bit, especially for Brian's sake, since he was stuck literally in bed for a few days. Yesterday, we ventured out in the rain during the afternoon to Shaw Farm, a pumpkin farm about 20 minutes away from our house. We've been going there since I was a little kid, and I love going to pick out pumpkins! We were basically the only people there - there was another family with a couple really little kids, but we purposely went during the school day so we wouldn't run into many people.

Today we went out to Rouster's, an apple farm nearby that's been around for ages - my mom went there when she was a kid! We bough tons of their special strain of apples, homemade cider, and apple butter. It was fantastic! Apples are my favorite part of fall - especially locally grown delicious ones!

I'm going to be stuck at home a lot this week - my counts dropped yesterday, so I'm especially nervous about getting sick. I'm hoping that some of my friends will be able to stop by the house and visit, especially since I can't go out on Halloween! I'm not sure what I'm going to do - maybe have a bonfire, because I really love s'mores, and I haven't had a fire in a long time! Plus, most of my friends work in the evenings, so a late-night bonfire would be a perfect option.

Tomorrow I'm going to go out and take some pictures of our deck - there was a storm last night and now our deck is covered in multi-colored leaves. It's going to be crazy to clean, but right now it's GORGEOUS! I can't wait to post them!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

ps there is a moth flying around in my bedroom and it's very annoying. I hope I can catch it soon...

Insomnia (again.... again....)

2009-10-26T04:31:00.000-04:00

Hey Guys,

It's 4am here in Cincinnati and I can't sleep. It's about that time in my cycle that the side effects from the steroids start hitting, so I'm a ravenous insomniac. I was thinking about running to the kitchen to grab a snack (maybe that would help?) but I don't want to start night eating!! I'm already eating to the point of stomach aches during the day - I can't imagine how I'd feel if I started eating in the nighttime too... The weird part is that I'm craving a McMuffin. Especially weird because I never, ever eat fast food... (although I did eat half a box of Kraft Mac & Cheese this afternoon...)

I also started getting some vein pain again today - I haven't had any since my last cycle, but I think this is about the time it started up before. Fortunately it only lasts a couple days, but it's such a strange sensation. It feels like my veins are shorter than the rest of my arms or something, and every time I bend my wrists or elbows they're stretching. Although, that makes it sounds a lot more painful than it really is - it's not so bad, I'd compare it to a pulled muscle or something. Irritating, but it's not going to stop me from getting around.

I'm kind of dreading this week a little bit because my counts are expected to drop on Tuesday, so I'm anticipating being stuck at home a lot. My mom and I have plans to go apple-buying at a local apple farm, and I'm really excited about that - plus I want to go see Where the Wild Things Are, so we'll probably do that. Unfortunately, my count usually stay low for a week or so, so I'm probably going to miss Halloween - I'd hoped to be able to get up to Berea or Columbus or something, but I'm hoping maybe Tyler will come down to visit or that James will come over for a fire - I can't even hand out candy if my counts are low! I also feel bad about being home all week because Brian's still pretty sick, and he's stuck in his room all the time so he doesn't "contaminate" the house (so I don't get the flu as well...) I'm hoping he's not getting depressed, and if I can't go to class, that means more time that he has to stay in his room... I hope he feels better soon, because I also want to go see Zombieland with him - no one else in the family wants to see it, so I was hoping we'd get to go some afternoon after he gets home from school.

I should probably get back to trying to sleep - I've just turned Law & Order: SVU on - it's the only thing on this early (late?) with the exception of infomercials and (strangely enough) Cable in the Classroom on MTV. Andrew's radio show starts at 5, so if I'm still up then, I know what I'll be doing!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

The Flu Has Hit Our House... UPDATED!

2009-10-24T20:59:00.001-04:00

Hey Guys,

Well... It's happened! The flu has hit my house... poor Brian was feeling a little sick yesterday, but has barely gotten out of bed today. He woke up with a fever and an achy body, and sounds terrible. My mom has kind of put him in a quarantine in his room and spend the whole day sanitizing the house so I won't pick it up... I feel bad that he's shut-in, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't mind much because he says he's feeling pretty lousy. My dad did take him out to pick out a few DVDs from Blockbuster, so they've been hanging out in his room eating chinese takeout and watching Year One.

My mom and I got out of the house for a little bit today to run some errands - we have a waterfall in our backyard, and she's been wanting a pair of rainboots to make it easier to get in the waterfall and clean out the algae. We ended up at DSW and she found the most adorable pair of rainboots with little chocolates all over them (perfect for my mom - she LOVES chocolate!) We also stopped by Dick's to peruse the clearance racks for a tank top and some tiny track shorts for Brian's Halloween costume (everyone tells him he looks like Michael Cera, so he and a friend are going as Juno and Paulie Bleeker). We found a pair of shorts for him, as well as some ADORABLE knit hats to cover my bald head now that it's getting cold out. I've been on a hunt for the perfect hat, and I can't believe I found them at a sporting goods store of all places! One is a thick turquoise knit and the other is dark grey with big purple polka dots and a puff on the top.

Finally, THIS:

is for sale... Andy Warhol's portrait of Michael Jackson. It's expected to get between $500,000 and $700,000 at auction... anyone want to pitch in? I'm pretty sure it would look amazing in my apartment...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Yes.

2009-10-23T21:30:00.000-04:00

THANK YOU!

I Can't Think of a Good Title...

2009-10-23T19:10:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

I don't know if I've written about this before, but I STILL haven't lost 100% of my hair... I had a little bit of fuzz left, and it's super annoying! My mom has to shave my head every few weeks, and it's always a little bit of a terrifying experience - I don't know how men shave their heads every day (maybe they use an electric razor?)

Anyway, I'm pretty sure the only person I would ever trust to shave my head is my mom - but even so I get really nervous. We always make sure to use a new razor, and she uses some kind of astringent on my scalp with copious amounts of lotion to make sure that I don't get razor burn afterwards. So far, no major bleeding incidents - just a couple of tiny nicks here and there (nothing that even shows up unless you look really, really close) so I'm pretty impressed with my mom's head-shaving skills. I'm hoping to have her do it again tomorrow, so be on the lookout for some pictures of the process in the next couple of days!

In other news, Planet Cancer just announced that they are officially teaming up with the Lance Armstrong Foundation - even going so far as moving into the same office building as LAF! I think this sounds like GREAT news, because with these two foundations working as one, it'll be even easier to reach Young Adults with cancer that have needs (whether it be financial, medical, general support, etc...). I'm lucky enough to have insurance, access to amazing medical facilities, and a huge network of support, but not everyone has that. It'll be really fantastic to have one GIANT organization to help provide as much as they can (you can go read more about it at the link above).

Also, Holly was awesome enough to send me a link to her friend's science blog, Urban Science, where she recently wrote an article about H1N1. I checked out the article (pt 2 coming soon), and I think you all should as well! Holly's friend is a Doctoral Candidate in Biology, so she definitely knows what she's talking about (not just some random person posting about things they don't really understand). The rest of her blog is really consumer-friendly as well - it's easy to understand AND there are some really pretty pictures!

I've been feeling kind of crappy lately - lots of nausea and heartburn (as well as a few unmentionable issues you all probably don't want to hear about!) and my taste buds are still all wonky. I'm hoping that will go away in a few days, because I'm expecting to be out of class all next week and my mom and I want to go to Rouster's (an apple farm) and I want to be able to taste all the apples and the homemade cider (this is why fall is so amazing - I love apples!). I've also been having this really strange thing happening in my feet - my muscles will tense up compulsively and it wakes me up at night, so I haven't been sleeping too well. It's kind of like a Charley Horse but in my feet... I used to get them very occasionally before the chemo, and my dad gets them sometimes, but now I get them ALL the time! I've been wearing heels more lately, so I don't know if it's the heels or the chemo that's making them really bad. I talked to Dr. Adams, and she advised that I eat more potassium - I can't eat bananas with my Procarbazine, but I've been trying to load up on spinach and broccoli. So far, no change, but I'm betting it takes more than a couple of days for the vitamins to start working their magic...

Finally, I want to post a little bit of a shout-out to some of the other writers of cancer blogs (especially the ones I've been following). It seems like everyone I discovered when I first got diagnosed is successfully finishing treatment now, soon, or has recently finished, and I want to congratulate all of the great success, especially to Chris (who had his last treatment today) and Jennie, who just celebrated a month post-treatment. Congrats, guys!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps check this out :-)

Vaccinations (and rants about not wearing masks)

2009-10-21T20:37:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

It's flu season again (well, I guess it's been flu season for a bit now, but it just seems like everyone's recently started to get sick) Knock on wood, I'm feeling pretty good - and I'm planning on keeping that way at least for another month so I can FINISH!

Anyway, I know a lot of people are really on the fence about vaccinations, etc. Almost every doctor will tell you that vaccinating your kids is perfectly safe (actually safer than NOT) and (I'm pretty sure - correct me if I'm wrong) kids legally have to be vaccinated before they can attend school in the US (excepting religious or "spiritual" beliefs). I know that some celebrities (I'm looking at you, Jenny McCarthy) are on this no-vaccinations kick, saying that vaccinations cause autism, etc. I get so mad every time I hear about this, because it seems like just because you (as a parent) would rather listen to a celebrity than a doctor, your kid could get REALLY sick and make other kids REALLY sick (babies too small to be vaccinated, etc...)

You might be wondering what all this has to do with me... I read this article on Slate Magazine today, and I never really thought about how unvaccinated kids could affect me directly. However, now that I'm a patient at a Children's Hospital, I'm wondering how many unvaccinated kids I come in contact with that could be spreading things to allllll the many immunocompromised patients at CHMC. It makes me so mad...

Another thing that makes me SO mad is coughing kids in hospitals NOT wearing masks. The new procedure at Outpatient where I get my bloodwork (and I'm assuming at Children's Main as well) is that if you come in even looking vaguely sick, you have to wear a mask. This is because so many kids come in with low immune systems that hospital staff doesn't want flu (or anything else) spreading and making the really sick kids even sicker. However, some parents don't seem to follow these rules... When I was coming home from my treatment Monday, I was stuck behind a kid and his mom - the mom was holding a mask and the kid was coughing all over his hands and running them up and down the walls... Another woman in front of us commented (pretty loudly) "This is a Hospital. That kid should be wearing a mask..." The mom didn't even flinch or acknowledge the comment. One of my nurses at Outpatient put it best: she told me that she has parents come in all the time who don't want to force their kid to wear a mask (because, let's face it, the masks suck) so she tells them "Your kid might get the flu and have a tummy ache and miss a couple days of school, but someone else's kid might be on chemo, and that kid on chemo can get the flu and die. Put the mask on your kid, because we don't want any dead ones." It sounds a little harsh, but sometimes that's the only way to get through to people. A lot of times parents just don't realize that not every kid they come in contact with is as healthy as their own.

For everyone's sake this flu season, GET THE H1N1 vaccine! Get the Seasonal vaccine! Help us sick kids have a better chance of NOT getting the flu!!!!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Sick Sick Sick

2009-10-20T19:22:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

I had my 10th(!!!!!) treatment yesterday - only TWO more (man, I can practically taste freedom). However, I've been feeling a lot more sick than usual... Sunday, I was super nauseous all day (which is unusual, because I don't generally get sick from my first treatment, and it had been almost a week since chemo...). Monday, I woke up STILL sick and was feeling pretty nauseous all through chemo (which only lasted about 2 hrs - thank God!) and came home realllllly nervous I was going to throw up in the car (I made it - whew!)

When I got home, my mom made some really delicious baked chicken with some pasta with mushrooms & spinach (sooo good for my poor tummy) and I spent the rest of the evening on the couch with TWO cat nurses. They don't particularly make it any better (actually they make it a lot hotter!) but they're sweet and the purring is comforting...

This morning, I was definitely still sick - I was disappointed because last cycle I had felt fine this Tuesday. I ended up not making it to my Song Lit class (which sucks because I love my professor!) but I did make it to my piano lesson. I enjoy my piano lessons a whole lot - my teacher is either a grad student or a doctoral candidate who's only a few years older than I am. She's really understanding and fun to talk to, so it makes me want to practice more than usual! I have another lesson Thursday (a makeup), and I'm hoping I'll be able to make it to my lesson on Tuesday even if my counts are low (I'm thinking it will be OK since it's a one-on-one situation...)

I'm going to go lay down some more now - I went out for dinner and now my stomach is turning! I'm crossing my fingers that I'll make it to the end of my treatment without ever throwing up, but yesterday's treatment isn't making it easy!

Also, my veins are kind of burning from the doxorubycin... it's making my chest feel really tight, which is NOT helping with the nausea. My whole chest just has this terrible feeling in it (like there's something wrong with my veins - I'm assuming that's just residual chemo still hanging around) and that's part of the reason I'm feeling so nauseous... UGH!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

More Weekend Fun!

2009-10-18T13:32:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

Sorry it's been a couple days, but I've had a crazy busy weekend! This Friday was BW's Fall Break, so Gene & Katie came down for a visit (Gene is auditioning at CCM for grad school, and Katie just wanted to tag along for the visit!)

Friday night, I got a group together to go visit Hofbrauhaus in Newport, Ky (there are only three in the world - Newport, Pittsburgh, and Munich). Katie, Gene, my family, William, James, and James' parents all went out for beers (them) and delicious German food (all of us). Hofbrauhaus is SO much fun - I wish that I hadn't been tired, because there was tons of dancing on tables, live polka music (seriously!), cougars, and GIANT (liter-sized) in-house brewed beer that apparently is delicious.

Me & James (& James on beer #1)

Gene & Katie

My Mom & James' Mom

Me & William

William & a rose that my dad bought me :-)

My DELICIOUS dinner - JaegerSchnitzel, veggies, and a potato pancake. The JaegerSchnitzel is pounded, breaded, and fried pork with a musrhoom & bacon sauce (LOTS of pork!) and the potato pancake is DELICIOUS with applesauce... I was kind of nervous that it was going to be super-bacony, but really I couldn't tell at all. It was SO good and SO filling. Mmmm!

William

Me, Katie, & Gene

James telling secrets (& beer #3)

James (& beer #4)

On Saturday, we took a jaunt down to CCM, where I took Gene & Katie on a tour of CCM until there was some kind of security issue and alarms started going off. We headed out of the building at that point and went down to Ludlow, where Gene & Katie experienced their first tastes of Skyline Chili & Graeter's ice cream.

5-way (spaghetti, chili, beans, onion, cheese)

Katie with her Graeter's

Gene

Graeter's reppin' the support for Children's

Gene had to head out early Saturday evening because he has a church gig Sunday mornings up in Cleveland, so he had to get back up Saturday night to wake up for that. Katie & I headed out to do some shopping (I'm proud to say that I didn't buy anything!) and get some Tex-Mex for dinner. We'd had some big plans for a night out on the town on Saturday night, and we totally did! (I can't believe I forgot to take pictures!)

We dressed up and went to Below Zero on 12th & Sycamore for Human Rights/Equality night to hear our friend Erin play piano and sing. Unfortunately, we were running late and only caught the last couple songs of her set, but you should go check her out - she's AMAZING!

After that, we stopped by a bar/restaurant called Nada - it's right next to the big theater downtown, so it's pretty fancy & there were tons of people there. One of the bartenders is actually a guy in one of my classes (who I didn't recognize at first, and I felt SO bad about it!). Katie & I kept being hit on by this really creepy pair of OLDER men (think 60+), one of which was super drunk and kept wanting to kiss me for good luck (since I'm bald). After several emphatic rebuttals, he asked me if I would kiss him if he readjusted his dentures. The bartenders quickly intervened after that...

Finally, we went to Arnold's (the oldest bar in Cincinnati) to meet up with Kelvin (who I worked with this summer) and Mike (a guy I went to elementary/driving school with and had run into the previous night at Hofbrauhaus). We stayed there for a bit, then Katie & I headed home because she had to leave this morning to get back to to Berea for homework, etc.

I'm so glad that they came down to visit - I always love showing people around Cincinnati and taking them out to my favorite places. Thanks for visiting, guys!!!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps everyone should listen to this button!

Tired of Being Bald

2009-10-14T16:11:00.005-04:00

Hey Guys,

So I've reached the point where I'm tired of being bald!!! I'm HOPING that by the time I take my trip for New Year's that I'll have a little bit of fuzz growing back in (that gives me about a month and a half after my last treatment) and by the time I go back to school, I'm hoping that I'll have enough to get a little styling done.

