This Blog is About to Get Mighty Boring....

Which I suppose, all told, is a good thing. I say this because so far chemo has been pretty uneventful. Here, take a look at my symptoms:

Day 1 & 2
- trouble swallowing
- a LOT of hiccups
- a teensy bit of nausea and fatigue

Day 3 & 4
- less of the first two above
- more nausea and fatigue
- weird, dry eyes

Day 5 - 7
- I cannot stay awake for more than 3 hours at a time. I have 3 hour naps and then 3 hours later, I go to bed for 11 hours.

Day 8
A miracle! I am awake for 15 hours in a row. I have a shower! We leave the house! I buy a fake head to store my new wig on for 10 bucks! I show my mom the dog cafe and have a cafe latte! I eat spicy food (which initially I thought was a HUGE mistake but then turns out to be okay - thank you McDonald's Sundae and latish night walk)!

I don't know if it is the fact that the chemo must mostly be out of my system by now, or the fact that I am finally off the insane number of pills I am required to take after chemo but I feel almost normal again. I wasn't able to complete the week at work - it was just way too much - but they are open to being flexible which I deeply appreciate. Any way you look at it, chemo week 1 has been a success. Hurrah! Now only 11 more to go. Le sigh.

In other crappy, crappy news, we've had to give Hogan up, at least for now and probably forever. Once we got him home and after the initial honeymoon phase where he didn't freak out every time we left the house, we discovered his SEVERE separation anxiety. It escalated over the week but it all culminated in him breaking into our kitchen and eating enough chocolate to kill himself. We got to him in time and rushed him to the vet, so he lived. But even they commented on how they were unable to leave him in a recovery room by himself. When we went back that night to see him he was in the reception room on an IV as they couldn't leave him alone. Because we are not in a position to have a dog that we can't ever leave alone, and because we have a house that despite our best attempts to puppy proof he is still managing to break into rooms he shouldn't, we've opted to send him to boarding kennel where a guy will work with him for a month. We're looking for a new home for him and at the same time, hoping this guy can help get the anxiety under control. So, if anyone out there wants an amazing companion (we think he is a Belgian Malinois from a working line, so do your research before you commit - these dogs, while intelligent and amazing, are an insane amount of work. Had we been told this prior to fostering him we wouldn't have brought him home.) please let us know. He really is sweet, just extremely co-dependent. Like, more co-dependent than me and that is saying something.