Shady.

12 days without chemo.  Just my Tuesday Dex.  12 days of Bill not driving me to the Cancer Center.  12 days of not getting my port accessed and drawing blood.  12 days to relax some at home.  12 days like the 12 days of Christmas! Ha!  Was able to visit with Mark and Irene.  Finally get to see Mimi, Aaron, Skylar, Olivia and meet Gray.  Was nice to hear the laughter of little kids.  Got to see their new homes.  My favorite room between the two homes was Mimi's sewing room.  Lol!  Now who would have guess that???  Beautiful homes both of them though.  We also were able to get to the beach again.  Beautiful day.  Had dinner with Kristi and girls one night.  Got mom for a day of manicures, pedicures, naps and dinner.  12 days!!  Was able to get in to my sewing room and finish a project I have been working on.  Oh, I felt the effects of coming down off of drugs but the 12 days of no drugs kept them at bay in my mind.  Didn't want to ruin our 12 days.

And today. Tuesdays the 21st,  started back my treatments.  Darzalex, Kyprolis, Dex.  We left the house at 7 this morning.  Appointment time 8.  Was taken back to the lab draw room by Ellen and Kristine (new today and Ellen was training her).  Vitals done.  Needles went in to port without a problem.  Blood draw was excellent.  Needed, along with CMP and CBC draws, the draws for Myeloma.  Six tubes total.  Have an appointment with Dr. Sarriera on the 31st.  My MRI brain scan is this Friday the 24th.  Dentist appointment on Thursday, the 23rd.  Busy week for us.

Sent to room 20 with Emma being my oncology nurse for the day.  Excellent, excellent nurse.  Was on top of everything from the beginning.  First asked Bill what happened to his leg before we got started on me.  He was bitten by something on the back of his calf.  Not a fire ant bite.  Looks like when he got bite when we were in Tampa.  Emma questioned him about it and told him if it gets bigger, he needed to see our family doctor.  Been taking Benadryl.  Using a hydrocortisone cream.  Even used a piece of aloe vera (from the plant I brought from Kerri's).  Will look at it in the morning to see if it's bigger.  Emma wanted to draw dots around it to see if it gets bigger but Bill said no.  I wanted to put at least a few dots around it before he went to bed but no to that also.  Will be checking it in the morning again.

Labs coming back.  Saw them in my portal.  Bill and I took bets on what my bilirubin and platelet count was going to be.  Was ready to let Emma know they were back but here she comes with her cart.   Bill tried to bet with her on my counts but that didn't work.  Oh, my platelets were 103 and bilirubin was 1.6.  Had my premeds ready and knew the counts were in range and did not have to contact Dr. Sarriera for the go ahead.  A lot of times, we have to tell the nurses the labs are coming back.  Not Emma.  Hooked up my Dex drip.  Gave me Benadryl and Tylenol pills to take.  Hooked up the Kyrpolis to started after the flush from the Dex.  Even had my Darzalex and hang that on my pole of drugs.  Kyprolis started.  Had to wait 15 minutes after that to start Darzalex.  Vitals taken.  Darzalex started at 9:30.  About an hour earlier than usual.   All was good.  But Emma took vitals about every 1/2 hour for quite a while because my temperature was spiking.  She stopped the drip for about 30 minutes to see what would happen.  We sort of figured out it was because when I fell asleep between vitals, I was sleeping on that ear on the pillow.  When she took my temp in the other ear, it was normal.  Once Emma was satisfied that was probably the reason, she restarted the drip.  Then went to vitals every hour.  Nice sleep then.  Drip was finished around 2:45.  Again, about 45 minutes to an hour earlier then usual.  Flushes done.  Left the hospital around 3:15.  My appointment is at 2:30 tomorrow for Kyprolis.  Welcome back drugs.  Welcome back my "treatment plan."  I can do this.  I will do this.  I have to do this.

Last Sunday Bill and I were guests of Ken (our support group leader) at a BMT (bone marrow transplant) reunion for Florida Hospital.  We set up a booth with lots of information about Multiple Myeloma.  Information from our sponsor, International Myeloma Foundation.  What a great organization for us.  Check them out if you have a few minutes.  Here is their website www.myeloma.org   I so enjoyed talking to the people when they stopped at our booth.  Not shy at all.  Was happy especially talking with others that have Myeloma, inviting them to our support group meeting.  And educating those who never heard of Multiple Myeloma.  A lot of them thought it was Melanoma.  So, so different from Myeloma.  We also set up a ring toss game which seem to go over big.  4 other members of our support group joined us.  There was a great luncheon.  Then they had several great and informative speakers.  Two young ladies from a musical support group at Florida Hospital sang a much appropriate song that brought a few tears to my eyes (and I am sure others).  "I Can See Clearly Now."
Here a few lyrics that hit me.  Of course they are not as the song is sung.

"I can see clearly now the rain is gone.
I can see all obstacles in my way.
It's gonna be bright, bright sunny shiny day.
Here is a rainbow I've been praying for.
Look all around you, there's nothing but blue skies
Look straight ahead, nothing but blue skies
It's gonna be a bright, bright sunny shiny day."

And to end a fun day, I won the door prize.  Yes, me!   There were over 200 people there.  Thanks Ken for a wonderful day.  I throughly enjoyed it.   Let's do it again.

Finally, it's really another hot and humid summer Florida.  Thank goodness for air.  Bill usually starts his yard work as early as 8:30 and finishes up anywhere from 11 to around 12.  We came to the realization that  it is summer in Florida when we get to a store and the parking spaces are determined by shady spots and not how close you can get to the store.  Not complaining because we are happy in Florida no matter what the temperature is and how humid it is.

Quote:

You are braver than you believe.  Stronger than you seem.  Smarter than you think.  And loved more than you know.

This quote/saying was on a beautiful plaque that come from Kerri, Paul, Jakob, Kristopher, Chad, Leah, Juliana and Layton.  Done in Myeloma colors too.