What I'm really looking forward to is having enough hair to do this:

I really love Audrey Tautou (so disappointed Coco Avant Chanel isn't playing anywhere in the Cincinnati or Cleveland areas...) and we have similarly textured hair, so I'd really like to keep it short cropped and curly for at least awhile. I think she looks so chic, and despite the fact that I'm betting it takes a decent amount of product to keep it from being super frizzy, it's GOT to be easier to take care of than the mid-back length hair I had before I cut it off.

I know, I know... it's still a little early, but a girl can plan, right?

Lots of Love,

Lauren

1 more down, 3 to go...

2009-10-12T20:45:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I'm SO CLOSE to being done! Only three more treatments left!!!!

Today went really smoothly - my nurse, Anne, is the same one I had last time, and she's fantastic! Everything got started within about a half hour of our arrival (amazing) and she was so prompt at changing my fluids and my meds so that I hardly had ANY wait time - actually, I'm pretty sure that I didn't have any time where I was just sitting around waiting for her. The only time we really had to wait was when my last bag of fluids was finished and we had to wait for a different nurse because Anne had to sit in another patient's room for the first half hour of something. If the kids have bad reactions to a drug (like my little brother - his throat closed up after he started one of his chemo drugs) or if they're taking something particularly dangerous, the nurse needs to stay with them for a a bit to make sure nothing awful happens.

I slept most of the day, which was unusual for me - generally I stay awake and talk with everyone a lot, but I just couldn't keep my eyes open today! I was feeling a little nauseous in the hospital - the flushes that they put through my port after chemo makes my mouth taste like rubbing alcohol which always makes me feel like I'm going to throw up. So far, so good, though! I'm definitely going to bed early tonight - I'm exhausted after a busy weekend and then going out with James and his work buddies last night. That was probably a bad idea, but I never get to see James and his friends from the Playhouse are a lot of fun!

I also ran into a fellow "adult" patient on the hem/onc floor at Children's today. We didn't talk - he was in a wheelchair with a mask on and I was getting weighed - but we exchanged those little "what's up" nods. It's strange to see another big person amongst the sea of little bald kids (which can be really, really depressing - especially since Brian was one of those little bald kids at one point...)

I got an email yesterday from a girl (young woman?) named Tiffany - she lives pretty close to me in another suburb of Cincinnati (Fairfield, for you all in the area). She had Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma six years ago, and was treated at a local hospital. Now she's involved with the local Leukemia Lymphoma Society chapter, and gave me some really cool information. She told me they're trying to start up a Young Adult group, which I'm really excited about! Lots of other cities have big YA support communities, but Cincinnati really doesn't. Hopefully that will take off and be something I can get involved with, especially when I move back to Cinci after I graduate in May.

She also told me about the First Connection program, which is a one-on-one support network for survivors to council/help newly diagnosed patients. From what I can tell, the pairs are matched up by age, sex, and diagnosis, which sounds really cool. There's a training session on October 24, so I'm really hoping that I can attend and help someone out (or even be paired with someone to council me!) I'm also in contact with a woman at Children's Hospital about their Children's Champions program, which is something similar, plus much more. I'd love to be able to volunteer at hospital events and even be on a committee to be a patient (or family) consultant. I'll obviously be gone for a few months in the spring, but it's most likely that I'll be back in Cincinnati for at least a while, so I'm hoping I can get more involved with things when I have some more time, and get started on them now!

To all of my fellow Cancer-Havers (I hate saying 'patient' because it makes me feel sickly), do you guys participate in any programs like those? If so, what kinds of experiences have you had? I'd love to hear!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Guess Who's Back

2009-10-12T00:03:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I'm back from my jaunt in Cleveland, and it was really, really fantastic to see everyone! I spent most of the weekend with Tyler & Katie, with a little bit of time having some delicious brunch in Oberlin (of course! where else am I going to eat brunch?!?) and got to see Matt & Marina, which is always a good time...

My mom says Winnie cried a lot while I was gone - I'm worried about what's going to happen when I leave her here for spring semester (so she doesn't have to be alone in my apartment all day...). I also brought home all of my winter clothes, which is nice (because I haven't worn them in months) but also sucks because I hate winter! Fall is beautiful, but I'm NOT a fan of cold weather at all... At least I'll be in Cincinnati for part of it, which is good because it doesn't get nearly as cold as Cleveland (even though they're only 4 hours apart)

Anyway, I go in again tomorrow for another treatment (always lots of fun). Only four left, though! I can't wait to be done - it seems so close now!

I should probably go to bed now, since I have to get up so early! But I'm watching Knocked Up on E!, so I'll probably be up for a little bit longer...

Also, I wanted to thank everyone who's sent me emails in the past few weeks - it's really great to hear peoples' stories and get to know you all. Thanks so much!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Last-Minute Echo/PFT

2009-10-08T18:20:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

At the beginning of the week, Debbie called me and told me that Dr. Adams wanted another set of tests done before my next cycle - An EKG/Echo (for my heart) and a Pulmonary Function Test (for my lungs). Well, you all know how much I LOVE the PFT (not very much...)

If you've never had one before, basically you're in this little room (remember the picture I posted last time? It looks like a phone booth!) and it's vacuum sealed shut, and you have to do all this weird breathing stuff through at tube. That's measured by a computer, which is checking different things about how well you can breathe. The worst is when you have to blow out for an extremely long period of time. I always feel like I'm going to pass out and/or wet my pants. Neither of which I really want to happen.

Anyway, the good news is that my heart and my lungs are still normal, which is fantastic! It doesn't look like the chemo is affecting my lung capacity/function or my heart walls, which can be a problem. I wasn't really too worried, though, because the amount of chemo I'm getting isn't really too high...

Also, Kaylin from Cancer Is Hilarious had her six-month scans today... Go wish her luck with the results!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

This Weekend!

2009-10-07T20:35:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

I wanted to let everyone up in Cleveland know that I'll be in Berea this weekend! I'll be up Friday in time for dinner, and I'll probably be in town through Sunday afternoon. Tyler will most likely be up with me for Friday night! Let me know when you're free and I'll visit you!

Also some good news - I got MORE bloodwork done today, and I'm finally out of the woods with that! I'm back up to relatively normal - 1,200! Woohoo!

There's nothing to exciting to report today - although I think today was the coolest day we've had in a long time! I'm not too thrilled about it - I'm not much of a winter person! I like it to be cold and snow around Christmas time, but I'd be more than happy if it stayed warm all the way through Thanksgiving!

I went on a long walk tonight with my mom - I haven't done ANY kind of exercise in so long, I can't believe how out of shape I'm getting! My legs are already sore just from walking a few miles. I can't wait to get back to my pilates classes in the spring. It's probably going to kill me though! I'll have to keep going on walks so I can start slowly getting back into shape - and maybe riding my bike since I brought it home from my apartment...

Finally, I've been reading about this book all over the place! I might see if I can find a copy of the library, since my taste buds change for a couple of weeks each cycle. It'll be interesting to see if the recipes really work!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Professors are Cool

2009-10-06T18:42:00.006-04:00

Hey Guys,

So today was my second day back to school after my week-long involuntary hiatus, and I really like my German Song Lit class A LOT. The professor is so knowledgeable, and it goes really fast because we never really take a break from note-taking, and there are musical examples interspersed. I feel like I've learned a lot, and I've only actually made it to two classes so far!

My professor is so nice about me being out of class. He's hooked me up with another kid in the class who he knows is a good student and takes good notes, so I always have someone to go to if I've missed class and need some notes. I'm especially thankful for that because there's SO much information and I don't want to be relying on someone who might not write down everything I need to know!

I had my first piano lesson today as well. I was kind of nervous because I haven't had a piano lesson in almost two years (or really even played piano much more than plunking out melodies to learn music). It wasn't so bad - I'm REALLY rusty, but as the lesson went on, things started getting a lot better.

I've had a lot of congestion the past few days, so I called Debbie this morning because I was worried about getting a cold or flu and not being able to go visit Cleveland this weekend (or worse: not being able to get chemo on Monday). She assured me that since I don't have a cough or fever, it's probably just allergies... I'm hoping that's the case, and I'm a little less sniffly than I was this morning, so we'll see what happens! I'm going to try a different allergy medicine and see if that helps!

I'm also going in on Thursday to have another Pulmonary Function Test (remember - the one where it looks like I was sitting in a phone booth? haha) and an EKG/Echo before my next treatment. I hate the PFT because it's so time-consuming and all the extreme breathing always makes me feel like I'm going to either burst out laughing or wet my pants! The EKG/Echo only takes about 15 minutes, but it involves the ultrasound gel, so it's a huge mess...

Finally, Winnie has been helping me with this post by sitting on my lap and occasionally batting at the screen when the mouse moves too much. She's growing up to be a pretty well-behaved cat (unlike the maniac she was as a kitten!)

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Back to School (Again...)

2009-10-05T15:48:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

Celebration! I got to go to class today! Unfortunately, though, my counts were still a little low this morning (around 350), so in order to go to class, I had to wear this lovely mask. In case you were wondering, yes, it's from Children's, and yes, those ARE flying band-aids printed on it. It matched my outfit SO well...

Anyway, it was really good to be able to get out of the house and back to school. Basically things seemed like they had been pretty uneventful when I was gone, and I had kept up with my reading, so I wasn't confused. I had a French quiz to make up, but I took it while the professor went over the graded quizzes with the class.

I felt a little foggy all day, but I'm pretty sure that's because I got up at 7am so I could make sure to be at the clinic by 8 (when they open) to get my blood work done to see how low my counts were.

I also got to meet up with my friend Andrew for a little bit - it was nice to see him because we haven't gotten together in over a month because our schedules have been kind of conflicting. Hopefully we'll be able to get together again sometime soon, because I miss all of my friends!

Time to go do homework! (is it bad that I'm actually getting excited about that??)

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Weekend Fun!

2009-10-04T14:52:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

Well, it ended up being a pretty good weekend, despite the fact that I'm not really allowed to leave.

Yesterday I pretty much just hung out around the house, and finally motivated myself to finish the last couple of essays I had to read for my Thesis research. I still have to type all of the notes onto my computer, though... that's going to take awhile...

Last night Arielle came over with some chips & a bottle of wine and we spent the evening watching movies featuring the one and only Johnny Depp - Chocolat and Secret Window - two VERY different movies! When we were in middle school and high school, we used to have groups of girls over all the time and have Johnny Depp nights. We'd rent as many of his movies as we thought we could watch in a night and then stay up as late as we could eating nachos and gossiping. Unfortunately, Arielle and I (and Megan, but she was out of town) are the only ones still in Cincinnati, so it ended up just being just the two of us. We made the nachos, and my mom brought us some DELICIOUS special-edition Hot Chocolate flavored ice cream. SO GOOD!

This morning, my mom made an AMAZING brunch - quiche, goetta (a sausage-like breakfast meat, for those of you not from the Cincinnati area), coffee cake - and my grandparents came over. My mom got out her good china and made Kona coffee (my dad ordered it straight from Hawaii for her) and mimosas, and my grandma brought some berry trifle that was so sweet it was like dessert. It was super fancy, and we ended up eating and eating for about two hours, and still had enough food left over for the next few weeks! We're going to be having delicious breakfasts for a long time now...

I'm going in tomorrow EARLY to get more blood work done, and I'm crossing my fingers so hard that my counts will be high enough to go to class. Not only am I starting to be bored out of my mind, I'm also really worried about missing so many lectures - especially orchestration, because I know absolutely NOTHING about what I'm doing in that class. Even with reading the book, I'm still confused - some things you can only learn by demonstration. It's kind of like math in that way... yikes.

Anyway, they just redid a house at the end of our street that's been empty for... I don't even know how long! There's an open house going on right now, so of course my mom and I are going to check it out...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Already Out...

2009-09-29T23:51:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

Well, I'm already missing class, which totally sucks.

My mom (who's been through this whole cancer thing before with Brian) had been worried that I wasn't getting bloodwork often enough. When Brian was on chemo and going to elementary school, his doctor had him get bloodwork ALL THE TIME to make sure that his counts were high enough to go to school. My mom and his nurse were able to track and predict when his counts would drop so that the school could give him his work ahead of time so he could keep up with his class (which worked out so well!)

Unfortunately, I hadn't been told to get bloodwork as often - my mom mentioned this to Debbie, who told her it was ok. However, when my mom sat down to track my counts so I could give some warning to my professors, she realized that I'd never gotten bloodwork done when my counts were dropping - only when they were rising. On an instinct, she sent me in herself to get bloodwork done this morning (since I have a standing order, I can basically go in whenever - there's no specific date on the paperwork). I wasn't expecting them to drop until Friday at the earliest, so I got up, showered, got dressed for class, ate breakfast, and stopped by the outpatient clinic.

aaaaand....drumroll.... my ANC was 450!!!!!! For those of you who don't know, it has to be 500 to go out in public, and normal is in the THOUSANDS. So... back home I went, and back into the sweats. I was excited, too, because I had a new dress I'd been wanting to wear to class (but that's beside the point...)

I'm disappoined because I was hoping my counts would be low over the weekend so I'd maybe only miss a day or so of class. Now it's looking like I might be missing the entire week! I'm crossing my fingers I'll be cool for Friday.

I guess this means I'll have more time to work on my research... or to watch movies...

Also, my mom's feeling a little under the weather, so I'm hoping she feels better soon! She hardly ever gets sick, but she does such a good job taking care of all of us that sometimes she needs us to take care of her!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Surrounded by Britten

2009-09-27T23:19:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

Yikes, I'm getting really bad at consistently posting!

Anyway, I've been SO happy to get back to class! It's really weird being at a new school, very disorienting. I keep telling myself that I really shouldn't be back to BW anyway (since I'm a fifth year...) and would most likely have been starting Grad school, but it's still weird being someplace new! Especially because I'm taking all upper-level classes with kids who have been together for the last two or three years. I'm the only "new kid"!

My French Civ class is interesting - I can't really figure out WHAT the heck the prof is talking about most of the time, and the class is even in English! I kind of think it's a forum for him to ramble on about his political views, but it's not going to be too much work (only two 1-page papers, a midterm, and a final) and it's all opinion-based, so I'm not too worried about anything but getting bored. Plus there are no windows in the room, so not even anything to distract myself with. The TA is cute, though... and French! He interjects occasionally when he can tell the prof. is getting off topic, so that helps a little bit...

I'm taking a French language course as well - I'm a French minor, so I've taken all the "Advanced" French classes, but I have to go back and take the 200 levels to get the credit for my minor (I skipped them when I was just taking French for fun...). The class I picked to transfer is all about food (I accidentally picked it! They gave me a choice of three courses that would transfer correctly and I picked the third in the series... lucky chance!) and my prof is AMAZING! She's this older French lady (maybe in her 60s?) and used to design lingerie for Victoria's Secret before going back to school, getting her master's in French Lit, and becoming a professor - she also was a professor in the Fashion Design dept. until a couple of years ago. Sooooo cooool! There's a girl in my class that I sit next to who's a Fashion Design major, and she was telling me about a design class for non-majors. She's bringing me some info about it tomorrow in class, and I'm hoping that I might be able to audit or sit in on the class - I've always wanted to take a design class, even though I can't sew or draw... I guess that's why you take class, though...

So far, though, my favorite class is my German Art Song class... It's taught by this tiny, tiny man who knows EVEYRTHING! He reminds me of Dr Strasser (at BW) - just a font of knowledge. We sit in the class (me and 60 voice grad majors - intimidating!) and he talks and we take notes. I'm extra happy that he's not making me sing, either (I wouldn't want to force the other singers to listen to my chemo voice right now!) so I just have to do written work, which isn't a problem for me since I'm not taking a full load of classes OR voice lessons!

I'm also taking an Orchestration class (required for my Music History degree) which I'm still not so sure about. I'm the only vocalist in the class (singers aren't required to take it unless they have a double major, like me) and I know NOTHING about instruments! I warned my professor, though, and she's been really kind and offered to help me out whenever I need it.

