<p>sunriseeast: You are amazing. Wishing you good luck in your journey. Thinking healthy thoughts for you for the new year.</p>
<p>sunrisesinthe east,</p>
<p>You were on my mind today and I told my daughter about you. The one thing about this CC addiction is that you talk about your cyberpeople like you see them every day IRL. As we wrap up this first decade of the new millennium, I am glad that you are here and that our family chain on CC has not been broken.<br>
stealing a New years wish from one of my friends…</p>
<p>May the next decade be filled with health, financial prosperity, a sense of purpose, a reassessment of your treatment of those less fortunate and of our environment so as to make those conditions better and above all, happiness and gratitude.</p>
<p>May GOD richly bless you and yours (and all of our CC family and friends) in the new decade.</p>
<p>Happy New Year, sunrise! May 2011 bring you health and happiness!</p>
<p>Sunrise - You FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT this year, girl. You can do it!</p>
<p>Been following this thread from the beginning, but just posting for the first time with more greetings and best wishes to you. Your supportive husband, positive outlook and great sense of humor are certainly strengths to be admired. There will be some bad days, but my hopes for you are that your sunshine continues to overtake most of them.</p>
<p>Happy new year to everyone.</p>
<p>Thank you so much for your warm regards. Please excuse me for not thanking everyone individually. You see, there are so many of you, and there is only one me. So, I have been happily out gunned and out numbered!</p>
<p>We had a whole family over from Connecticut for the new year’s day for an overnight visit. They left in the early afternoon of the new year’s day. This is the family we vacation with and celebrate holidays with. Thanksgiving at their house, Passover at hours. Diane (the mother/wife of the family) is an amazing person, and has been an incredibly friend. Already drove from CT to NJ several times to visit me at the hospital, visit me at home, etc. She said, she would come a couple of days after the first chemo (scheduled for this coming friday), whether I welcome her or not since she already did her research and predicts that Monday or so after the chemo, I will really need somebody at home. </p>
<p>She is a devout Lutheran, and jokes that most of my other friends are heathens and she and her extended family members are all keeping me in their prayers so that I can have all the base covered. </p>
<p>Some more black humor. I started to muse over dinner with all of us including Diane and her family that I should find a way to monetize my condition. How about a reality show? Last time I checked there is no reality show about deadly disease. Who knows, there may be a market for this. Then we started to discuss what kind of advertisers will sponsor a show like that. That’s when the business plan started to fall apart. Local funeral homes - ummmmm, probably too macabre. Weight loss products - well, nothing can beat the chemo drugs, so a moot point… We just couldn’t come up with a viable collection of advertisers… </p>
<p>Oh, well…</p>
<p>I wish you all amazing new year and thank you so much for your generous good will. By the way, though I am not particularly spiritual or religious, I welcome all offers of prayers of all religions as a token of sincere good will EXCEPT the “I will pray for your soul” variety.</p>
<p>PEACE to us all.</p>
<p>And a Happy and Healthy New Year to you, sunriseeast! I will continue to have a good thought for you and your family, and may mention your name (I will have to think up a derivation thereof, LOL) in shul. 
How great that you have such a close friend among the heathens. ;)</p>
<p>Sunrise…The chemo should not be too difficult especially the first few rounds. Today the anti nausea drugs are amazing and if you don’t mind me saying so, marijuana is very effective as well. If you enjoy black humor…think about your kids rolling a joint for their mom on chemo, when you spent years telling them to Just Say No. One of my friends diagnosed with stage 2 ovarian just got back from a great trip with her kids and one grandchild. She was diagnosed over 10 years ago. She swore by pot after her treatment, and so did my mother, and that was over 20 years ago when people were not as accepting of the medical uses of marijuana. I must say that I still remember my mom smoking it and to this day my husband and I get the biggest laugh remembering how funny it was to see my mom smoke pot. My father was appalled but she did it anyway because I told her how I read so much about it. You hang tough and don’t be afraid to try something that may be just the thing to help. You want to keep in mind that the important thing is to stay healthy and well so that you could get as much chemo as it takes to make you well. Thinking and praying for you. </p>
<p>By the way sunshine is really good medicine…hope you have been out and walking a bit.</p>
<p>Advertisers: I would think the “healthy food” group would be excellent advertisers. The broccoli commission, for one. And it could be a late-night show, one where they could use the unfilled slots for all those PSAs about the dangers of smoking and so on.</p>
<p>Advertisers: homeopathic products that boost the immune system. In my area there are several wellness centers that provide all kinds of services for cancer patients – support groups, etc. Unfortunately, people aren’t always aware of what services are out there – advertising would be a good thing. And, I suppose it’s okay to say that stores that sell scarves, hats, wigs, etc. would be potential advertisers. As well as cleaning services – someone to come in and clean while you focus on getting better, etc.</p>
<p>From your keyboard to the storyboards of the reality show producers. When I think about it, I’m kind of surprised that there isn’t already a chemo show.</p>
<p>I actually have been thinking of a way to market the aspect of the chemo drugs that makes you anorexic. for the first two days I was eating more form the steroids, but then it was downhill. If they could package that stuff, no more obesity!!!
