Tuesday.  Cathy had her 2nd chemotherapy treatment.  This one was much smoother.  Less chaos in the waiting room and our fabulous nurse had all the answers to our questions.  Fortunately, C has been able to tolerate the medicine without any vomiting.  This is great, because she really HATES to vomit (don’t we all).  Next week, she has a ‘bye’ week from the chemo.

She still has radiation everyday, even on chemo days.  We’ve really gotten attached to some of our colleague patients who are in the treatment waiting area at the same time we are.  Today, one of the men finished his treatment.  There is a tradition in the radiation ward—the person who finishes treatment  goes to the end of the hallway and rings this giant bell and everyone in the waiting areas comes out and cheers.  Today, it really choked me up.  It’s a really simple but powerful signal.

Cathy is beginning to lose her sense of taste and is finding that sweet or bland things are what she wants to eat.  Does anyone have any good recipes out there?

Today is the perfect day for relaxing.  It’s coolish, rainy and very autumnal.  Leaves are falling and the neighborhood is quiet.  This is good and we are enjoying our ‘down’ time to the max.  No treatments and no trips to Johns Hopkins.  Cathy has lit a fire and is listening to the crackling wood.  Time to get some wood delivered to the house so that we can enjoy this aura for the duration of the winter.

Cathy needed the rest today.  In fact, she got up at 11 AM and took a nap in the afternoon.  The radiation nurse said that her energy would dip this weekend as the chemotherapy medicines peak and the steroids’ effects subside.  And, though, this isn’t always the Cathy that normally appears on a weekend, I view it as a good sign.  She’s listening to her body.  It also means that the treatments are working and doing what they are intended to do.

During treatments, I visualize that the cancer cells are green and that they shrivel up or explode when the treatments happen.  We cheer after the radiation about zapping some more little green cells and thinking of them dying.