I've finally spent a lot of the past few days realllly sitting down and working on my thesis. This is going to (obviously) be a TON of work. I've got a few of my books all read and notated, and I have an EXTREMELY preliminary outline written (just so I have an idea of what to look for when I'm reading my books). My goal is to finish all the books in the next week or so and to have a better outline written by the end of October. Ideally, I'd like to start writing before I go back for the spring. I'm just worried that I'm not going in a good direction, and it's hard to work with my advisor via email! It would be SO much easier to sit down for an hour every week (like I'm supposed to be doing!) and get his advice face-to-face. I'm emailing him to see what I should do about that (maybe find an interim advisor here in Cincinnati?) but in the mean time, I'm slogging along through all of this Britten and Peter Grimes on my own. It's amazing, but overwhelming sometimes!

On a chemo note, I finished my FOURTH round of steroids tonight, which marks the end of my drugs for my fourth cycle! Woohoo! Only two more rounds to go, which means four more chemos, two more weeks of Procarbazine (which doesn't bother me much that I can tell), and four more weeks of steroids (which I HATE). I'm a little but nervous because my counts drop lower and faster with each round, and they've already started dropping according to the bloodwork I had this morning. I'm hoping they'll hold up until this weekend since I'm supposed to give a joint presentation in class on Friday, and I don't want to have to beg off a project already! I mean... I have a good excuse, but still! I had to wear a mask for the first time today - there were tons of sick kids at Outpatient (where I get my blood drawn) and they were all coughing all over the place... Fortunately, the nurses let me go wait for my lab tech in the ultrasound room so I wouldn't have to sit in the waiting room with the sick kids. Score one for being bald! Less exposure to Swine Flu...

Well, I promise I'll be back again soon. Hope you guys are all holding up well & avoiding H1N1!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

@Jacinta - check out your last comment! I put a response in the right place this time!

Back to School - Finally...

2009-09-23T18:32:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys!

Sorry it's been a little while since I posted - I had treatment on Monday and FINALLY got back to school today!

Monday's treatment went really smoothly - I didn't have to stay in a tiny infusion room like last time (although this time I wouldn't have minded - the treatment was only about an hour and a half, so I was basically only in Day Hosp. for three hours at the most!) My nurse was really fast, which made it soooo much easier - she came quickly when I buzzed for my med changes, and you wouldn't believe how much time builds up when you're just waiting for the nurse to get there to change the drugs!

Knock on wood, I've been feeling a lot better this round following my day 8 treatment than usual. I've basically got the nausea under control (thank GOD, since now I actually have to go to class & I can't spend all day sleeping because I'm feeling sick!) Everything tastes pretty crappy, though - I always forget how BAD the chemo makes my mouth taste for about a week or so after this treatment. I know I've mentioned it before, but just for a recap - sweet things taste like they're made with artificial sweetener (blegh) and everything else tastes fuzzy and sour. Except plain water, which is just not good. Even filtered water kind of tastes a little bit sewer-y (which I'm 99% sure is the chemo because normally we have pretty great water in Cincinnati... unlike my apartment in Berea!)

In the week or so before classes started, I decided to do some experimenting with my newly rediscovered crocheting skills and set about making some hats. My first attempt(s) were abysmal and actually pretty funny, but after a couple trial-and errors, I was able to make a couple that actually turned out pretty good!

This is my first successful attempt - you can't really tell, but the yarn I used is mostly a deep purple with some navy and teal running through it. It's SUPER silky, and I think it'll look really nice with the celery-colored pashmina scarf I have from Florence two summers ago, and also with the pink pea coat I found when I was cleaning out my closet (I don't even know when it's from! Middle school? Early high school? It's cute!)

This second one I made with yarn that I had originally bought to make a scarf for my mom - it's pinks and grays and some lavender, and the yarn is REALLY knobbly. I got the same kind of yarn in black, white, and gray also (I was going to make coordinating scarves for my parents) and tried to make a scarf for my dad out of it. However, I didn't buy nearly enough yarn of each color AND the knobbly-ness proved to be extremely hard to make an even scarf out of. So I ended up having to scrap the scarf for my dad, and used the pink yarn for my hat experiments. I think it turned out pretty well! It kind of looks like a bathing cap - my mom says I should crochet some little flowers to attach to the front, so that's probably going to be my next in-hospital crocheting adventure!

Also, check out my neck reallllly closely - you can barely even see my scar anymore! Woohoo! I've been putting lotion on it basically every day to make sure that it doesn't get too tight or itchy, but I'm pretty sure that the fact that my surgeon GLUED me back together has had a lot to do with the fact that it's healed so well and SO quickly! When I wear necklaces, you can't even tell it's there. And even when I'm not wearing one, you can really only see it if you're looking. It's not red or angry looking or anything.

In addition, I'm happy to report that I STILL have a full face of eyebrows and eyelashes, which THRILLS me! Of course, I'd be more than happy to wear crazy falsies everyday, but since I still have my eyebrows and eyelashes, people still think that I shaved my head on purpose. Since I'm starting at a new school, I'm pretty thrilled not to have that "cancer" look.

I'm heading out for some dinner, but I'm happy I was FINALLY able to stop back and get a post up. I really need to start doing this more regularly again!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps to Jacinta - I posted a reply to the comment you left on my post from Aug. 27. I wasn't sure if blogger would alert you to a reply, so I wanted to let you know! Please feel MORE than free to ask any questions you'd like!

pps as a general note, if you guys ever ask me questions in comments, I'll definitely reply to them under the comment section. Blogger doesn't give access to email addresses, so if you've asked anything, always check back in the following days to see if I've posted a reply!

Bad Moods

2009-09-19T00:03:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I've been getting pretty frustrated with myself lately. Throughout the entire first half of my treatment, I managed to stay really upbeat and positive about everything. Lately, however, that doesn't seem to be the case. I've been finding myself in bad moods pretty consistently, and getting frustrated with people who are only trying to help (especially in my family - I'm sorry to all of you guys!).

This is the most time I've spent at my parents' house since I left for college, and I think I'm starting to go a little stir-crazy without much to do, especially since most of my friends are up in Cleveland, and the few that ARE here actually have jobs - so it's hard to see them sometimes. Plus, my blood counts get lower and lower with each treatment, so I'm worrying about days when I can't really go out in public much (remember the meltdown I had when I was supposed to go up to Berea a few weeks ago??)

I'm hoping that when I start classes at UC on Wednesday, some of this will turn around. I'm not used to feeling so negative all the time! I think it's probably due to boredom - I can't seem to really get motivated to do anything that I normally would LOVE to be doing (namely, right now, researching and writing my thesis on a topic I'm super excited about...)

In better news, my mom finally convinced me to organize allll (or... at least most) of my clothes - a majority of my "winter" things are still living in my apartment, which I'll hopefully remember to bring home next time I visit the Cleveland area...

about half of my shoes (too many to fit in one organizer... yikes...)

my tiny closet - organized mostly by color (score one for good ideas)

my new rhinestone sandals... (I mentioned them in my Chicago post)

for some reason, the picture transferred sideways...

Also, my mom and I went today to visit my brother Andrew at Indiana University in Bloomington, IN. It's about a 2.5 hour drive from our house, and it's a really pretty ride through a lot of farms and small towns. We found a new restaurant that none of us had ever been to - it's called Roots, and it is completely vegetarian (or vegan, if you request your meal made that way) and I had some AMAZING polenta with pesto and steamed veggies... I wish I'd thought to take a picture, because it was sooo delicious and colorful.

In chemoland, I've been feeling pretty decent since my Monday treatment - some mild nausea and a few mouth sores, but mostly I've figured out a routine to keep that all under control (unless I do something stupid like forget to take my Kytril - which I did this morning! I'm glad I have my emergency tin of anti-nausea drugs in my purse!) The mouth sores don't suck nearly as much as they did during my first round. I get a little bit of soreness around the bottom and sides of my tongue, but mostly I just get a couple down my throat - which may sound worse, but is actually better since it just feels like having a sore throat.

Finally, I'm really looking forward to helping out with the musical at my little brother's high school (my old school...) They're putting on a production of Blood Brothers, by Willy Russell. Brian will be playing the part of Mr. Lyons - everyone in the Cincinnati area should come out and see him (he's an AMAZING singer!!!). You can contact the Anderson High School Theater Department for tickets (Nov. 19, 20, 21). We'd love to see as many of you there as possible!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps posting this has already made me feel better :-)

Intermission's Over - Time for Act II

2009-09-15T17:06:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys!

Sooooo let's see... Saturday was the Survivor's picnic at the Cincinnati Zoo, courtesy of Children's Hospital. I feel bad because I was feeling a little grumpy all day (I'm not sure why - I also felt like I was on painkillers or something, but definitely haven't taken any in awhile!)

Anyway, we were able to meet up with some of Brian's old friends from the Little Star Foundation trips he'd gone on to Aspen and San Diego. We also ran into Debbie, my nurse, and Sarah, who is the fellow who works with Dr. Adams. She brought her boyfriend with her (who she'd talked about before when she would come to check on me in the hospital) and he was really cute! They made a great couple together, and it was really nice to see her!

We walked around the zoo for a bit - I'd wanted to do more, but I was super tired for some reason - I think it was the anticipation of starting treatment again on Monday. We did get to see some monkeys, some flamingos, the white lions, and a variety of bears. My favorite, however, was the zoo babies - a baby cheetah which was SUPER adorable (and acted just like a regular cat!) and a baby bearcat. Honestly, I had no idea that the bearcat was a real animal - I thought it was just something UC had made up to sound intimidating!

Me & Brian in front of a fountain on the zoo lake

(I cracked a lens on my favorite sunglasses so I had to make do with Brian's old ones - which are a little big for me!)

The zoo always has beautiful landscaping, so my mom likes to take pictures of it for ideas for our gardens... Sometimes she likes to put us in them.

The building in the back is (I think) the Reptile House... it's my mom's favorite building at the zoo...

I started treatments up again yesterday (yay....) and was a little bit surprised to be put in an infusion room as opposed to a chemo room in the Day Hospital. Mostly because there was a tiny, tiny half-bed type thing... not really a recliner, but not really a bed either. More like a combination of the two. I found out that the reason I got put into a room usually used for transfusions (kids only stay for an hour or so) is because there are so many kids who need to be in isolation rooms (the normal chemo rooms with a private bathroom so there's no contact with outside people) that they had to put the "less critical" patients (ie me) into the infusion rooms... which just have a public bathroom in the hall. This public bathroom was a little bit tricky to navigate connected to a giant pole, especially when I was getting so many fluids that I had to USE the bathroom every hour (or more) and parents from isolation kept using the bathroom (even though it was clearly marked "Patients Only") so sometimes I would have to wait for someone to come clean it before I could actually go.

My mom and I were thinking up ways that I could pretend to be sick enough to be ensured a normal room... All of them involved faking the symptoms they always ask if you have (fever, vomiting, diarrhea, cough, sore throat) but that always runs the risk of me seeming TOO sick and not getting my chemo, which would suck and push me back further!

Arielle came to visit, which was super fun - we ended up watching several hours of Wife Swap with my mom - what is it about chemo that makes you become addicted to really, really stupid TV???

I also had a funny experience with "room service" - I had read the menu, and seen that under soups they offered the following: Chicken Noodle, Vegetable, Chicken Broth, Beef Broth, and Vegetarian Chili. So, my mom called down to food services (the phone was too far away from my pole for me to use it without unplugging) and ordered me a bowl of chili. Since vegetarian chili was the only one listed on the soup choices, we didn't feel the need to specify. Unfortunately, when they brought my food, I got TWO bowls of Gold Star chili - no spaghetti or cheese or anything. Just bowls of chili. For those of you not from Cincinnati, Gold Star is a type of Cincinnati-Style chili, which is more like a sauce, and always (ALWAYS) served either on spaghetti or a hot dog (Coney style). This is not a kind of chili you want to eat plain (like regular chili). Needless to say, I ate a few spoonfuls and gave up, sticking with my wheat toast. Oh well... probably chili and nausea don't go too well together...

Me & Arielle stuffed into my tiny chair-bed

This week is UC's open house type thing where students can go and meet professors and such, so I'm excited to go meet some of the new professors I'll have. School starts a week from tomorrow! FINALLY!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps check out the previous post for content updates and NEW PHOTOS! wooo!

there's no place like home... UPDATED!

2009-09-11T17:43:00.005-04:00

Hey Guys,

So my mom and I were in the Windy City this past week (although it was more like the Slightly-Breezy-Very-Foggy City, in my opinion...)

It was great to have so much time away from the house - combined with my trip to Berea/Oberlin, it's the most time away from my house since MAY! Yikes.

Anyway, we did TONS of shopping (fortunately for my dad, we did most of it at discount stores/H&M - the big names we just window shopped). I got some really fantastic pieces at SUPER low prices. I absolutely love love love H&M, and Chicago's Michigan Avenue store was definitely the best I've ever been in - even better than the last time I was in New York! I'm really into the whole 80's revival, and it was definitely in full swing at H&M. I found an amazing super pale denim jacket with puffy sleeves and really nice details on the bottom. I also found the perfect pair of lace up high-heeled oxfords and a variety of brightly colored tights (although I wore the shimmery purple ones to the bar last night and snagged them on a stool and didn't notice til there was already a hole - any advice on fixing that would be so welcome!). We also stopped by Filene's Basement (which I'd been hearing about but never visited). There was a lot of not-so-great stuff there, but a few reallllllly sweet finds for my mom and I. She got a couple of really cute things, and I found a pair of Betsey Johnson massively awesome rhinestoned sandals. Originally $250 and I found them for $60... I almost died.

We did a couple of tours - a bus tour around the city, and a really cool architecture tour on the Chicago River. Unfortunately, I forgot my sunscreen and ended up with a moderately scorched scalp. Bit of warning to all of you readers with cancer: NEVER forget to wear sunscreen on your bald head, even if you don't think you'll need it! It was super foggy when we went on our tour, and my mom & I both managed to get sunburned. A rosy scalp neither feels good nor is an attractive look. I've been moisturizing like crazy to make sure that it doesn't start to peel (which I'm pretty sure would just drive the boys crazy...)

Anyway, we also took a day trip to Oak Park to check out Ernest Hemingway's birthplace, as well as the 35(ish) Frank Lloyd Wright homes in town. This may make me sound like an idiot, but before that trip I'd always thought that Wright had been designing in the 50's - I'd had no idea that it was really the 1890's and early 1900's. That makes him even more impressive. Instead of doing the typical walking tour, my mom and I stumbled upon Rickshaw Rick - which sounds extra-cheesy, but really he was AMAZING! He took us all around Oak Park on an actual rickshaw. He knew so much about everything in Oak Park, and gave my mom and I a great tour. If any of you are planning a trip to Chicago, I definitely recommend a day in Oak Park with Rick.

My Mom & I in the rickshaw before the tour... Lookin' good in our shades

My lovely Mom in front of Ernest Hemingway's birthplace

We stayed in this very European little hotel called the Raffaello - also highly recommended. The beds were some of the most comfortable I've ever slept in, and the rooms were excellent - clean, light, and very pretty. The only thing was that they weren't particularly "service" oriented (no room service that I noticed, not very much concierge service) but I'm cool with that. Plus, we found an authentic Italian cafe (coffee, pastries, bar, lunch service) just down the street that we ate breakfast at every day. Our last day I even managed to remember enough to order in Italian (from the real Italians who work there). The Raffaello is in an amazing location as well - on Delaware, just block off of Michigan, and right by the John Hancock building. Right by all of the best shopping, but far enough off Michigan that it's quiet and peaceful, even in the city. It's also located right next to the Casino Club - an EXTREMELY mysterious and exclusive club for billionaires. No, not millionaires - BILLIONAIRES. Plus, Oprah's main residence is just around the corner. Awesome neighborhood!

Me on a fountain at the Presbyterian Church across the street from the Hancock Building

Me eating lunch & sipping champagne at the American Girl Cafe

*UPDATE!*

I totally forgot to write about the fantastic lunch my mom and I had at the American Girl Cafe in Chicago... It was almost like a tea party - dolls included! We (obviously) hadn't brought any of my American Girl dolls along, so they even let us borrow one (actually... the sort of forced her on us, haha) to have lunch with! My mom and I each had a drink - I can't remember what it was called - that was cranberry and champagne - SO GOOD! For lunch, we got a "welcome" of a warm cinnamon roll, an appetizer of veggies and strawberries with cheese, a main course of cheese & cranberry quiche (great with the champagne!) and a dessert with a piece of cake, a cookie, and a cup of chocolate mousse (OMG sooooo delicious). We got tiny portions of everything, but when it all added up, we were so full by the end! The decor was amazing, too - lots of black and white and pink, with chandeliers decorated with daisies. Definitely not little-girly, but plenty whimsical!

