December 16-18

Tuesday was a really good day! I had to turn in my keys at the apartment (chapter closed) and while I was downtown I stopped by to visit my office, something that I’ve wanted to do for quite some time. I knew it might be my last opportunity for a while since chemo is scheduled for Wednesday and is getting more intense. So I had to take advantage of my GOOD DAY!

It was so exciting to see everyone around my old desk – it really is the greatest group of folks that I’ve ever worked with! I was there until after lunch (with one brief trip to my car to sit and rest)… Probably a little longer than I should have stayed, but still didn’t get to see everyone that I would have liked to see! It was a real inspiration to see everyone that I DID see!

I came home and pretty much went straight to bed (what a light-weight).. but my appointment on Wednesday started at 7am so I really needed to be rested – and it’s a good thing that I did.

Timing for chemo was good because I finished just in time to grab some soup and sit in on the Music Therapy Class – which was very interesting. Michael is the therapist who designed the program which is used at MDA. He basically took a therapy used by psychiatrists to help mental patients with severe depression and altered it to help patients who need to deal with pain and stress.

To ease depression, the music is orchestrated to move your mood along with the rhythm of the music (basically going from slow and pensive to upbeat) In order to bring relaxation, this is reversed – going from fast to slow with optimal being about 60 beats per minute (basic resting heartbeat). This process has been a tremendous help to children with cancer, who for many years were treated without the benefit of sedatives.

During the class, Michael gave us guidelines for creating our own personal “relaxation tape”. I’ve been thinking all night about it and can’t wait to try and record some relaxing play lists with some of my favorite tunes! Since my mood changes, I’ll have to do different playlists for classical, Gaelic, fiddle, country, folk, rock/pop, Latin and Hawaiian!

As exciting as the class was, I was ready to leave when it ended. This chemo treatment had more dramatic reactions again – more like the first one. My fingers hurt and I had leg cramps and a headache even before I left the hospital. Too bad I don’t have that recording yet!

The pump will come off on Friday and I scheduled an appointment at MDA just in case I’m not able to disconnect myself. Hopefully that will prevent the mad dash I had last time.

So I’m not really sure about tomorrow, but today is a day of rest…

Much love,
Sia

PS - for those inquiring minds... the condition I mentioned about sensitivity to touch is neuropathy..