I spent a little time putting together some pictures of my chemo hair experience, which is now five months along. The top left picture shows me getting that pre-chemo buzz cut on June 12. That's when I saw my real hair color for the first time in about 20 years! The bottom right picture shows my hair coming in on November 12 and colored with a little help from L'Oreal. It's just a temporary color but it looks better than the "grandma" white that you see in the picture on the bottom left. I'm pretty happy, at six weeks post-chemo, to have hair that could even take a color!
I had my six weeks follow-up with my oncologist last Wednesday and it was delightfully uneventful. My labs looked good and I feel pretty good, too. Earlier the same day I had an appointment with my new primary care physician, so I am now doubly assured that my ticker is working properly, I weigh 122, my blood pressure is normal and neither doc could feel any unwelcome lumps or bumps.
One cool thing - let's give a big "hurrah" for electronic medical records! My new PCP is part of the Elliot Hospital system. Because they have e-records and Dana Farber is somewhat tied into Elliot, she has access to all of my records that have been generated since we moved here. Even better, they can electronically transmit your prescriptions directly to the pharmacy of your choice, including the mail order guys like Express Scripts. Extremely convenient!!!
I have an appointment on Tuesday with Dr. Harris, my Radiation Oncologist at Dana Farber. I thought this might be the radiation planning session; but based on the confirmation call that I received on Friday, I now think it's just a consultation. I'm sure we'll get started soon. Not looking forward to it, the daily drive is going to be tiring for both of us. This, too, will pass...once it gets started.
Love those photos, Michelle. Hey...a gal in our swim class that has really short hair dyes it all different colors, depending on the time of year. She loves change. She does purple sometimes, which actually looks so good on her. Have you thought about having some fun with this OR are you just so happy to HAVE hair now? I know purple would not look good on me with my coloring. Since I believe we have similar coloring, it might not work with your skin tones. Anyhow, glad the meeting with your doctor came out well. You'll get through the drive and meetings with your radiation doctor too. I'm SURE you'll find some neat things to do on the way...unless it's just a really dull drive. Thanks for sharing all this. I'm SO GLAD your hair is growing out so well.
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Thanks, Photo. The drive to Boston is all interstate until we get to the city. It's in the middle of Rick's workday, so we probably won't be taking any time to do fun things along the way. And we will be highly motivated to get out of there before the commuter traffic slows things down to less than a crawl.
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