I'm off to bed (again...) but I'll be back soon - tomorrow we're going to the Cincinnati Zoo for a Children's Hospital event. I'm excited to go back to the zoo for the first time in YEARS! I'll hopefully have lots of pictures and stories.

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Back in the 'Nati

2009-09-11T02:13:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

I know it's super late (at least here in the US!) but I wanted to do a quick update to let you all know that I'm back in Cincinnati!

For those of you who didn't know ( I can't remember if I mentioned it in my last entry or not) I've been in Chicago with my mom for the last five days, and before that I was in Berea and Oberlin visiting all of my BW and Oberlin in Italy friends.

Since I'm a patient in the Day Hospital at Cincinnati Children's, the Day Hosp was closed for Labor Day (this past Monday) and since my scans all came back normal (woo!) Dr. Adams decided that it would be cool for me to delay treatments a week (since I always have treatments on Mondays). My mom and I decided to take advantage of this and take a quick trip up to Chicago.

Now, since it's 2:15 am here, and I've had a couple of drinks (thanks to the always wonderful William in celebration of my clean scans), I'm pretty tired and I keep mis-typing. I wanted to let you all know, though, that I'm back in town and back to blogging. I missed you all!

You'll get a more detailed account of my trips in the next post or two. Until then, GOOD NIGHT!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Finally Made It!

2009-09-03T12:37:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

As you all know, I was supposed to go up to Berea to visit my apartment and see all of my friends up at school on Tuesday. However, that morning as I was about to walk out the door, Debbie called and gave me some bad news - my ANC (Absolute Neutrophil Count) was wayyyyy too low - 290! It needs to be at 500 for me to be around a few people, and 1,000 before I can safely be in large groups without having to worry about catching every little bug. I was SO disappointed - especially because she wanted me to stay home until THURSDAY to get more bloodwork done and check all of my counts. Fortunately, though, when I called her back later that day, she told me that I could go in early on Wednesday morning to get my workup - and it was at 560! Wooo! So I took off to Berea around 10am on Wednesday.

I was super excited to stop in Columbus and visit Tyler for the afternoon - we had a FANTASTIC lunch and then Tyler took me on a driving tour of the campus area and the victorian-era part of Columbus - the houses were SO BEAUTIFUL! We also walked around the Short North a little bit since it was the middle of the day on a Wednesday and no one was around (safe for my poor white blood cells...)

I made it up to Berea around 4:15 - I FINALLY got to see Gene and Katie and Emma (and Katie and Emma's new apartment right upstairs from mine!). This morning, I was thrilled to get to go sit in on Opera Workshop (one of the classes I'm supposed to be in) and say 'hi' to Scott Skiba (one of my favorite professors) and see everyone in my class (which was... too fantastic for words...) Tonight we're having a big dinner at Cornerstone (an awesome restaurant/brewery in Berea, right next to the Conservatory), and tomorrow I'm headed to Oberlin to have a quick visit with Matt and a dinner party with the girls I went to Italy with last summer (plus Herbert, our Danish friend)

I'm going to head out (I'm in the Music Library and supposed to be working on my Thesis... whoops...) but I wanted to let you all know what was up!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

SCANS!

2009-08-31T19:00:00.005-04:00

Hey Guys,

I had my first post-starting-chemo scans today! I started at 8:30 this morning (ugh) and finished around 4:30 this afternoon... kind of like having the crappiest job ever.

I got in a little early and was taken back to radiology for all of the pre-PET shenanigans (IV, contrast, sedation so I lay still enough while the contrast settles...)

watching a movie while I wait...

getting sedated...

contrast! (time to lay still...)

into the PET machine...

PET's over... waiting for the CT lady to bring more contrast (this time it's drinkable)

it looks like I'm drinking medicine, but really I'm drinking red contrast mixed with fruit punch (the first of two bottles...)

MORE contrast for the CT (this time it's jungle-themed...)

in Clinic with Debbie (my nurse) and Dr. Adams (my oncologist) - they're SO MUCH FUN!

in a cube for the Pulmonary Function Test (I promise it's not a phone booth...)

Now, the PET and the CT are pretty self explanatory - the PET lights up Lymphoma (and other cancer, but obviously mine is looking for Hodgkin's) and the CT scans bones, soft tissue, and the vascular system - it's kind of like a much more detailed x-ray.

The Pulmonary Function Test, however, is unlike anything I've ever had to do. I sit in that tiny glass box and do all kinds of weird breathing things into a tube while wearing a really attractive blue nose clamp (I know you guys are all wishing that I took a picture with the clamp). I do regular breathing, really deep breaths in and out (out is the worst because I have to keep blowing out for a set amount of time and usually I feel like I'm about to wet my pants towards the end...), panting like a dog... all sorts of weird things. I'm also pretty sure I do it while they pump different air combinations into the glass box, so sometimes it's a little harder to breathe than others. Then, they compare all of them to see how well my lungs are working. I guess it's times like that when being a singer comes in handy (although I've always had issues with my breathing while I sing!)

I hate getting scans done - the worst part is that I'm not allowed to eat until after the CT, which today ended at about noon. Generally, I don't even eat until 11 or so, but that's when I get up at 9 or 10! Getting up at 6 and not being allowed to eat until noon is terrible! I get headaches and get really cranky (just ask my mom...) The good thing is that Children's actually has a fantastic cafeteria, so lunch was totally worth the wait!

Finally after all of my scans were done, I met with Dr. Adams to get the results. I wasn't particularly nervous since I could physically feel that the chemo had been working - I'd had a pretty sizable lump under my collarbone, and it's been gone since the middle of my first cycle. Dr. Adams had fantastic news - all of my scans look normal and my lymph nodes have shrunk down to normal size (2mm or less). Now, this doesn't mean that the cancer is officially "gone" yet, but it's definitely exactly what I want to be hearing at this point! I'm so happy that I can head out to Cleveland tomorrow with such good news!

In other news, I'll be in Columbus/Berea/Oberlin TOMORROW! (Well, maybe not Oberlin tomorrow - but definitely this week) and I can't wait to see EVERYONE!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

paper Gown Book Club #3

2009-08-28T00:30:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

This week, as you may recall, I decided to read an article that was mentioned in last week's book - "Mortality Can Be a Powerful Aphrodisiac," (also published as "Sex and the Sickbed") by Jennifer Glaser for The New York Times. The article ended up being a lot more moving than I had expected - very different from the humor that I've been trying hard to stick to so I don't worry anyone too much. Before I go on, I want to put a little bit of a disclaimer (especially if you haven't read the article yet): This article IS pretty depressing. But, as funny as I try to make things, cancer is kind of depressing sometimes, and everyone isn't as lucky as my family has been. I guess you all probably know that, though.

Back to the article. I thought Jennifer Glaser wrote "Sex and the Sickbed" BEAUTIFULLY. The way she described her relationship with her boyfriend (who remains unnamed for the totality of the essay) is so real and so intense, even though she doesn't go into any gushing romantic detail about him at all. Instead, she gives short glimpses into incredibly personal and meaningful anecdotes that do more to describe a relationship than any outpouring of affections could. She paints a picture that, in some ways, makes me wish I was in a relationship right now - but in the end, after reading her descriptions, makes me also incredibly happy to not be in one. As mostly good as I feel a majority of the time, sexy is usually not what I'm feeling, even at my best. Sometimes I feel pretty glamorous, especially when I have on crazy makeup accompanying my baldness, but also sometimes I feel the complete opposite. It's also kind of hard to feel sexy with a port - if I were in any kind of "romantic" situation (sorry, Mom and Dad... and Grandma...) I can't even imagine what that would do to the mood!

I like how honest she is about keeping sex as a part of their relationship even as her boyfriend was getting sicker - a constant that they could always rely on even as everything else was changing. I like even more how she doesn't, as she says the eulogies did, praise his intellectual and emotional aspects, but instead she praises his physicality - which is what the cancer took from him most of all. It's something people rarely think about.

I'm having trouble writing as much about this essay as I'd like - not because it's emotionally hard, or upsetting me at all - quite the opposite. I've been extremely moved by Ms. Glaser's essay, and I'm not quite able to put into words exactly how I feel - mostly, I think, because it's not really something funny that I'm trying to say. I'm used to turning almost everything I write on here into some kind of humor to keep myself upbeat and to keep all of you guys as unworried as possible. However, this essay was so fantastic in an unhumorous way that I can't really figure out what to say. I guess you can all read on your own and see what I mean.

What do you think?

Next week, I'll be heading back into the "upbeat" territory with Crazy Sexy Cancer Tips by Kris Carr - it's the book that accompanies the 2007 documentary... Definitely check this one out, I've heard some amazing things!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Smooth as a Baby's Bottom

2009-08-26T21:32:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

I haven't posted for a couple of days because I've been feeling kind of crappy - I finished my third round of steroids on Sunday, and the side effects from two weeks of them always kind of start hitting me a couple of days after I'm done taking them. I was a little bit concerned on Monday night - I went out with William and met up with a few people I haven't seen in YEARS, and it was a later night than I've had in awhile (I got home at 1:30 - sad, I know, that now I consider that a late night!). When I got home, I was having all of this weird itching and soreness all around my braline on my back and my shoulders... it was kind of red, but I hoped it would go away when I woke up in the morning. No luck. The next morning it was all rashy and PAINFUL! It looked a little blistery in some places, and my mom and I were worried that I might be having a recurrence of the chicken pox (fantastic) or maybe some shingles (also fantastic) - best case we were figuring it was probably the beginning of some really attractive steroid-induced bacne (goodbye, sundresses...). I was also having all sorts of other weird pains that I hadn't had yet - my veins were sore (which is a really bizarre feeling...) and I was getting shin splints (confusing since I definitely haven't been doing any running lately) so I decided to keep close to home and lay low most of the day. I was getting so frustrated yesterday because I haven't had chemo for a week, but it seems like everything saves itself up and then once the nausea goes away, I get hit with the pains. It could be worse, though...

Fortunately, it was a BEAUTIFUL day outside so I spent most of the day on the screened in porch or laying in the hammock - I took a wonderful nap out under the trees... Also fortunately, when I woke up this morning, my back was looking SO much better and was a lot less sore. I was feeling a lot better in general today - a little bit of a headache, but most of the aching has gone away (with the exception of the mysterious shin splints... maybe I've been running in my sleep)

My mom has been cooking some really great meals the past few nights, which I'm so thankful for because I am hungry CONSTANTLY. Like... you guys have no idea. I've been like a bottomless pit. Last night she made this delicious baked chicken and pasta with pesto and tomatoes, and I ate basically half a chicken and an entire plateful of pasta without blinking an eye. Tonight my dad grilled burgers and my mom made tomato & mozz salad, and corn - healthy food so at least I'm gorging myself with something nutritious instead of the Kraft Spongebob Mac & Cheese I was craving during my first round. I shudder to think of how I'd be feeling if that was still all I wanted to eat...

I have a couple other pieces of news to share with you all. First of all, even though it LOOKED bald, I really haven't lost all of my hair - there was a fine layer of dark baby fuzz that never fell out. It was really soft and made me feel like a baby bird, but it also was STILL GROWING (!!!) so it was getting longer and longer and longer... tonight I finally caved and let my mom take a razor to it. You would not believe how soft my head is now. I feel like I'm wearing a bald cap or something because it's so smooth. Secondly, for those of you who haven't heard, I'll be up in Berea on Sept. 1 (Tuesday) for a few days visiting BW and Oberlin kids... I'll be posting a FB event for a dinner in Berea one night, and most likely be doing something similar for Oberlin another night (Marina & I were talking today about an Italy party?) so I want to see all of you at some point! Third (and last) is something that may sound bad, but really it's not. My treatments are getting delayed by a week because of Labor Day (kind of lame, but it ends up being a good thing!) Since I'm getting treated in the Day Hospital, the clinic is closed on Labor Day, so Dr. Adams suggested that we just push everything back a week since it won't really affect my school schedule or anything important. I was a little concerned about this from a treatment standpoint, but she says that a week isn't going to make any difference, especially at this point in my treatment. Because I have this extra week now, my mom and I are going to take the Megabus (!!!) to Chicago (!!!) for a few days! I haven't been to Chicago since a class trip in high school, so I'm super excited. Plus, I think it'll be really fun to take the Megabus - the trip is only 5 hours, and I've heard the busses are pretty nice. I'll arm myself with a couple of DVDs and some snacks, and I'm pretty sure we'll be golden.

I'm going to head out now and watch some more of Top Chef, but I'll be back tomorrow for a new installation of the Book Club.

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Gettin' Crafty

2009-08-24T09:39:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I've been feeling kind of down & crappy the last week or so, so to cheer myself up I've been reading LOTS of fashion blogs. Ok, maybe not the best way to cheer myself up because now all I'm doing is coveting a bunch of things I can't afford! But, by checking up with Jessica at What I Wore, I've been inspired to jazz up some old stuff in my wardrobe and make it a little more exciting.

Last winter, I did a ton of crocheting - nothing fancy, but I made some pretty awesome scarves for family and friends as Christmas presents (even though I was pretty bad at judging how much yearn I needed and some of them ended up taking FOREVER to finish until I could find another matching skein...) Being in the hospital and being stuck at home a lot has prompted me to take up crocheting again - this time, I might even go as far to get some patten books out of the library and *gasp* attempt a hat or two?!?

I spent a few days working on a scarf in a really beautiful deep blue yarn (at this point, the recipient shall remain nameless because it's a surprise and it's going in the mail today!) and I forgot how quickly it goes once I get into the groove of things. Of course, it was a little stop & go at the beginning - I kept pulling too tightly and started to end up with a trapezoid. Not really a good look for a scarf. The end product turned out much more nicely than I had hoped - I'd wanted to put a picture up, but I packed it up before I remembered to take one!

My mom did take this picture of me making it, though - just to prove that I actually can be crafty!

I also went through my closet a little bit to kind of reorganize and see what I had hidden in the back, and ended up finding a cream-colored Gap cardigan from back in high school that I haven't seen in years. I wore it around to the movies, and decided that with a little love, it could be awesome. So, yesterday Brian and I stopped at Michael's craft store and I picked up some really big rhinestones that I'm in the (very slow and tedious) process of sewing to the cuffs to sparkle it up. Theoretically, I want them to look like big gaudy bracelets... we'll see what happens in reality, but so far, so good...

In other news, Andrew moved back to college yesterday... I've been really sad about everyone going back to school since I'm going to be stuck here, but I've also got some good news in that department! After weeks of waiting, I got word from the French department AND the composition department at UC that I'm going to be approved to take some of the classes I requested! I'm still waiting to hear back from a couple of the professors I emailed, but at this point I'm approved to take French 250 (which is a basic class I need to take just to meet the minor requirement), French Civilization (which is an English-language class about French history until the 17th century - I'm SO excited about this one!) as well as Orchestration I (a music theory class I need for Music History... kind of nervous about this since I have absolutely no knowledge of orchestral instruments... oh, well...) AHHH! I'm so excited to be able to take some classes this fall! I'm still not at the 12-credit full-student load that the insurance company requires, so I might just be taking some random English or History classes that I don't need approval for, but I'm headed in the right direction (finally!)

Also, this was quite a movie-filled weekend! On Saturday, I went with my family to see Inglorious Basterds which was AMAZING. Definitely go see it. It's a little gory (then again, it is Quentin Tarantino, so what do you expect?) but it's also surprisingly hilarious. At first, there was a lot of nervous laughter in the theater (like... "Should I really be laughing at this?") but Tarantino presents everything SO well that there's no question when he's joking and when it should be serious. Go Go Go see it!

Yesterday since my parents and Andrew were moving him back to Bloomington, Brian and I decided to go see District 9. He'd been wanting to see it, and I hadn't heard much about it so we picked up an afternoon showing. It was pretty good - not exactly what I was expecting (I didn't really know what to expect, I guess) but I liked the parallels drawn between the plot in the movie and apartheid in South Africa. I also liked that it took place in Johannesburg, as opposed to in New York or DC or LA - it made it seem a little more "realistic." It was pretty violent (what else would you expect from an alien movie?) but all in all, not so bad...

Finally, I'm going to leave you with a picture of the waterfall in my backyard... Our house backs up to the woods, so we don't really have a backyard, but my parents built a beautiful deck around the trees and put a waterfall in against the back of the house. I LOVE to go sit out there, especially if I'm feeling a little down. It's like being in the middle of the jungle!

