There’s A Paula Shaped Hole In Louisiana (and my heart…)

That’s right, Paula has finally ditched me for Birmingham to find a husband further her education. I guess it’s all text messages and emails for us from now on (since I still don’t really talk on the phone). Sad day. What’s a girl to do with her best friend 396 miles away? The especially sad part is I can’t indulge in junk food to help me wallow in self pity. Stupid cancer - ruining my misery.

Haha, actually, I’m very excited that Paula is headed off to school. Not because she’s leaving me, but because she’s gonna be all smart and educated and get herself a real job and she’s supposed to come visit me in like two weeks. I just wanted to make you all feel bad for me and maybe make Paula cry, because I’m a punk like that.

I got some medicine on Saturday for thrush (apparently you can diagnose it over the phone) and it’s clearing up nicely. The bad taste in my mouth is disappearing and I can taste a little better – except for sweet stuff, yeah, those taste buds are zapped and that makes me sad, almost as sad as Paula leaving me. I’m craving apple juice, but I can’t really taste it, so it’s not the same, and most stuff burns my mouth. Tomorrow is the half way point and I keep telling myself that I only have 16 more after that! Then a few weeks for the mouth sore to go away and then we’ll play the rest of the recovery by ear. I’m hoping it will be fast since I have not lost any weight (I even gained some today).

I saw my radiation oncologist for like 2 minutes today. Apparently if I want him to spend any time talking to me or examining me I need to be a worse patient. He walked in, looked at my charts, said my weight was great, and my blood was great, and to keep it up. I told him that I had lost almost all the hair on that back part of my head and he was like, yeah, that’s a side effect. Such sympathy. I was only telling him in case he wanted to keep track of all my side effects, apparently that’s not that important of a symptom in the grand scheme! My dietician and chemo nurses laughed about that story when we told him. Apparently Dr. Fields has a reputation for telling you like it is and having no sympathy, he’s all business.

I slept through chemo – they got my IV in on the first try, which was a huge relief. Usually they have to dig for my vein or try like four times. Then Warner and I went and saw Wall-e. It was cute - A good distraction from my mouth sores and everything that’s going on. Tonight the guys from work came over and Warner grilled some bratwurst for dinner. I don’t like brats, but they sure did smell good out there cooking. I schooled Mike in Guitar Hero. He was talking major smack and I totally showed him how it’s done. Now I’m going to bed early, because I am WORN OUT!