Eric brought Julia home from day care and I was sitting in a chair waiting for her with a stuffed bear with angel wings that my nurse navigator had given me for Julia. Eric put Julia down and she didn't recognize me at first. She just kept turning around towards Eric, wanting him to pick her up. We started eating, and then I think throughout the meal she started realizing who I was. After dinner, we went outside and I sat on a chair while Eric and my mom played with Julia in the backyard. My mom was teaching Julia how to kick a ball and I was blowing bubbles for her to pop. Yesterday after Julia was home from day care, my aunt, Eric, and I did the same thing, and by the end of the night, Julia knew to have my aunt pick her up. As I reflected on those two nights and seeing Julia slowly adapt to having others hold her, my silver lining of the whole not being able to pick Julia up piece, is that she will grow closer to others in my family instead of being my little koala bear as she always has been.
Yesterday my nausea definitely decreased and I just took one nausea pill in the morning. I think my main complaint was my dizziness. But I'm hoping that after walking and eating more, that will subside. I got my hair washed by my neighbor and that felt great after 3 days of no soap! When I got home I decided to take a shower, and I thought that would feel amazing as well...I was wrong.
I had to wrap a towel around my neck and safety pin my three drains to the towel. I also couldn't let my stitches get soap on them, and it hurts to lift my arms past a certain point. So I was basically limited to washing from my stomach down. I so badly wanted the water to run over my head and back. I also wanted to shave my disgustingly hairy armpits, but when you think about that motion, it really requires stretching beyond my capabilities at this point. So now my underarms look like a poorly manicured lawn with crabgrass.
When I got out of my disappointing shower, I looked in the mirror and looked at my new naked self in the mirror. It was shocking. I had seen my surgical area from above at my own eye level, but to see it straight on with no bandages present was scary. I reminded myself of a zombie character from The Walking Dead. I have some volume, but I have a large horizontal line about five inches long across each breast with bold, black stitches, and the stitches look as though I had alterations done to close the hole in an old pair of jeans. It is concave in some areas and more wrinkly as your eye nears the stitches.
I called my aunt for help to put Neosporin on the stitches, cover it with gauze, and then put my surgical bra pack on and unpin the drains. I had covered my chest with my towel and I said, "I need your help, but I'm sorry if it's scary looking." She said, "Don't worry about it, precious, it's fine." I removed the towel and started crying. She reassured me that it would get better every day as she patted my back with the towel. I nodded, and then reminded myself that I needed to get back into fight mode. I wiped my tears and got down to business, opening the tubes of Neosporin and getting the job done. With my clothes on, I look bulky with the drains underneath my sweater, almost like a pregnant cat. Hopefully the drains will be removed next Wednesday though when I see Dr. P for my follow up appointment.
Also next week, Dr. G will call me to let me know about the pathology report. They are going through hundreds of slides to look at the breast tissue they removed, and make sure there aren't any invasive cells there. If there aren't any, I'm essentially done. If they do find some though, they may upstage me and I may have to go through chemo. The good news is that since they didn't find cancer in my lymph nodes, the highest stage they can upstage me to is Stage 1.
So every day is slowly but surely better. I'm off to enjoy the rest of this beautiful day!
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