Well, I'm off to try and finish up this beading on my sweater... and then hopefully some lunch downtown with Stephanie! I haven't seen her since my internship ended, so I'm really hoping we'll be able to get together today (and maybe have some Indian... YUM!)

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Paper Gown Book Club #2

2009-08-21T23:36:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

So it's a little later than I expected, but I've finished Kairol Rosenthal's Everything Changes and I've got to say that it's DEFINITELY worth it a read, whether you have cancer or not. Actually, I think it's a fantastic resource for friends and family members (especially younger ones) because all of the people she speaks with are so candid about their feelings.

I had originally planned on buying the book, but kind of changed my mind because I was like "Do I really want all of these cancer books sitting around the house once I'm done with treatment?" I ultimately decided that I DON'T want them later on, so I checked Everything Changes out of the library. However, I'm going to head out to the bookstore and buy my own copy because I kept coming across things that I wanted to highlight or notate to look back at later, and obviously you can't do that in a library book.

Kairol's book is fantastic because she interviewed so many different people, but ultimately settled on a few main stories to tell, with her own interspersed throughout. In addition, each chapter is vaguely themed (Insurance, Sex, Peers, Working, College, Alternative Medicine, etc...) but is concluded with a FANTASTIC set of resources related to each theme touched on in the chapter. Through an incredible amount of research, Kairol has provided with advice and contact information for all kinds of support systems from insurance help, financial aid services, support groups for young GLBTs with cancer, resources for siblings and for parenting with cancer - basically any question you might have Kairol has an answer. And, after emailing her, I found out that she is EXTREMELY prompt and enthusiastic about responding to correspondence!

One of the most insightful parts was the section relating to dating. Being single, I've wondered what it will be like dating someone new once I'm done with my treatment - especially if it's someone completely new, who I didn't know before my diagnosis. I know it might sound trivial, but for some reason it really worries me that it would be hard to introduce the topic of cancer to a date. How soon? Is cancer something you bring up on a first date? Kairol addresses this subject so gracefully - and with the help of an expert, Sage Bolte (who she calls the "Dr. Sue of the young adult cancer world"). Bolte says that you should wait until about the fourth date - long enough to know if you want to see the person for an extended period, but soon enough that there's not a real chance of making them feel like you've been withholding something from them. I like this advice. It's straightforward, it makes sense, and it gives me something tangible to think about whenever I decide to start dating.

That's one of the many things that makes Everything Changes an almost perfect resource for young adults with cancer. Kairol puts everything out there exactly how it is. Sure, there's humor (there's humor in everything) but there's no adding humor to sugar-coat what's really happening.

Thanks, Kairol, for taking the initiative and compiling such a comprehensive and ACCESSIBLE resource for all of us. Everything Changes has opened up my eyes to things I hadn't even considered.

I hope you guys can all enjoy this book as much as I did :-)

From now on, I'm going to make sure to do a new Paper Gown Book Club every Thursday - so keep an eye out for it! Next week, I'll be kicking it up a notch with the raciness and reading an article recommended in Everything Changes called "Sex and the Sickbed" by Jennifer Glaser. I've decided to alternate books and articles or short stories because even for a speed-reader like me, a book a week is a little much! (Especially if I actually want to be able to really absorb the information enough to write an entry about it and hopefully be able to comment discuss with you all)

In other news with me, I don't know if the neurontin hasn't had time to take effect yet, or if it's not strong enough, because today I was really disappointed to feel the numbness creeping up a little in my toes again. It's intermittent, and I'm definitely not fending off any impending paralysis, but I hate the "falling asleep" feeling that my toes have been getting all day. Argh.

On the upside, I've gotten approval for three of the classes for the fall - so far, I'm up to 6 credits. Definitely not a full load, but enough that I can start filling out the paperwork and officially get registered! Woohoo!

Ok. I should be getting to bed now (it's after midnight and I haven't been sleeping well) but I'll be back later on, and I can't wait to hear what you guys think about Everything Changes!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

I Am Not Tech Savvy...

2009-08-20T12:41:00.007-04:00

Blog Helper of the Day: Madeline

Hey Guys,

Well, for today's post, I had wanted to create a little photo slideshow of sorts since I've got pretty many pictures to post. However, due to the fact that I am NOT technically literate (and can actually barely figure out how to use most of Blogger's simple tools) I couldn't figure out how to get the damn slideshow to work! Oh, well... you guys all just have to see the pictures lined up as opposed to tucked away in one nice little place.

Which brings me to this first photo - sorry if it grosses anyone out, but I realized that I haven't actually posted what my port looks like under my skin (at least... I don't think I have...) So I decided to take a snapshot of it's prettiest moment thus far - my first post-tape rash! Woohoo! So far, I haven't had any problem with all of the tape being removed while being deaccessed - it's come of pretty smoothly and painlessly, and this is the first time I've developed any kind of reaction. Although - this picture doesn't really do it much justice. It's now Thursday, and it's still red and itchy. I'm glad I have two more weeks before my next treatment & I don't have to put MORE tape back on top of it for awhile...

Anyway, I didn't post yesterday because I'm been feeling hella crappy. Im pretty sure I accidentally drank some bad milk yesterday because I couldn't tell that it tasted wrong (everything is tasting & smelling a little sour, so I didn't think anything of it when the milk I had a breakfast tasted off... bad choice) I was basically in bed or on the couch the whole day, on the edge of puking... Not a pleasant feeling. It wasn't until Andrew casually mentioned that he thought we should probably get new milk because the milk tasted weird that I realized what had been pushing me so close to the edge all day. Well, that and the chemo... But I'm pretty sure the milk contributed a lot. Lesson: always have someone taste the milk first! Or better yet, just don't drink milk when your taste buds are messed up...

I had some pretty awesome caretakers though... One of my FAVORITE things to eat in the whole world is the chunky veggie soup from First Watch. They don't have it all the time, and when they do I could eat bowl after bowl. It's SUPER chunky and has all kinds of great things in it like zucchini and tons of beans and chickpeas... mmmmm...

Since they don't always have it, and I'm trying really hard to eat a balanced diet with all of my restrictions, Brian and my mom decided that they were going to recreate this soup for me. Oh. My. God. The whole house smelled SO GOOD for hours - they made it all with fresh veggies and herbs from my mom's fledgling herb garden in the backyard.

Brian slices & dices

The End Result: can't you smell it from here?

In addition to my human caretakers, I had two very furry helpers (there's a third cat in our house, but she doesn't like me much...)

Winnie spent a ton of time with me out on the screened in porch on Monday afternoon, chilling out and protecting me from whatever kinds of bugs might try to penetrate the screen...

She also gave me a helping hand with my Snowie (best sno cone in the world) and also with perusing Brian's new yearbook... she just tucked herself up there under the covers (probably to make sure that I didn't fall off the couch in my Ativan-induced confusion)

After jealously watching from the ottoman for about a half hour, Madeline (my baby - she's 13) joined us, despite her intense dislike for Winnie (The Intruder) and we happily napped for a couple hours. As much as I fear becoming a Crazy Cat Lady, I like having them around... especially at times like this!

William came by for a little while last night, which was fantastic. I'd really hoped that by the evening I'd be feeling better and had planned on calling to see if he wanted to hit up Dollar Burger after work, but alas. I was thrilled when he called to see if I wanted him to bring over the second half of Angels in America. We're still not all the way through it, but I fall a little more in love with Mary Louise Parker each time I see more of her. It also reminds me how much I love Meryl Streep, and how much I need to go out and rent some of her older movies... (someone remind me to do that next time I'm feeling crappy!)

Finally, I went shopping with my mom at Kenwood Mall last week and stopped to take a look in Arhaus Furniture. I found the chairs below, and although they are WAY out of my price range, and I don't really even have a place to live, I've decided when I DO finally get my own house I am buying ONE chair (or a cheaper version & asking my grandma to recreate the upholstery) and decorating my entire house around it. I can't stop thinking about the vivid colors and patterns - it's even effecting my recent clothing choices. I've been ditching the blacks & greys I've been wearing continuously all summer for the HUGE stash of near-neon I have at the back of my closet & the bottom of my drawers. SO different than the IKEA modern style that's decorating my apartment in Berea. I definitely need something more cheerful.

photo courtesy of Arhaus Furniture

Well, t-t-t-that's all, folks! I'm off to get some bloodwork done to make sure I don't need any GCSF shots (so far, so good - those steroids are good for something, I guess...) and then to pick up a couple books from the library so we can continue with the Paper Gown Book Club. Yay!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Lauren van Winkle

2009-08-18T09:13:00.002-04:00

Hey Guys,

I am not a morning person, but somehow I managed to drag myself out of bed at 6am yesterday. Maybe it was the promise of delicious chemo that got me up & at 'em so easily. ...I'm going to have to say probably not, though.

We actually made it to Children's early yesterday - my appointment was at 7:30, and we were sauntering in around 7:20 - potentially a new record? (My mom and I tend to run late for things...) We made it up to the check-in desk at Day Hospital just behind a woman talking really loudly on her cell phone, with an adorable little boy curled up sleeping in a wheelchair. The woman (it's still unclear if it was his mom or not) just stood there complaining into the phone about how she had to take "The Kid" to the hospital and he was giving her so much trouble today, and he was such a handful... The nurse kind of looked over after she got off the phone and gave the woman a doubtful look, with "He always seems so sweet here, and he's sleeping now!"

I feel really bad for some of the little kids at Children's, especially the ones who are really sick and don't have a support system from their families. Most of the time, you see the little tiny kids in their rooms all hooked up but looking relatively happy because they're surrounded by family and toys and don't really know any different (which is sad enough on its own). It's even worse to see the kids who are all tiny and hooked up but being yelled at by their parents, because they're not even surrounded by the positive energy they need to heal more quickly. I guess that's why Children's has such a great system of social workers checking in all the time (heck, I even have a social worker come in and check on me - but maybe that's because the staff thinks we've lost our minds because we laugh SO much...)

Anyway, I got Kristy yesterday, who is my favorite nurse. She's about 3 years older than I am, and is by FAR the best nurse I've ever had. She never waits to be asked to do something and is always in as soon as my machine starts to beep - sometimes even before I have to press the alert button! Usually, the nurses wait until Dr. Adams comes in before they'll access my port, but Kristy always does it right away so that as soon as the chemo order is filled, all she has to do is hook up the tubes, instead of letting it sit there while she hooks ME up also. Because of all of her awesome prompt nurse-work, I was unhooked and on my way out of Day Hospital by 11:20 - I'm ABSOLUTELY sure that's a record for us.

I was feeling pretty crappy by the time I got home, and Brian was cool enough to run to McDonald's and get me a milkshake and fries (which sounded so good at the time, but now thinking about it is making my stomach turn!) I spent a few hours up in my bed, alternately sleeping and watching a couple hours of THS:Investigates Various Terrible Crimes Against Beautiful People (I believe it was a mish-mash of "Husbands Who Kill" and "Young, Beautiful, and Missing," because I managed to catch a bit of Elizabeth Smart at the end...)

Later on in the day, I was able to keep down some ramen (knock on wood, but I've managed to keep the vomit count down to 0... I'd like it to stay that way, although some days take more willpower than others...)

I spent basically the rest of the night sleeping on the couch or sleeping in my bed with Winnie (who normally hates cuddling, but makes the sacrifice when I'm feeling crappy) so I feel a little like Rip van Winkle - when I woke up this morning, I had absolutely NO concept of what time it was. And it's raining (which I love) but when I got in bed yesterday afternoon, it was really sunny out...

I'm feeling pretty good at the moment (all hopped up on Kytril to stave of the nausea) and even considering meeting a friend for tea before he goes to New Zealand for three weeks - this, however, could take a turn for the worst when I make the first attempt to get downstairs and/or eat anything. The digestive system on chemo is a delicate beast...

Thanks for all of the comments people have been leaving! I love to hear from you!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Cats, Flies, and Cell Phones

2009-08-16T20:33:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

What do these three things have in common?

They're all things that kept me awake last night (not for long though - mix a couple tablets of Benadryl with a little Ativan, and I was drowsy and confused in no time...)

There has been a giant fly buzzing around my room for days now, and Winnie, having never had to fend for herself in the wild, does not have the sufficient skills to hunt and trap such a wily insect. So, I still have a giant fly buzzing above my head (as I type, she's bounding around the room, clumsily trying to catch it - still to no avail)

In other cat-related news (as a side note, I'm pretty sure I'm going to end up a crazy cat lady in the next twenty years...) Lily (my little brother's cat) has discovered the super-secret location of Winnie's food container (not-so-cleverly hidden on top of my dresser, which until last night I had thought was basically inaccessible...) and spent the entire night jumping from the foot of my bed to my dresser, attempting to knock the plastic container of cat food onto the floor so she could devour it. My bed is made of iron. My dresser is pretty far away from it. This created a pretty big noise every time she jumped. Agh.

Finally, I love you all, but I do NOT love when my phone keeps ringing in the middle of the night. Texts are fine, but someone (honestly, I'm not even sure who, because it was someone whose number I don't have in my phone) kept calling me in the middle of the night... Not cool...

Anyway, back to the stuff that you're all here for. I don't think I've written about this before, but my doctors are on the lookout for "foot drop" in my walking, which is basically when you start walking weirdly and not bending your feet the right way - it's a long-term side effect of one of my drugs. They're not expecting me to develop it, but are checking early just in case. So last Monday when I went in, Dr. Adams decided she wanted me to take a spin around the oncology hall, just to check on my walking. She had me walk up and down the hallway (pre-access, fortunately - I'm still not very dextrous with the pole...) and I felt like a really bad contestant on America's Next Top Model. If I still had any delusions of a career as a runway model, they're gone now! For those of you who don't know me, I am not a graceful person (my ballet teacher last semester told me that I "make her laugh")

Tomorrow, I'm back in for my rough chemo - Adriamycin, Bleomycin... and something else. I'm blanking. I should probably keep better track of what I'm getting on a given day... The good news is that my appointment is at 7:30am, so I'll theoretically be home before lunch if the nurses get everything started on time (cross your fingers for me!)

Talk to you all soon :-)

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Goodnight :-)

EXCITEMENT!

2009-08-14T20:57:00.005-04:00

Hey Guys,

Great news! Well... don't get too excited, it's not cancer-related... but it is awesome-related! After months and months and months of procrastination, Tyler and I have FINALLY booked a hotel for New Year's Eve in New York City! We've been talking about it since before I was diagnosed, and once I was diagnosed, we were afraid that we wouldn't be able to make it anymore! However, since I'm supposed to be finishing up my treatments in mid-November (keep your fingers crossed!) I should be feeling good enough to take the trip! We've booked four days, three nights at the Edison Hotel on 47th between 8th & Broadway. It's a wonderfully-reviewed Deco hotel built in 1931. It looks so beautiful! I can't even believe that we found a room for a decent rate for New Year's weekend. I was sure everything would be full or sky-high! Especially right on Times Square...

I'd been feeling pretty crappy all day... I've had basically no appetite, and every time I think of something I want to eat, it's on my list of "bad foods." I almost started crying in Servatii's Bakery this afternoon because all I wanted to eat was a grilled cheese sandwich. Moments like that I feel like a little kid, or like I'm losing my mind. A 22-year-old girl shouldn't be crying about not being allowed to have grilled cheese!

Anyway, booking this hotel has made me feel so much better! Now I have a post-chemo celebration planned! Plus, Tyler will have just turned 21, so New Year's is the perfect time for us to take a trip!

...now we just have to figure out how we're going to get there...

Here's the lobby... Beautiful!

I can't wait!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps apparently there are some problems with posting comments on here... I'm going to try to figure it out ASAP because I love hearing from you guys (I can't even post comments to myself under my Google account name!)

Well, Hello, Ginger Ale & Saltines!

2009-08-14T09:49:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

Man... by this point after my "Day 1" treatment, I'm usually ready to hop out of bed and go about my day. Today, though, I was hit with another wave of nausea, achy joints, and an all-over sense of uneasiness. They weren't wrong about the side effects becoming more and more intense each time (and by they I mean basically everyone I've talked to...) For some reason, I'm also having a lot of trouble typing. Sometimes I'll think one word and when I look at the screen, a completely different word is there. I suppose this is another aspect of the chemo brain? Or maybe my hands are just better writers than my brain is...

