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        The infusion nurse had warned me that my body would try to make me sick to avoid chemo treatments.  As in, it’ll know that I’m about to have chemo and try to make me so sick that I won’t do it again.  So on the morning of my third treatment, I dreamt about a guy assaulting me.  He was a pretty big dude, sitting in a metal folding chair.  I went to sit down, and he snuck his hand into my chair, essentially grabbing my butt.  Somehow I was aware of a punch-problem in dreams: when you go to land a punch in a dream, it somehow slows down for a soft landing.  So I grabbed one fist with the other hand and dropped my doubled-up fist as hard as I could on top of this guy’s head.  He fell backwards out of his chair and tried to crawl away out the backdoor.  He assaulted me, so I assaulted him right back.  But somehow I woke up with the splitting headache; again, I think my body knows I’m going to chemo this morning.

        Prior to the first chemo treatment, my oncologist told me about this new test that takes DNA from my tumor and compares it to my blood.  Basically they want to see if the DNA from my tumor is circulating through my blood.  We know it’s loaded up in my lymphatic system, but we need to know about my blood too.  Turns out, it is.  My blood test is positive.  

        “So what exactly does that mean?” I asked the oncologist.

        “We’re going to do more scans.  We’re going to look for it everywhere.  We’re waiting to see if it pops up somewhere else.  I’m ordering you another bone scan and another CT scan.  You haven’t had any headaches, have you?”

        “Actually, I woke up with a splitting headache this morning.”  

        ”I’m ordering an MRI on your brain, too, then.”

        This sneaky motherfucker.  It’s loaded up on every conveyor belt in my body.  We’re just waiting to see if any other tumors form.

        Because of my positive blood test, the doctor didn’t want to delay chemo for my pesky ear/sinus infection, so I’m essentially getting walloped while not all the way healed.  But we can’t delay.  This fucker is on the move.

        Let me talk a little bit about hair loss.  I already wrote about my hair falling out.  Thankfully, my eyebrows haven’t crawled away yet.  I think my eyelashes are on the move.  My leg hair is still hanging on, though it looks a little thinner.  But my armpit hair is GONE!  So much for my PT goals…all I wanted to be able to do was shave under there, and now there’s no need.  And let me tell you about pubic hair.  No one talks about how uncomfortable it is when your pubic hair starts falling out and collecting in your underwear.  Talk about irritation!  And for some reason, it’s falling out in a reverse-Brazilian sort of fashion.  As in, the bikini line is still there, but nothing in the middle.  As if I have a Hulk Hogan mustache down there.  Go figure.  

        They didn’t prescribe me the steroids this third time around.  I kinda forgot to ask, given the bad news about my blood test.  I tried to pretend on Thursday that I didn’t feel like I was dying, and actually tutored.  I knew I needed to eat or I’d vomit (very much like being pregnant–if you don’t eat, you’re gonna puke), so I tried for the Wendy’s drive-thru.  The line was wrapped around the building.  I kept driving and stopped at Taco Bell.  The line was still very long, but not wrapped around the building.  TB took forever.  But most of the waiting was me at the window.  Mind you, I only ordered 3 items (two things for me and one for Chris–he was working late), but somehow it was as if they were making me a 4-course dinner.  The TB employee was actually hanging out the window chatting with me.  He’s one of 7 siblings.  He wears gloves at work because his mom hates when he gets his siblings sick, and he doesn’t want to handle people’s money and debit cards with bare hands.  He normally works the late shift.  He usually is okay with staying later than normal, but not tonight.  He’ll be out of there like lightning.  Why is this dude talking to me??  I wasn’t asking any questions and I felt like DEATH.  He finally handed me my food, but one glance in the bag and I knew it wasn’t mine.  I had to hand it back.  NOOOOO!  More conversation.  I’m not sure why he was so friggin chatty, but he actually started dancing a little to my music.  I just want to eat and go home!  Why am I being tortured?  His mom doesn’t like hospitals.  He needs bigger gloves because “look at my hands–they’re busting out of the gloves!  I have to go through like 30 pairs in a week–they’ll probably start charging me for them.”  After closing time, he’ll rock out to Ed Sheeran (which I thought was the WEIRDEST comment because who ROCKS out to Ed Sheeran??).  

        Finally, he was able to hand over my food.  I told him good luck and drove the heck out of there.  Unfortunately, my food was so hot that I couldn’t eat it right away, but I sure did try!

        Thursday night was awful.  It’s really hard to sleep when you feel like you’re being punched all over your torso.  I knew Friday wouldn’t be good.  Needless to say, nobody made it to school Friday.  I couldn’t get out of bed.  Chris caught the crud too, so officially everyone got sick in the house.  And all we know is that it isn’t flu, covid, or strep.  But that illness packs a punch, as does chemo.  I hope to God I stay healthy next week, because at this rate, I’ve been some sort of sick for almost a month.  I’m so ready to feel normal again. But I’ve got a long way to go. 

        And now I know you'll never look at Hulk Hogan the same.