My nurse told me I would lose my hair in two weeks. Sue enough, she was right. My hair was originally down to my back. Before I started chemo, I cut my hair twice. Once to my shoulders and then really short. Like Halle Berry short. It was a nice change. I never had really short hair so it was neat to see how I looked in short hair. When my hair started to fall out, I asked my husband to shave it all off. It was a sad experience for my husband and for myself. As her started to shave, tears just came tumbling down. I think it killed him to have to do it and to see me cry. Emotionally it was hard, but it was mentally easier on me to do that then wake up one morning and not have hair. It took me a week before I could get myself to look in the mirror. I was bald, sick, and ugly. That's how I felt. I used to be this cute, petite women and now I felt so ugly. I stayed home most of the time because I didn't want to be in public. When I did go out, I just wore hats. It was hard because I can tell people were starring at me. I had lost my eyebrows and eye lashes. And I got dark circles under my eyes. It was horrible. The worst experience was when I was shopping at the grocery store. As I stood there waiting for the clerk to ring me up, I can feel her eyes starring at me. Because of my appearance, I avoided looking at people. This lady made me feel like I was an alien or something. I just wanted to get my groceries and get the heck out of there. I know people don't understand, but do they have to be rude and stare!
On the second round of chemo, I got really sick. My head was spinning every time I woke up, I was sleeping all day and every day for 3-4 days. I consciously made myself get up so I can try to drink water and eat something. The first day or two I felt very nausous. The anti-nausous medicine didn't work most of the time. My saddest moments are when I didn't have enough strength to hold my son. he was barely a month old and my husband was raising him alone. My husband had to take 3 months off of work to take care of him and I. Then my mom took time off after my husband had to go back to work. I am so thankful for my family. When I have the strength, I would go to our living room and stare at him. That's all I can do. I would stare at him for five minutes and then go back to sleep. As I close my eyes, I try to picture my son in my head. Even though I was in the next room, I missed him dearly. My son bonded with my husband and my mom, but it took him awhile to bond with me. It would break my heart to see him wanting my husband or my mother. I felt like a stranger at times.
The side effects of AC wasn't too bad. It was the Taxotere that was the worst! My hands and feet were tingling and the skin started to peel. My eyes constantly were watering. it looked like I was crying all the time. Worse of all, my nails started to fall off. I was so freaked out about it. I tried to wrap them in bandages because I was afraid I would bang my fingers and have the nails fly off. After the second rounds of Taxotere, my doctor decided to move me to Taxol. The side effects of Taxol was nothing like Taxotere. My nails started to get better so I was lucky it didn't completely fall off. I'm sure it would have if I stayed on the Taxotere for another round.
Chemo was so tough on me. There were times I thought dying seemed like a better choice then living, bit it was my son that kept me going. I didn't want him to grow up not knowing who I am. I had so many sad moments. I was heart broken when I found out I could no longer breast feed. If you're a mother, you'll know what I mean. I was struggling with a bit of post-partum and depression. In my worst time, I prayed a lot. You know, I never blame God for the cancer. Throughout the experience, I felt it in my heart there was a reason why I'm going through it. The only prayer that I had was for God to take away the pain and suffering.