In other news, I bought a couple of study guides for the GRE exam the other day. As a voice major, I hadn't ever really thought about taking it, but since my internship, I've totally changed my track. Yes, I still want to be involved in the Arts, but in a much less hands-on way. I spoke with Marcus at the Cincinnati Opera, and I've decided I'm going to apply for an Arts Admin master, which is, obviously, much more academic than a performance degree. I need to score well to make up for my less-than-stellar GPA (not horrible, just not awesome) if I want to get into IU or CCM or anywhere close to Cincinnati so I can stick around for scans, etc. Of course, I would prefer something in New York or the West Coast. That had been my original plan - take a year and teach English in France, then come back and go to school (or find a job) on the West Coast. Probably not going to happen for awhile now...

And now, I leave you with two things: little test of your verbal skills, and a photographic surprise!

ELEGY : PAEAN :

eulogy : praise

euphemism : expression

threnody: song

benediction : blessing

lamentation : joy

Now, Winnie looks adorable (she's trying to steal my necklace...) I, however, have somehow managed to develop a double chin at this angle... Yikes...

First person to send me a right answer to my little verbal puzzle, I'll send you... something...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Paper Gown Book Club #1

2009-08-13T17:09:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I've decided to add a new aspect to my blogging - book club time! I got the idea after reading Kairol Rosenthal's blog Everything Changes and deciding that I really, really wanted to read her book. Unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to run out and get it yet (I'll be heading out to Barnes & Noble in Kenwood tonight!) so I'm going to write about an interesting book my mom passed on to me. Now, for those of you who don't know, my mom has had cancer (more on that in another post...) so she's a fantastic resource for any advice or questions I might have.

As I've written about before, I've had a lot of issues with my diet since starting chemo. I've got tons of dietary restrictions, and those mixed with the nausea and mouth sores makes a skinny girl even skinnier! I know that might sound appealing, but trust me... skin and bones is NOT an attractive look. Anyway, the with all of the diet problems, my mom dug out this book for me: The Cancer Recovery Eating Plan, by Daniel Nixon, MD. Dr. Nixon is a Folk Professor of Experimental Oncology at the Medical University of South Carolina, as well as a consultant with the American Cancer Society.

Now, I was a little skeptical at first - the book looked pretty dry, and it's also fifteen years old (published in 1994). I was also extremely skeptical about the part about "Folk Professor of Experimental Oncology." Usually I shy away from anything that tells me to use alternative-type medicine to cure my cancer. But then again, that advice usually comes from aging hippies in vintage shops, not popular books written by accredited medical professionals.

As I started the book, my skepticism lessened - especially when I came across this one particular quote: "Your goal is to eat adequately without feeding the cancer." That really struck me. Dr. Nixon makes the very important point that so many cancer patients are so absorbed with just trying to keep on weight they don't stop to think about what they're actually putting in their bodies. This hit close to home for me, because I've been struggling with the same thing. Before I was diagnosed, I was used to eating mostly organic, local foods from farmer's markets. After my first chemo, I was so nauseous that the only thing I wanted to eat was Kraft Macaroni (SpongeBob or Pokemon shaped, please!), which, I'm sure only made me feel worse.

Dr. Nixon dedicates chapters to specific types of cancers (such as breast, colon, and others), with dietary suggestions for each type. Unfortunately, he also lists Hodgkin's (along with NHL and Leukemia) as non-diet related cancers, which kind of made the book moot for me, but oh, well - I still learned something! And at the back, he wonderfully puts recipes high in "good fats" but low in "bad fats" - perfect for someone like me, who is trying to put on healthy weight - not just any old kind of fat. In addition, there's a "Get Healthy" menu at the back - helpful for jump starting a new healthy eating lifestyle.

All in all, I enjoyed the book. It was a little dry - I don't always have a lot of patience for mainstream books with too much medical jargon, but this one wasn't as bad as it could have been. I learned a pretty decent amount about how cancer is effected by diet (even though MY cancer, apparently, doesn't have anything to do with diet) and that was good to learn for the future.

Let me know what you guys think! Also - Book Club. Good idea? Bad idea? I feel like I need a little something else to do to fill my time before I (hopefully!) start classes at the end of September.

Next, I'll definitely be reading Kairol's book Everything Changes - click on the link at the beginning if you want to grab a copy and read with me! I'd love to get some discussions going.

I'm also open to suggestions! I'm going to try to lean towards books for YAs with cancer, but I might throw something else in the mix every once in awhile, just for a little surprise :-)

Talk to you soon!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

I'm not on Chemo, I'm the Cutting-Edge of Fashion

2009-08-12T13:30:00.007-04:00

Hey Guys,

So my eyelashes have been thinning a bit, but the fantastic people at Dior have been keeping that pretty much unnoticeable (best mascara EVER). My eyebrows seem basically intact, but just in case they end up falling out, I wanted to point you all in this direction. If/when they come out, I'm on the cutting edge of the makeup trends. The "no-eyebrow" look is apparently all over the runways and print ads - Givenchy, Balenciaga, and Prada all featured eyebrow-less models for the Fall 2009 shows. Woohoo!

Also, I generally love to watch Bravo - Real Housewives, Top Chef, The Fashion Show - I love them all. However, I'm severely disappointed by NYC Prep and Miami Social. And they're on all the time! (sorry, just turned on the TV and Miami Social was on. They're driving me crazy. I should turn the channel...)

In a "side-effects update," so far I've been feeling pretty awesome today (knock on wood). I only had to take one kytril for nausea this morning (more of a precaution than anything else), but I'll probably be able to rely on zofran for the rest of the day. The kytril's really expensive and hard to get from the insurance company, so I need to stock it up for next week's treatment.

Finally, any advice about scarves? I've got a TON of beautiful silk scarves (lots of them hand-dyed) that people have given me or that I bought at Summerfair in anticipation of being bald. Since it's so hot, I haven't been wearing them on my head, but would love some more suggestions. Claire sent me a twitter link to tying headscarves, but I'd also love some advice about tying some of the bigger ones into skirts, shirts, or dresses... share the love, my fashionable friends!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps what do you think of the new purple theme? I just found out the "Purple Ribbon" is for Hodgkin's, so I thought I'd change up the page colors a little bit to represent that :-)

Change is Good

2009-08-11T19:37:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I mentioned before that Sarah Sullivan came to visit me yesterday. Since she works for Children's, she's able to share a lot about what's going on "behind the scenes" - the parts of the hospital that the patients don't see, but that keep everything moving smoothly (well, as smoothly as a hospital can run!)

This morning, Sarah emailed my dad & I with a great article that had been published for Children's staff members. It's all about the changes the hospital is making to help things become more efficient, especially in the area of patient waiting times. My family has been in and out of Children's a lot over the past nine years or so (years of treatment and scans for Brian, and now myself...) and it's really great to be able to see all of the past changes occur, and even better to be able to see what the hospital wants to change in the future. I was so happy to read this article, because a lot of times you wonder if the people who run things even realize what the real problems are for the patients. I know for myself, the waiting time to start chemo is really frustrating - especially on my short treatment days. I've had to wait three hours for someone to write an order so I can get less than two hours of chemo! Now, I know that's still better than being an inpatient, but patients shouldn't have to wait longer than their treatment time to get the treatment started! It was really refreshing to see that Children's recognizes that wait times are something they need to fix, and have actually drawn up a plan to make that change happen! That's one of the many reasons I'm thrilled to have been taken on as a Children's patient!

Also, congrats to Children's for moving up from 5th place to become the 3rd best Children's hospital in the country! Woohoo!

In my world, I'm definitely reaching a point where the chemo's building up enough for the side effects to start getting a little worse... usually after this first treatment, I feel slightly crappy that evening, but fine by the time I wake up in the morning. However, it's 7:50pm and I'm still nauseous! Maybe I should start eating more bland foods... or some ginger ale! I've got some achy joints from the Vincristine, but nothing unmanageable - no trouble with stairs or anything, but I was a little stiff after the "Tour of Clifton" I gave my mom today. We drove around areas of Clifton she'd never really been to - especially the Gaslight District (so pretty!)

On a funny note, I'm definitely bald, but I'd say I've still got about 10% of my hair... and that 10% is growing... and growing... I'm going to have to ask my mom to buzz it off again, or it's going to start looking silly! My little chicken fuzz hairs that are left have gotten long enough now that they're starting to curl...

Finally, one of my friends posted this on Facebook, and I thought it was pretty funny/ridiculous, so I'm posting it here for all of you to enjoy. This guy watched every episode of Friends in one sitting - over 80 hours of TV! He broke the World Record for longest TV watching (or something like that...)

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society is holding a Light the Night walk at Sawyer Point in Downtown Cincinnati on Thursday, September 24. I'd love to be able to get a team of family and friends to walk, so anyone who's in the Cincinnati area (no matter how well we know each other), please feel free to send me a message or give me a call and let me know if you'd like to participate! Find more details HERE... Thank you guys all so much!

Disappointment

2009-08-10T21:25:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I know I just posted like... 45 minutes ago or so, but I just had to get this off my chest. As you all know, one of the things I'm most sad about with this treatment is that I can't return to BW until the spring semester. I just got even more sad when I received Bryan Bowser's email about the part-time job opportunity with Apollo's Fire (a fantastic Cleveland Baroque music group). The internship I had this summer was officially called the "Rehearsal Department Intern," but Stephanie, who I was interning under, is Cincinnati Opera's Production Coordinator. The job with Apollo's Fire is to be their Production Coordinator, and is being offered to Conservatory students in the Cleveland area. I'm so sad that their season starts in October, and I really can't even apply for the job since the earliest I can possibly be back in Cleveland full-time would be the end of November (and that would be pushing it).

Missing out on the opportunity made me feel especially down since I've decided to apply for Arts Administration Master's programs for next year, and I feel like I absolutely need more experience if I want to be accepted into a high-level program. This job (even part-time) would be such a wonderful experience.

Thanks for listening, everyone, and I'll be back soon (though... not in 45 minutes...)

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Another Day, Another Round of Chemo...

2009-08-10T19:50:00.006-04:00

Hey Guys,

Well... I'm almost halfway done... today was, all in all, one of the best treatment days I've had (in no small part to my awesome visitors)

I can't remember if I've mentioned this before, but Children's offers free therapeutic massages to all their patients. I got my first one last week, and now I'm officially on the massage therapist's schedule, which means that every time I come in for a treatment, she's notified, and I get to have a massage! (woohoo!)

As you can see in the picture above, it's not like a regular massage - I lay in my hospital bed (fully clothed) and she works VERY gently so that nothing gets too sore. She asks what I want to have her focus on (usually my neck and shoulders - too much computer time!) and then she always gives me a little bit of a head and ear massage.

After the massage, my nurse came back in to access my port, and I made a terrible mistake. Usually I lay so that my back is to the nurse while she accesses me, but today she stood on the other side so that I was facing her. This was not a good plan. As I've mentioned before, I get numbing cream to put on my port before I get to the hospital so I won't feel it when they access me. Today was no different - except that it was the first time that I actually SAW the needle they use. It looks kind of like a plug - except instead of prongs for the electrical socket, there's a 3/4" long needle in it's place. 3/4" may not sound particularly big, but it is when it's a needle about to be stuck in your side! So, due to this unfortunate turn of events, I tensed up a lot before she put the needle in, and even though the skin was numb, it was the first time it's ever hurt to be accessed. I'm pretty sure that had something to do with me watching.

After this though, everything went really smoothly. I had some fantastic guests! William came around 11am, armed with the perfect selection of DVDs... among them were Angels in America, Arrested Development (one of my favorite TV shows), The Emperor's New Groove (thank you, Disney), and A Mighty Wind... we watched the second part of Angels in America (William commented a couple of nights ago when I told him to bring it "Are you sure you want to watch a miniseries about AIDS while you're getting chemo?" I responded with "Well... at least I don't have AIDS...") and later watched a little bit of A Mighty Wind... just to cheer the place up a little after an hour of depression.

Thanks, William, for being such a fantastic visitor and staying for almost my ENTIRE treatment - and being hilarious company the whole time! We managed to take a few pictures at one point - notice how much more tan he is than I am... (I guess that's what happens when he works at a pool and I work in a tiny office with no windows...)

Also, he was pretty tired all afternoon (apparently last night was a little crazy) and opted to "take a nap" while my mom was taking pictures... complete with a cuddly bear (courtesy of Sarah!)

Sarah Sullivan also came to visit - she works at Children's, and we met her a few years ago when she first started working there. I love seeing and talking to Sarah, especially now, because she's not much older than I am, and had Hodgkin's when she was my age. It's really wonderful to have someone who went through almost the exact same thing so close by to talk with! It's also especially encouraging because she's pregnant and due on October 11 - that really gives me hope that the treatments won't damage my fertility (which is something I was a little worried about before I talked to Sarah). She stopped by for about an hour, and brought me an adorable stuffed bear (which is awesome, since I hadn't been wanting to bring my "special friends" to the hospital for fear of leaving them behind - yes, I have "special friends" at the age of 22...) as well as a stress ball. I'm pretty sure that will come in handy - I get stressed a LOT and I've been having some pain in my right arm that relaxes when I squeeze a fist... the ball was helping me relax it a lot in my bed.

(me & Sarah... she looks a lot better than I do!)

I also have some good (I hope) news in regards to my tremors and tingling! I talked to the OTHER Sarah (my fellow) and she told me that people my age generally feel those side effects worse than others, and wrote me a prescription for something called Neurontin, which is a pill I take three times a day, everyday (boo to more pills) throughout my treatment. It's sort of like a painkiller, but won't make me groggy and I have to take it all the time for it to work. She says it usually works really well (and my mom's friend Sue agrees), so I'm hoping when I come up to Cleveland in a couple of weeks, I won't be so shaky and weird.

Finally, I wanted to thank Claire at A Little Piece of Me for sending me this fantastic sketch - we've been communicating through a blogger network, and exchanging stories - she offered to send me a sketch, and I told her about a joke I have with some of my friends about having the crappiest superpower ever... I think it's pretty funny!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Testing 1-2-3

2009-08-09T17:14:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

This is a quick test - I can't get internet at Children's, so I added the mobile update feature that Blogspot offers. Before I go in for my treatment tomorrow, I want to check to make sure that this actually works!

In other news, I had my pre-chemo bloodwork done today (all normal!) and had to wait FOREVER at Outpatient Anderson (where I get labs done so I don't have to go all the way downtown), which also happens to be the CHMC Urgent Care. Normally, since I get labs done on Sundays, there isn't anyone elso there and I'm in and out right away. Today, however, I was there for almost and hour surrounded by little kids with soccer injuries and serenaded by the always beloved Hannah Montana. I almist went crazy.

Anyway, treatment tomorrow at 7:30am... If you're in Cincinnati, I'll be in until dinner time, so feel free to text and stop by!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

Before I Forget...

2009-08-08T21:11:00.008-04:00

Hey Guys,

I wanted to post this quickly before I forget - I've been starting to get Chemo Brain and I've been forgetting things A LOT (even more than usual - I know that's hard to believe!)... for example, this morning I asked my mom twice within five minutes if she wanted to share some bacon at breakfast...

Anyway, I came across this when I was doing some reading on a Lymphoma information site (if you have any questions I haven't answered in my posts and for some reason you don't want to ask, definitely check out that site... it's got some of the most detailed info I've found on the web! But seriously - you should feel free to ask me ANYTHING)... I've definitely gotten off topic, and I wanted to share a really great e-card site with you all. These cards are hilarious! I love the humor - I saved some of the pictures to my iPhoto, and they totally give me a lift when I'm feeling bad. Check this one out - it's one of my favorites:

That's all for now, but you'll hear from me again soon! Also, a HUGE thanks to Dennis Pyritz from www.beingcancer.net for adding me to his blogroll as a resource for other Hodgkin's patients... I'm so happy to (hopefully) be able to help other people!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

...more insomnia...

2009-08-08T01:23:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

So I've been really partaking in all of my favorite "forbidden" foods this week. One unfortunate side effect of this is that my body isn't used to caffeine anymore, and the cup of kona I had at 5pm is still keeping me buzzed 8.5 hours later. What a bummer.

My grandparents (on my Dad's side) are in from Montpelier (near Toledo) for the weekend, and it's always fun to see them, especially since we don't get to often. My grandma brings delicious treats, and I was soooo excited that she brough my favorite pecan tarts - bite sized pecan pies that are incredibly delicious and addicting.