My friend did chemo for ovarian, she did not lose weight. She is doing well now. You are always in my prayers.
coming out with a new blood test for cancer just announced today.</p>
<p>^^The blood test sounds exciting. If they can detect metatasthases (sp?) earlier that would be wonderful. Or conversely, give peace of mind that the disease HASN’T spread.</p>
<p>Our employer provided insurance plan changed from BSBC to Cigna (same excellent coverage, just different provider) as of Jan 1. So, hell lot of headache to set everything up all over again. Chemo starts this Friday, and there is SO much paperwork, blood works and test, medication to take before and after that have to be all picked up and lined up. All sorts of things to follow through and follow up. AND this is going to be repeated everyweek for minimum 18 weeks and possibly longer. A wig for a chemo patients are covered, but none of the insurance agents I talked to knew exactly how this should be handled. Nearly 10 calls and 10 different answers, etc. Add to all this a new fangled tax free health care reimbursement account provided by the employer. More paperwork, and more things to investigate. </p>
<p>Of course, this is in addition to the list of things I am supposed to do, not do, eat, not eat provided by the oncologist, AND all the wonderful combinations of potential side effects of whatever it is they are pumping into my body, AND more drugs to take care of other drugs. Oh, did I mention that I am getting a port inserted into my chest for easy access for all the chemo drugs? So, I am going to be a walking champaign bottle with a cork.</p>
<p>I told my husband today that they should set up a licensing board for cancer patients. This is not a job for the intellectually lazy and disorganized. Those who fail to get a “cancer patient” license must be assigned to simpler medical problems like broken ribs… ;)</p>
<p>Re: chemo show. Already WGA’d. But frankly…not sale’able. But yes, 3 to 4 days after infusion is the most challenging. The first round is, generally, the easiest.</p>
<p>I bet I can answer the wig part. If you go into a store that sells wigs, a Hair salon usually, they will know how to get reimbursed for the wig. They do it all the time. They will also help you pick a wig that you like either similar to your current hair or something completely different. I got a wig when but also most never wore it because it drove me nuts. I know other people who were never bothered by their wig. I made do with berets and caps for the most part.
Take the anti nausea pills before you feel nauseous. I am glad to hear you are getting a port. I did not for my first round and regret that now since my veins are more challenging now. I should have known better since I am a nurse.
Good luck and I will hold you in my thoughts. I just had my 6 month check up and passed with flying colors.
Ellen</p>
<p>Ellen: how nice to hear you’re doing well!</p>
<p>Sunrise–</p>
<p>When you get that port inserted, make very sure that the gauze does not ever stick out from the sides of the tape.</p>
<p>My Mom was in a coma in hospital with one of these ports, and careless handling by a nurse enable staph germs to be wicked via the gauze that was not covered, to her bloodstream. She died from MRSA a week later.</p>
<p>Not to scare you—I have been following and you are in my prayers! But just a heads up. God bless!</p>
<p>Sunrise, hang in there! With your sense of humor and your caring family and friends you can tackle anything, even the hard job of being a cancer patient. May the actual chemo be the easy part compared to all the paperwork troubles you had to go through!</p>
<p>Cancer is such a complex disease, and the treatment options are so vastly different, even doctors have a hard time of keeping up with the latest findings (that may not be the latest, because it takes time for a scientific publication to see the light of day). One melanoma survivor is trying to help cancer doctors overcome this problem:</p>
<p>[Internet</a> Commerce Pioneer Seeks to Crack Secretive Culture With Cancer Commons | Xconomy](<a href=“Informa Connect - Know more, do more, be more.”>Informa Connect - Know more, do more, be more.)</p>
<p>I just saw JRZMom’s post. Demand proper hand washing form any health professional who touches you! It is amazing that such a simple yet effective way of reducing hospital-acquired infections is still ignored by many!</p>
<p>If it is financially possible get two wigs. Like human hair it does get dirty. You then have to get it cleaned (meaning a few days without a wig). In my cast I wore the same wig times two. I have friends who did different styles, one of them a hair style that she had always dreamed of having but her natural hair didn’t allow it.</p>