Brief update

It's Tuesday evening, and Val has had two days of less pain than she had on Sunday. We don't understand why, and we're not wondering, just accepting. She's not leaping tall buildings, but she did drive up to Deluca's for supper ingredients and prepped the veg for our usual pasta dish. Wonderful.

It's a bit busy around here: Chester had his annual shots yesterday. Holly may have a minor bladder irritation. I had a very short stomach upset Monday morning that was resolved by class time (1pm). I'm having my teeth cleaned Wednesday afternoon. Thursday Linda is coming to clean the house (blessings on her!). The weekend will see us (me?) tidy the basement in advance of the new furnace being installed on Wednesday (remember that service call a while back? yup - the heat exchanger has cracks in it. time to bring in a new one. sigh). Monday I take the car in for winter tires and an oil change. Tuesday Val has an appointment to see the radiation oncologist (we weren't expecting this so soon; will know more once we see him) and then we'll roll our way into the Thanksgiving long weekend. Then Val has chemo session #3 on Oct. 17. Good grief - pretty soon it will be November. Oh my goodness.

Fall on Lake Winnipeg

In the meantime, we've enjoyed a couple of lovely fall days. I wore sandals again today. Lovely.

xxoo
Amanda

Getting tired

End of weekend report:

• We found the perfect small recliner yesterday; it will be here in two weeks
• We enjoyed another episode of Call the Midwife yesterday evening - what great drama!
• Today, we headed to the cottage for the day with Yvonne and Bella to do some seasonal chores - put the kayaks under the cottage, put the snowfence around the cottage posts, bring all the latex paint inside, and so on

It was lovely today and the fall colours were beautiful. The lake was wild with wind and waves - gorgeous to be up there. Bella loved racing around the yard and then trotted behind Yvonne and me as we rode our bikes down the road. Great fun.

Yvonne and Val

Val, meanwhile, is baring up to the new realities: more joint pain and significant fatigue. She was the driver this morning and was wiped out from that activity. Instead of leaping into action on arrival (as she usually does), she actually lay down and rested in the gazebo (which was a wonderful 21 warm degrees inside). Then she supervised Yvonne and me as we did the chores.

So. Life goes on and we continue to do things, but Val is moving more slowly and with greater pain. Her hair is now almost all gone - not quite, but almost. Her spirit is willing, but the body won't necessarily cooperate.

Thanks to each of you who have sent messages and emails; they are greatly appreciated - for the information you share and the connection they make with us.

Here's hoping for a gentle week to come...
Amanda

Reclining

Just a quick hit on a rainy Saturday morning: We are off to find a comfortable recliner for Val to use in the sun room. We have comfy chairs and a good sofa, but for that in-between resting pose, we have nothing.

Yvonne has suggested The Urban Barn, where she bought her compact and comfortable recliner. Here's hoping it's a quick and easy trip there and home again.

Val is wearing an
under-cycling-helmet liner,
one of the buys from last weekend's

hat shopping trip. 

Some new pain is manifesting itself in Val's joints, particularly the left ankle which was badly injured many years ago in a rafting accident. If you don't know the story, make a note to ask Val about it sometime. It's a good one!

Chester is miffed that he's not yet made it into the blog, so here he is with Val snoozing Friday afternoon.

Of cardboard and cucumbers

The day after chemo session no. 2 went well, with Val up and about and going for a walk with Jacki in the neighbourhood. She was also able to feed herself and do some laundry and the dishes. Excellent activity, and much appreciated by me!

For supper, we had our standard fall-back meal of cheese omelettes, steamed potatoes, coleslaw and broccoli, with cucumber chunks on the side. Val, normally a huge fan of my omelettes, said hers tasted like cardboard - but then so did everything else...except the cucumber, which tasted delicious. We figure this must be chemo taste (or lack thereof). Do you think she can survive on raw veggies in a Winnipeg winter???? (just kidding. she'll keep eating, and eating well, don't worry.)

Val describes this disappearance of taste as very peculiar and a tad distressing, given her general gusto for good food. Oh well. If that's as bad as it gets for the moment, we'll take it!

My students are all yawning in class these days, and I am not taking it personally. Or trying not to, anyway. It's week 5 of the term and everyone is already trying to figure out how to make it through to December. Is it Thanksgiving yet??

Holly on her look-out post in the sunroom.

Holly did not escape outside this evening, and she's not happy about being indoors while Chester is out there, romping in the dark.

 That's all for now...
Amanda

Session 2 completed

We're at the end of the day on which Val completed session two of chemo and all is fine. The port worked fantastically well.

Mendel took Val, stayed with her and brought her home. Yvonne visited during the session, as did Dr. Marni Wiseman, our dermatologist who is at CancerCare every Wednesday. Very nice woman, and she and Val had a good catch-up.

Yvonne came for dinner. Holly (the cat) went missing mid-evening but is now back in after I found her hiding in the front junipers.

We're a busy household here! I'm now done for the day...
Good night.
Amanda

Numbers are good

Pre-chemo blood work complete. Numbers are all good. Chemo session two will go ahead tomorrow (Wednesday) as planned.

Val now back home and sleeping with Chester, the cat, after some anxiety leading up to the blood-work session.

And she bought another addition for her hat collection.

Hair raising tales (2)

On Saturday, we went hat shopping. Val claims to have the smallest adult head in the world, so finding the right style and fit is a challenge, but MEC in downtown Winnipeg produced a few good options.

One is a piece of tubular headgear, which is a remarkable item that can be worn about 100 different ways, it seems. See for yourself at MEC's tubular headwear (or check out BUFF how-to videos online). Val chose the Spa Green Ellipses design - good colours for her. The others are beanie type hats in lighter materials.

We came home and Val played around with these new items. On and off they came. She tried the tubular item several different ways; she is a natural for the 'pirate' version. But in the end, she opted for her navy blue Tilley winter hat for our outing to the symphony. It was cool enough in the evening to need the head covering outside, and in the symphony hall it was warm enough to not require anything.

At the end of it all Val pronounced that, if you're going to look like a dork (which she claims to in most head gear because it tends to emphasize the smallness of her head), you have to stay true to your own style of dorkiness, i.e., peculiarity. Thus the Tilley hat.

The symphony was wonderful. Superb playing of Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto no. 3 by Andre Laplante, followed after intermission by Holst's The Planets with the women's choir from the University of Manitoba. The musicians and singers deserved every moment of thunderous applause we gave them.

It's a busy week coming up: furnace is being cleaned tomorrow (morning's are now cold enough for a blast of heat), blood work for Val on Tuesday, then chemo session 2 on Wednesday. Here's hoping all continues to go well...

Some of you are asking how I am doing and if I'm taking care of myself. I am fine and I am taking care of myself. Going to work every day is good for me and coming home with time and energy to give to things here is good for me, too. I am reading a Kate Morton novel (light) and also enjoying a serial story featuring my favourite pony book character, Jill. It's fan fiction, an entirely new genre for me, and it's fun to read each new chapter as the author (Jane Badger) posts them online. I discovered that Jill has  her own Facebook page, which is how I came to find the fan fiction. Who knew!

That's all for today.
Amanda