I started watching Angels in America tonight with William - I'd never seen it before, but it's AMAZING. I love Mary Louise Parker in Weeds, but this is making me love her even more. One question though - what's with her and the drug theme?? We got through the first segment tonight, and (I can't believe I'm saying this but...) I can't wait for my treatment on Monday, because he's going to bring another segment or two with him and I'm itching to see what happens next.

Also, everytime I get in the shower or take my makeup off, I'm expecting my eyebrows and eyelashes to go (so far, so good...). In preparation for my eyelashes falling out, I've been doing a little research at sephora.com to try and find some nice falsies I can use as a replacement. I really like the extreme variety offered by Make Up For Ever... especially the super crazy ones. Let me know what you guys think - if you all like anything in particular, it might help me make a decision when the time comes.

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps maybe I could take some makeup advice from Boy George now that I'm bald...

Home Sweet Home

2009-08-06T14:36:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

I'm back in Cincinnati - a little earlier than planned, but due to Tyler's car troubles and a family emergency with Katie, I ended up not having anything to do last night, so I decided to drive home.

Katie - I want you to know that I'm thinking about your Grandma, and I hope that everything turns out as well as possible! If you ever need to talk or if you have any questions about anything, please feel free to call me! I hope you can make it down to Cincinnati, but definitely stay home if your family needs you!

I had a great time in Berea/Oberlin - the drive up was boring (as usual) but it was fantastic to be back for a few days. I got to see a lot of Madeline, Vanessa, Ben, and Will, as well as a return to Maya (best mexican restaurant EVER - I miss it so much when I'm at home!) I also was able to go and spend some time in Oberlin with Matt & his roommates, which was massive amounts of fun (also as usual)

I was worried on my way up - I was having some issues with the tingling/burning in my legs, which got a little worse (it's mostly gone now, but I'm going to have to talk to my doctor about it when I get back to Children's on Monday) and my hands have been shaking so bad lately that I've been having trouble opening my pill bottles, putting on makeup, typing, dialing the phone, etc... For a few days, it was terrible all day long (Matt kept asking if I was nervous because my hands were visibly shaking so much) but now it's the worst in the morning, and mostly tapers off as the day goes on. I'm hoping they'll be able to give me something to calm that down a little bit, because it's really frustrating, especially with the typing and phone usage. I'm also anticipating a little bit of trouble with piano playing this fall once classes start (still waiting to hear back, though...)

I got really sad last night when I was leaving - it sucks a lot not being able to go back to school for the fall. As much as I know that it's not always fun when I'm in classes, I still really, really want to be going back. It'll be hard once I know that everyone is back for the semester and I'm stuck at home in Cincinnati...

Finally, I was on msn today and was reading Dear Prudence on Slate Magazine and came across this question, which made me really sad... (it's the third question in the article). It made me so thankful for all of the unwavering support I get from my family and all of you guys. Thanks for everything.

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps Thanks to Holly to all of the great advice in comments you've left! I don't know how to reply to comments that people leave, but I wanted to let you know that I'm reading and appreciating them!

pps I'll be back up to Berea the week of August 30, when everyone will be back! There are a bunch of you who weren't in town that I REALLY want to see!

Stars Without Their Makeup

2009-08-02T23:56:00.003-04:00

Hey Guys,

So I've been getting a lot "Wow! You look FANTASTIC!" comments from people when I see them, especially if it's been awhile and they haven't seen me since before I was diagnosed. I think people mostly assume that I'm going to look all pale and sickly (well, I'm always pale...) but I've made a vow that no matter how bad I'm feeling, if I have to go out somewhere, I'm putting on makeup. There is absolutely no way I ever want strangers (or friends, for that matter) to ever think "Wow, that girl looks like she has cancer!" I even put on makeup to go to the hospital to get chemo! Thats really the same reason why I refuse to wear a bandana or a head scarf when I go out - I feel like wearing something like that makes me look more cancery - if I walk around bald, I feel like people are more inclined to think that I'm bald on purpose since I'm not trying to hide it.

Anyway, I'm offering you all a rare treat - a glimpse of me without all of the makeup I wear on a daily basis (much more now than ever before!)

With Makeup (smiling!)

Without Makeup (YIKES!)

You can't see them as well in this picture because of the giant flash, but in recent weeks I've developed some extremely attractive chemo circles under my eyes - I've started to look like the losing end of a fist fight.

I'd like to thank Sephora, Clinique, and Laura Mercier for their part in keeping me lookin' good (as well as significantly shrinking the size of my wallet)

In other news, I've had a couple of weird side effects sneak up on me the past couple of days. I'd been hearing ever since the beginning that dry skin would be a big problem. I'd been feeling pretty triumphant about the fact that I'd somehow escaped this, but starting yesterday, I've been feeling it. The skin on my arms and legs is peeling and tight - I kind of feel like one giant piece of dandruff or something. My mom got me some amazing moisturizing body wash and extra-thick lemon scented balm from Bigelow's, and I've been slathering it on, but it's effects are short-lived. Hopefully drinking massive amounts of water will help.

Also, I've been feeling the nerve effects of the Vincristine (which, annoyingly, are always delayed - I'd rather feel crappy all at one time). My calves are all tingly and burny feeling just under the skin - at first I thought it was from the dry skin, but it's definitely not on the surface, it feels like the nerves are all over-firing. I took one of my oxycondone pills (which are meant specifically for neurological pain), but all it did was make me groggy enough to run into my bedroom wall when I got up to go to the bathroom. Hopefully they'll be less tingly while I'm driving to Cleveland tomorrow, because pain meds + 4 hour drive = disaster.

Finally, enjoy this picture of Winnie I found when I was cleaning out the memory card on my camera. She looks like a little lion.

Lots of Love,

Lauren

on the upside...

2009-07-31T17:33:00.006-04:00

Hey Guys,

I've been thinking the past few days and I've realized that despite all of the really crappy side effects of the chemo, there are actually a few that I've been really enjoying! (I know that probably sounds really weird)

1) hair loss means ALL hair - not just on your head... this means that I haven't had to shave my legs or under my arms in a few weeks - which is great for the summer

2) hair loss also means shorter showers - a time AND money saver... especially when I'm used to having too much hair, which clogged the shower drains and took forever to wash & dry

3) freckles! I've always wanted freckles, and I've noticed in the past few days that the chemo has been giving me tiny little freckles on my cheeks - apparently they're only temporary, but I'm enjoying them while they last!

4) the BEAUTIFUL skin that is the result of a combo of chemo drugs & bactrum (the antibiotic I have to take twice a day on Mon, Tues, Wed to prevent a chemo-specific strain of pneumonia). My skin is fantastic - clear, smooth, and glowing like I've gotten a facial (but not)

5) people in public assume that because I'm bald, I'm either on chemo or really edgy (since I still have a tiny bit of hair as well as eyebrows and eyelashes), so they're always clearing the way for me to walk through or holding doors... nobody wants to mess with a bald girl

6) I don't have to worry about my hair messing up in the rain... I can just wipe of my head and be done with it! (I still have to worry about my makeup running, though...)

...That's my list for now. I'm not sure I'll come up with much more, but I'm glad there are at least a few good things coming out of this!

Also, I have a funny story to share...

Today I was at IKEA with my family, looking for a futon for Andrew's dorm. So far, I haven't had any issues with strangers commenting at my bald head, and few instances of anyone staring (even little kids). However, today there was a little girl that made me laugh so hard I started crying... I was walking through the store and passed a tiny girl and her bald dad... She was maybe two, three at the oldest. She starts pointing and yelling "That girl has no hair!" I smiled and waved at her, and her dad looked mortified - he picked her up, and she kept yelling - even AFTER he put a pacifier in her mouth and tried to take her around the corner. We ran into them later, and he looked so embarrassed, but I don't particularly care - little kids are basically uncontrollable with what they say! The fact that she was so insistent about it made me laugh so hard - I can imagine that I was probably like that as a

little kid. My mom says I would never stop talking.

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps here are some pictures of me decked out in a couple of wigs from the opera... Thanks to James Geier for letting me try them on!

Me as Susanna from the Marriage of Figaro

Me as Carmen from... well... Carmen - I look good as a gypsy

who knew?

2009-07-30T17:52:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

So today I was browsing CNN and MSN as I usually do when I'm bored (which is often) and I came across this article...

I had no idea that there were so many hilarious blogs out there documenting twentysomethings with cancer. I was THRILLED to come across it, thrilled that there were links to the blogs, and even more thrilled that there's an entire social networking site for people in their twenties who have/have had cancer... it's called planetcancer.org, and I just joined, so I'm not entirely sure what it's about - I need to do some exploring.

I've been reading through some of the other blogs, and it's really cool (kind of crappy, but still cool) to see similar experiences with the nausea, the drugs, etc... they also make me realize how "lucky" I am to hang Hodgkin's instead of something else.

In other news, I've discovered that little girls and really cute guys are fascinated by my bald head. Little girls (in the 3-7 year old range) love to stare, but not in a mean way... it's like they're trying to figure out what's going on... like... "ok... that person is wearing a dress, makeup, and heels... but they have no hair..." I've started waving and smiling, which usually gets a big grin and a wave in response, sometimes with an apologetic look from the mom. I don't mind - I kind of like being bald (it's a lot cooler in the heat and humidity of southern Ohio), and I think little girls should know it's ok to look different! I love standing out - first the bright red hair, now no hair at all. And the cute guys - I have absolutely no problem with them staring. I keep getting hit on (not creepily) by really attractive guys. Why did I never have this problem when I had hair?

Now that I'm done working, I think I'm going to start writing on here more. Lots is going on!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

3 am?!?

2009-07-29T02:58:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

Apparently I have insomnia... it's 3am and the only thing on tv is infomercials and Whose Wedding Is It Anyway? on the Style Channel...

My summer officially began today - my internship is over (which I'm pretty sad about), and now I have almost two months to relax before classes (hopefully) start at UC on September 23rd. I've sent out emails to several professors about taking their classes in the fall, and now I'm just crossing my fingers that everything gets approved and works out the way I'm hoping it will!

This past week was pretty rough - definitely the worst one so far. I had a lot of nausea and joint pain, and I was exhausted most of the time, but I'm hoping that the next one won't be as bad since I'll be able to sleep a lot more and not be working. Also, with the new nausea medicine they gave me all figured out, I'm looking forward to being able to take it before I start feeling sick instead of after. I still don't fell 100% back to normal, but definitely much, much better than I was at this time last week. I actually had to go home early from work one day, which was really disappointing since it was the last week and there was a lot going on.

In better news, the prescription my doctor wrote for the hot flashes FINALLY kicked in, so I'm not sweating profusely and turning bright red every hour, which is awesome... hot flashes really aren't that attractive...

Molly and Dan got married this weekend - the wedding was so beautiful! They got married at Lake Lyndsay in Hamilton, which is about 45 minutes west of my house here in Cincinnati. The ceremony was supposed to be outside, but it rained all day so it was moved into the hall where the reception was being held. Despite the move, everything went really smoothly and the ceremony ended up being perfect and wonderful! I still can't believe that Molly's married! We had a small fiasco at our table when *someone* (me) knocked the cake over while cutting it... fortunately, each table had small individual cakes as opposed to one big fancy cake for the whole reception, so there wasn't too much damage, and not too many people noticed (of course the bald girl has to be the one to cause a scene!)

I should probably get going - now it's 3:17 and my mom just came in telling me that it's after 3am and my light is keeping her awake...

Also, I wanted to remind all you Clevelanders that I'll be in town Monday-Thursday/Friday, so let me know if you're available - I'd love to see all of you! Anyone in Columbus, I'll be driving through late morning on Monday and either Thursday night or Friday morning...

See you soon!

Lots of love,

Lauren

ps Sydney posted this on her facebook today, and I loved it so much I feel the need to pass it along to all of you...

A Beer With Obama

Pills Galore + a third of the way done (sort of...)

2009-07-21T17:59:00.006-04:00

Hey Guys,

So the other day I've decided to take count of all my pills... there are sooooo many - I feel like an old person! I have one of those pill organizers that has all of the days of the week, with slots for AM and PM. So far, in the mornings I take between 10 and 15 pills (depending on what day it is) and about the same in the evening. It seems like every time I go into the hospital, I have a new prescription for some new side effect that has developed since the last time I was in.

So far, the worst side effects have been the nausea (ew) - with the first treatment of each cycle, it's not so bad (usually just a tiny bit that evening) but so far with the second treatment, it's been pretty bad. I had my last treatment on Monday, and I'm still having a lot of nausea. I have about four different prescriptions to help the nausea - each one is a little bit stronger, and some of them make me pretty confused & loopy (one I haven't even taken yet because it's supposed to be pretty potent), but between the combination of them, I've been able to eat pretty well and keep up my weight.

The other side effect that has been KILLING me is the hot flashes! When I had my first treatment, I got a shot called Lupron, which is supposed to stop my period for three months. What they didn't tell me was that it's basically putting me through menopause. I've been getting the most horrendous hot flashes that make me turn so red that it looks like I've got a really awful sunburn - so much so that Stephanie told me it looked like I'd been out in the sun a lot! I'm on a new prescription right now to help with those, so hopefully in a few days that will take effect and I can stop sitting around with a cold washcloth on my head!

Also, since my hair has mostly fallen out, I've got a new way of styling it - with a lint remover! It feels so ridiculous, but it's the only way I can keep all of the tiny little hairs from falling out and getting stuck on/in my clothes and itching a whole lot.

Today I also got some good news - I met with the Undergrad Dean at CCM about taking my fall semester here in Cincinnati. So far, so good - I just need to email all of the individual professors for each class to make sure that they're willing to take a "non-matriculated student," and I'll be all on course for making sure I can graduate "on time"(ish)

So far, that's all for now - Molly's wedding is on Saturday, so I'll have plenty to fill you in about & lots of pictures to post soon!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

No More Hair!

2009-07-17T15:37:00.006-04:00

Hey Guys,

For those of you who haven't heard yet, I am now officially bald! (well, except for a few stragglers that insist on hanging on & giving me a nice Alfalfa look when the light hits my head right)

(Tyler & I on our way to Ainadamar/Prom)

The Big Event happened all at once - unfortunately while poor Tyler was visiting. Last week, it had started thinning so I put off washing it until Thursday night's Ainadamar After-Party (I wanted to make sure I had a little hair to go with my awesome dress)... The next morning when I got in the shower, it all came out AT ONE TIME!!! For about 10 minutes I had a great "Little Old Man" look - about 20 pieces of inch-long hair scattered across my scalp. Needless to say, my mom was pretty shocked when I called her up to see it. Fortunately, she has the clippers and got right to buzzing the rest of it down to the scalp.

I was afraid that I'd be really traumatized when it happened, and I have to admit, there were a few tears - but all in all, I'm not hating the look. The worst part about being bald is that my head is ALWAYS cold! I haven't been wearing my wig because it's so hot outside, but it's freezing in my office! I've been wearing scarves occasionally, but they're kind of a pain sometimes (especially when I'm running around the building constantly). So far, I've gotten really good reactions about the new 'do... People (especially guys) seem to be fascinated with the fact that I don't have hair AND I'm not covering it up - the guys at the Opera (gay and straight) love coming up and touching my head (which I find hilarious and extremely unexpected)... It's also cool to be able to play with makeup and jewelry in a way that I wasn't able to when I had tons of hair... So far, the only person who seems to take any issue with my baldness is one of the Supernumerary Kids in Carmen - she keeps giving me weird looks, and I'm pretty sure she doesn't like my haircut...

On a different note, I started my second round of chemo on Monday (only 5.5 more to go!) and it went pretty much as smoothly as the first one. Well, after it FINALLY got started... When I got in on Monday morning, there was a HUGE backup in the Day Hospital due to a bunch of unexpected emergency kids, and I didn't end up getting started for about 2 hours after my appointment was supposed to start.

(Me & Tom)

After the chemo finally got started, though, everything was great. I was really happy to have a visit from Tom Jaworek and his mom (who is a good friend of my mom) - he's a couple years older than I am and is being treated at Children's right now also, so it was good to have him come up and say hi - we've never been in at the same time before... Also Molly and Dan stopped by with some games (that ended up not getting played), and it was fantastic to have Molly visit! She actually spent the entire visit in my hospital bed with me, which was awesome. Melissa came later on in the day, which was great - especially for my mom, who needed a break from the hospital room and was able to take some time to run down to the cafeteria and grab some food.

