Get out of Jail (but not for free!)

Hi Team,

I finally got out today! They released me from my jail cell.... ok maybe that's a little dramatic. I told my dad today they had me tied down to the bed and he was incredulous until I told him it was intravenously (my IV) lol. I guess technically that's not tied to the bed. But I did have to unplug the IV machine from the wall before trying to go anywhere, and then wheel the damn thing around with me everywhere. Nothing screams "sick" than having to wheel an IV behind you. To the side is a pic of me and my good friend Addie who came to visit me. I was feverish and all wrapped up to keep the shivers down.

I am not sick anymore though! White blood cell counts are firmly above 500 for 2 days in a row, and the same for my fever (below 100), so I had marked everything off their list of requirements. The hospital stay did not cost nearly as much as I had thought but you know Kaiser, they always ominously say "but this is just an estimation and you may get billed for a balance." Who knows! You may, at any time, get billed for any amount that our mysterious computer did not estimate. Of course you can't ask that person any questions because this is all passively done by the mysterious computer. So, we'll see.

Anyway, am safely home now, and my lovely mother was kind enough to go get take-out for us of my most favorite soup in the world, Bakwan Malang from the Indonesian restaurant about 8 blocks away, Borobudur. Delicious and has tofu, 2 different kinds of noodles, meatballs, fried chicken dumplings, greens, beef and just about the kitchen sink in it.

I am feeling more energetic as you can probably tell and am looking forward to hopefully a week off and really hopefully a week of having enough energy to actually leave the house and do something (seriously, anything).

Just to prep you all, this week may be the week I lose my hair. My head has started feeling sore - that feeling where your mom puts your hair in a super tight pony tail all day long and then you take it out and move it in a different direction. Just weirdly achy. My friend who has also gone through chemo, Dana said that's the feeling of your hair follicles "loosening" and a few other cancer survivors I know have said it was about 14 days into chemo that they lost their hair... that would be Monday! So am warning you all and my hairdresser that a shaving may be in order next week for both mess and pain-management.

Last note, my kitties are very glad that I was kind enough to come back from my spa-vacation to pet and take care of them. And of course, I love having them hold me down on the couch. Here's one of the cute ones - I have two, this is Brutus and eventually I'll post a pic of Toby as well, although they look very similar.

Love,

Amy