(Me & Molly!)

On the topic of food, Children's Hospital is great because they have "room service" that the patients (generally kids) can call and order from - it's a HUGE menu, with all kinds of kid-friendly foods that take me back to my childhood... Unfortunately, since it is a CHILDREN'S hospital, when you order off the "room service," everything comes in kid's portions... which gets EXTREMELY frustrating when you're 22 and have an appetite much bigger than the average patient. First of all, when I call, they always ask me for my child's information... and then expect me to order food for a kid... I generally forget that there will be a child's portion, and end up getting something like 3 fishsticks or 4 raviolis... not enough for a meal! The good thing, though, is that the cafeteria downstairs is FANTASTIC (although a little expensive), but we can also bring our own snacks.

...And even some more about food...

Originally, when I had my first treatment, I was given a short list of foods to avoid during the week that I was on oral chemo. The list consisted of bananas, citrus fruit, cheese, dark beer, and wine... all of which I was totally okay to stay away from - I hate bananas, I had mouth sores so citrus hurt, and I generally don't drink tons of alcohol, so that was cool to avoid. Unfortunately, because of the mouth sores, I lost my appetite and lost almost 10lbs in one week (don't worry, I've since gained it back)... Because of the weight loss, when I came back in for my treatment on Monday, they had a dietician come in to give me some options for healthy, high calorie foods (I was happy about this because I'd been eating a lot of high-calorie junk food, which was also making me sick since I was used to a healthy diet...) When she came, she also brought with her a list of foods that caused interactions with the oral drug I'm on. The list she had was MUCH longer than the list I had originally received, and includes things that are much harder to avoid. No foods that have been fermented or aged in any way (no alcohol, cheese, yogurt, soy sauce, ripe fruit, milk close to its expiration date, sausage, pepperoni, salami) and nothing that's been processed (lunch meat, meat treated with tenderizers, gravy, meat stock/broth, etc.) as well as a variety of things such as raspberries, avocados, chocolate, and caffeine (all of which I'm very disappointed about). Plus, I had to avoid all of those foods two weeks after I finished the drug - basically 3 out of 4 weeks of each cycle. We were immediately worried because I've been eating LOTS of those things and we were afraid that they had messed with my chemo.

Fortunately (sort of), we found out that while they won't mess with the chemo, they will cause a variety of other side effects that I'd been experiencing, but had no idea why - high blood pressure and plus, tingling in my extremities - all things that are kind of worrisome. So now I'm on a pretty careful diet of basically fresh veggies and chicken, with some extra stuff thrown in every once in awhile. I'm happy that I can still eat ice cream, because I'm worried that I'm going to lose more weight while I'm basically on this low-calorie diet for the next six months or so. The dietician gave me a bunch of high-calorie snacks and shakes I can make, which all sound pretty delicious (lots involving peanut butter, milk, and ice cream - I can't complain about that!)

Finally, I want to thank the Ross family for the BEAUTIFUL bouquet of flowers I came home to on Monday evening - they still look amazing, and my room smells fantastic... the smell and the flowers are wonderful to wake up to every morning! Thank you so much!

Also, I want to send good vibes out to Tom and the rest of the Jaworek family - Tom had his big surgery Wednesday, and Jacqueline called to say he was doing well, but I'm thinking of all of you and looking forward to seeing you guys soon!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps - for all of you up in the Cleveland/Berea area, I'll be up at T in the P for a week or so starting August 2 or 3... give me a call/send me a message so we can get together!

At the Opera...

2009-07-02T13:17:00.004-04:00

Hey Guys,

Today I decided I'm going to do an entry about my summer job! I keep getting lots of questions from all you guys who are out of Cincinnati wanting to know how it's going, what I do, etc...

My official "title" is the Rehearsal Department Intern, which is an internship in the Production Department.

As the Rehearsal Department Intern, mostly I deal with scheduling - I work with Stephanie (who is the Production Coordinator) to obtain, write, publish, and distribute the schedules for any events, meetings, rehearsals, etc. that occur throughout the season. Usually what happens is that the Stage Manager of a particular production will bring the calls for the next day to Stephanie and she will put them into the schedule format. After this (as long as there are no last minute changes!) I take the draft of the schedule to Glenn (the Director of Production) and Marcus (the Director of Artistic Operations) to have it approved. Glenn looks for things like crew hours, space issues, and "production" based problems, and Marcus checks the artists' hours to make sure that no one is rehearsing more than their contract allows.

After Glenn and Marcus approve the schedule, I get to make enough copies of the schedule for everyone in the company - from the business side to the artistic side to the production side to the artists themselves, almost everyone who works for the opera gets a copy of the schedule in some form, and I get to pass out alllllllll of the hard copies.

For the rest of the day, I sit at a vanity (seriously, it's a counter in a dressing room with a mirror surrounded by lights...) in an "office" that I share with Stephanie (my boss)... we answer phones, answer questions about the schedule (and all sorts of random things) from artists, etc. ...

During performances, mostly I sit in my office, but people are always coming to visit - some of our chorus friends, Jared (the Associate Artistic Administrator) and his assistant, The Other Lauren... All kinds of fun people - we always have people coming and going, which makes things pretty interesting once we've gotten the schedule out for the day...

I've only got a few weeks left here, but so far it's been one of the best experiences I've ever had. A couple of summers ago, I sang with the opera chorus, and I had no idea how much work went into the rehearsals, etc.... Now I hope that when I was in the chorus that I was kind and courteous to all of the staff members! yikes!

On another note, I'm totally going to plug AINADAMAR (click on the link for the Cincinnati Opera's website & more info) for all you people who are here in Cincinnati - it's a FANTASTIC modern opera about the life of Spanish playwright Federico Garcia Lorca, Margaret Xirgu, and a few other key players... It's in Spanish and only 90 minutes long, plus the music is BEAUTIFUL - there's a guitar and a flamenco singer. It's completely different than any other opera I've ever seen before. If you've never seen opera, or if you've seen opera but not enjoyed the length/plot/music, AINADAMAR is the perfect opera to come see... 7/9 and 7/11 at 7:30 with a HUGE dance party in the ballroom after the 7/9 performance... send me a message or give me a call if you want tickets at half price!

Also my hair is coming out for real now... every morning for the past couple of days, I've been waking up with a liberal sprinkling of hair all over my pillow - I'm afraid to wash it because I'm worried it's all going to come out at once! My wig is getting it's last styling this Thursday, so I'm hoping a reasonable amount of my hair will stay in until then so I'm not walking around with what my mom and brother call "leopard hair"

Finally, I wanted to thank everyone who has sent me cards/gifts/etc in the mail... I have a whole shelf in my room now with beautiful (and some hilarious) cards that people have sent me... Thank you guys all so much for your support! I really appreciate it A LOT!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Hair, Hair Everywhere

2009-06-29T10:23:00.010-04:00

Hey Guys!

Two big things... I got my wig, and I decided to cut all of my hair off...

I went to Allusions on Friday and picked up the wig that I had ordered two weeks ago - it was supposed to look pretty much like my hair - red and curly, with a little bit of brown at the roots.

When I got there, the hairdresser (wig dresser?) piled all of my hair under a wigcap with a LOVELY chipstrap underneath :

As much as I loved this look, I REALLY wanted to try on the wig.

It was so weird seeing it being carried around and laying on a table - it kind of looked like a little animal.

Anyway, the wig was so soft! It feels just like hair (probably because it's made out of human hair) and the scalp is a little latexy feeling so it was pretty much like skin.

When she put the wig on, I could believe it! It was damp when I tried it on, and at the time it looked just like my hair (when it was wet) - it fit perfectly as well... It was a little puffy on top because it couldn't sit right against my scalp (because I'm not bald yet), but otherwise it didn't even look like a wig!

The wig dresser did a little bit of trimming so the ends would be even, but I decided that I wanted it to be a little bit longer than it has been recently (more like my hair always has been), and that I'll probably have it cut shorter once my hair starts to grow back.

We were really happy with it, and all was well until we got home and it dried completely. I was at work, but my mom was keeping an eye on it and noticed that when it was dry, it was a little off.

We had agreed that they would do a pretty bright red (like my hair normally is) for the all over color and a little bit of brownish (my natural color) for a little bit of root... It had looked like that in the salon, but when it was dry, my mom noticed that they had confused the colors - the base was brown and the roots were red. Also, it had been wavy when it was damp - much like my hair is. I'd assumed that as it dried, it was going to curl up (like my hair does). However, that wasn't the case - it stayed wavy.

I called the salon back and they told me they'd do what they could to fix it - I have another appointment on Thursday so they can hopefully re-color and curl it... More on that when it happens!

Saturday was a big day as well! I had decided that once I had my wig, I was going to cut my hair short so that when it started falling out for real (it started falling out a little bit a few days ago, but has kind of stopped for the moment) it would be less traumatizing and messy. Instead of going and paying for a haircut, I decided that I'd have my mom give me a buzz haircut.

I called a couple of my friends who live closeby - Molly, who I've been friends with since we were 1; James, who I've been friends with since high school; and James' mom, who is hilarious and friends with my mom...

My mom had wanted to make mimosas, (since it was Saturday morning) but we decided against that since I had to work that afternoon AND I wasn't sure if alcohol and haircuts should mix...

And now... here is the ridiculous mini-slideshow of photos that my dad and my brother took during the process (most of them are self explanatory)

TA DA!

Thanks so much to Molly & my mom for giving me what turned out to be a really fantastic haircut...

although... now that it's all cut off, it's stopped falling out! i can't imagine it's going to stay in much longer, but we'll see...

and so it begins...

2009-06-23T22:33:00.003-04:00

Well guys,

it looks like this treatment ended up being a little worse than the previous one - I was especially disappointed since yesterday was my birthday - I had hoped that since it was supposed to be a two-hour appointment that I'd be able to maybe go to dinner with my family and then meet up with some friends this evening.

It all started out pretty well - I didn't have my usual doctor because she wasn't working until later (she eventually came in to say hi, but more about that later). Instead another guy, Dr Weiss, came in to do a quick exam and sign off on all of my drugs. He was really cool, and talked to us about the bands he's in and was happy to talk to Andrew about South Jordan's recent managerial successes.

My nurse this week was a little slower, which was annoying because it took MUCH longer to get started than it should have - but from then on, we tried to make sure to keep on top of things so that as soon as the chemo was started we could move through quickly.

and some exciting news! Dr. Adams had told me several times NOT to keep touching the lump in my neck because sometimes lumps take a long time to shrink and that continually feeling it would just be aggravating and nerve-wracking. However, being as impatient as I am, I felt it a couple of times throughout the week and each time I thought it might be a little smaller (but was also figuring I was probably just imagining it). BUT! When Dr. Adams popped in later on her rotation to say hi, she did a quick feel of all of my lymph-node areas (especially my neck) and did a little cheer! So, even though I'm pretty sure that the enlarged node in my neck isn't gone, it's definitely SIGNIFICANTLY smaller! I'm really happy to not be able to feel the Hodgkin's anymore - that was really bizarre, knowing it was right there under my fingers. I'm also extremely happy to know that the chemo's already taking effect! I was sure that I'd have to wait several weeks to see any real/physical proof that the treatment was working.

On the other side though, I think today is the day that my hair started to fall out a little. Not in huge clumps, but I had noticed that individual hairs had been falling more frequently this morning, and then when I was in Target, I reached up to grab what I thought was a stray piece off the back of my neck only to find that it was a small handful - and another small handful a couple minutes after that. So far, it's only been that tiny bit - but even that I wasn't expecting to happen so soon! My mom thinks it's probably because of the week of oral chemo I was on - even though I've only been in the hospital twice for treatments, I'd basically had 8 days of chemo in a row. I'm crossing my fingers that it only falls out slowly until I can pick up my "cranial prosthesis" (wig) on Friday morning!

Yesterday and today have been really weird days. Mostly, I've been feeling ok - some sporadic nausea that I've been taking some really great drugs for, so that hasn't been too bothersome. By far the weirdest thing has been just a sense of being unsettled - I had wanted to go into work today, but between my mom and Stephanie, I was convinced that staying home was a better idea. My mom also persuaded me that going out with my Cinci friends for my birthday should probably wait until Wednesday night. It's frustrating because I only feel a little sick, but I have a whole feeling like something just isn't right. I can't wait til the end of the week so hopefully I'll start feeling like normal again.

Other than the slight nausea and a general feeling of strangeness, I have gotten the most bizarre taste in my mouth. I'm really hoping this goes away soon! It makes everything taste slightly sour, even when I'm just sitting here typing. My mom was prepared for this and (at the recommendation of several friends) has stocked up on peppermint altoids - good for nausea AND this weird taste. I made sure to rinse my mouth out before dinner - that helped things taste basically normal, which was GREAT because my mom made the most delicious chicken and my dad and brothers helped with what ended up looking like Thanksgiving. It was the first entire meal I've actually had the appetite to eat in almost a week - and much more nutritious than the boxes and boxes of cartoon Kraft Mac&Cheese that I've been craving (for some strange reason)

As for my birthday yesterday, despite being a little sick and tired for most of the day, it was really nice to be able to have a day and lay around with my family (and cats!) My dad went out and got some Graeter's ice cream because I was nervous about mixing nausea and cake, and I opened some presents - one thing I love about my family is that they're always so great about knowing the right things to pick! Brian's gift was especially thoughtful - he took a professional-looking "portrait" of Winnie (the kitten) to go with a similar picture of my older cat (Madeline) that I have in my apartment at school. He even picked out a frame that matched and had it setup for me when I woke up from a nap! As an extra surprise, my Grandma sent me a quilt she made - it's so beautiful! She had mentioned something about making one a few weeks ago, but I had no idea it was going to be finished so quickly! She used really colorful patches backed with fleece... it's SO WARM and adorable! (at some point I will post a picture of me under the quilt - probably with a cat)

Finally,

I want to thank EVERYONE who called and sent me messages yesterday - my voicemail isn't working (I need to reset it), but I do have a list in my received calls box to call back! So thank you all very much and don't worry - You'll be hearing back from me soon!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

PAPER GOWN SUPERMODEL

Chunky Tomato & Pea Sauce

Black Bean & Veggie Sautee for One

Sorry for the Break!

New Hair!

Curlyish...

Uh Oh...

I Think I Scare the Freshmen...

More Hair, More Hair!

Cropped Hair Inspiration

Whoops...

First Day of School

Merry Belated Christmas!

More Hair?

New York Photos

Happy New Year!

Six Weeks Later...

No More Port!

Good News!

I Forgot to Post This Earlier...

Hair Today, More Tomorrow

Back to Children's

Getting Back to Normal

FINALLY DONE!

SO CLOSE!

Tired Tired Tired

Still Sick...

Almost Finished!

Halloween pt. 2

Halloween pt. 1

Cupcake Masters

Flu Flu Flu

Insomnia (again.... again....)

The Flu Has Hit Our House... *UPDATED!*

Yes.

I Can't Think of a Good Title...

Vaccinations (and rants about not wearing masks)

Sick Sick Sick

More Weekend Fun!

Tired of Being Bald

1 more down, 3 to go...

Guess Who's Back

Last-Minute Echo/PFT

This Weekend!

Professors are Cool

Back to School (Again...)

Weekend Fun!

Already Out...

Surrounded by Britten

Back to School - Finally...

Bad Moods

Intermission's Over - Time for Act II

there's no place like home... *UPDATED!*

Back in the 'Nati

Finally Made It!

SCANS!

paper Gown Book Club #3

Smooth as a Baby's Bottom

Gettin' Crafty

Paper Gown Book Club #2

I Am Not Tech Savvy...

Lauren van Winkle

Cats, Flies, and Cell Phones

EXCITEMENT!

Well, Hello, Ginger Ale & Saltines!

Paper Gown Book Club #1

I'm not on Chemo, I'm the Cutting-Edge of Fashion

Change is Good

Disappointment

Another Day, Another Round of Chemo...

Testing 1-2-3

Before I Forget...

...more insomnia...

Home Sweet Home

Stars Without Their Makeup

on the upside...

who knew?

3 am?!?

Pills Galore + a third of the way done (sort of...)

No More Hair!

The Flu Has Hit Our House... UPDATED!

there's no place like home... UPDATED!