Happy New Year From The Boob Blogger!

Hello everyone,

Reporting from my couch in cozy sweats under an equally cozy pink fuzzy blanket because with the wind chill factor, it feels like it's 400 #@$$%^ degrees below zero outside! Have I told you I never, never, never exaggerate? OK, it's super freezing out but I got to and from work in a taxi and my office is as hot as hades, I came home to a hot meal (read: I warmed up left overs in a toaster oven), and I don't plan on doing much more than reading and watching TV tonight. So who am I to complain? 

2014 began on a really positive note, literally and figuratively. My amazing beau got us floor seats to the Billy Joel concert at the Barclays Center. For those of you who haven't been, the walk from the subway is less than a minute so it's very convenient. I didn't form any real opinion about the aesthetics; let's just say it's a bit cold. We enjoyed a very good buffet at the 40/40 Club where we waited 40 hours and 40 minutes for our complimentary drink. So our waitress brought us three. (Several of the waitstaff and bartenders thought it was a great idea to call out on the busiest night of the year.) The couple next to us were dear friends of Mr. Joel's sax player so they had a few good stories to share. Most important though, the venue was awesome, Billy still puts on an amazing show (he might consider retiring his rock n' roll microphone bit before he dislocates a hip) and Sandy and I spent our third New Year's Eve together. 

There's a new member in the Boob Blogger's household. Hold on, hold on, don't get too excited. It's a rabbit. Like I SAID, don't get too excited, it's not THAT rabbit. It's a Rabbit AIR PURIFIER. http://www.rabbitair.com It's supposedly the best one for my needs, which are, detox my dusty-no-matter-how-much-you-clean-it-NYC-apartment. I went to an allergist hoping to get some clues as to why I was choking to death--my oncologist would just kill me if he heard me use such language--and all I learned was that I'm allergic to dust and dust mites. Like, who isn't? So I invested in this thing for my lungs and I like to believe it's helping me. For the record, I still choke when I cough but my cough subsided substantially, pre-Rabbit, whilst sea bathing in Turks and Caicos. My friend Whitney said that was very late 18th century of me.

You can purchase different artwork for your Rabbit and hang it, too.
I selected the Japanese inspired cherry blossoms.

My chemo continues and I have only three more sessions before my next scan. I've been experiencing nausea the last few times so I've been hitting the Odansetron and just trying to eat whatever my body craves. My taste for food is what I imagine it would be if I were pregnant. One minute I want herring, another minute salad, and another, my new fave, a toasted bialy with olive oil and rosemary (thank you, Lory D.!). Sometimes the thought of food is repulsive and all I want is cold seltzer and other times I'm ravenous. My doctor doesn't really know how to address this. He just sees me putting on pounds and thinks it's kind of funny when I complain about it (thank you, menopause). The truth is, he's just happy I'm otherwise tolerating the treatment ok and I'm not a vomiting bag of bones. 

The nausea with this chemo is rather strange. Until I wake up the next day after treatment, it's as if I drank a bottle of acetone. I don't really know what acetone tastes like, but I don't know what a liquified roll of aluminum foil tastes like either and I had to choose something strong and metallic. (Side note: Did you know Billy Joel once tried to kill himself by drinking furniture polish?). And if you can picture a clear soda bottle, say, an old fashioned bottle of Coke, and you fill it to the near top with water knowing that one more drop will make it overflow, that's what the chemo feels like inside me. It's as if I'm filled almost to the brim with clear toxic liquid and if I take one more sip, it'll start pouring out of my throat. Not too good on the psyche. I get very heady, my eyes blur a little, I'm queazy, a bit depressed and slightly agitated. Once home (I go to work from treatment), I look forward to the clock striking 11:00PM because it's a good time to retire without waking up too early in the middle of the night. I tell myself there's only X number of sessions left, but the reality is, I can stay on this for several months more if it's still, thankfully, helping the tumors shrink. 

You may notice from pictures that I'm sporting a bit of a 5 o' clock shadow on my head. This chemo is weird inasmuch as even in the midst of treatment, what hair you lost can come back. Just not all of it. My eye lashes started to come back--Sandy says they look like insect legs--and so did part of my eye brows. The hair on my head grows in dark, some grays, too, but there are patches that are much thinner than others. You get my drift. It's been suggested I go for a comb-over a la American Hustle (of all the characters in that movie to emulate...).

I'd like to end this blog with a lovely meditation that my cousin Jennifer shared with me for the New Year:

May I be at peace
May my heart remain open
May I realize the beauty of my own true nature
May I be healed
May I be a source of healing in this world

May you be at peace
May your heart remain open
May you realize the beauty of your own true nature
May you be healed
May you be a source of healing for this world

May you be happy as I wish to be happy
May you know peace as I wish to know peace
May you be safe from inner and outer harm as I wish to be safe
May you be free from suffering as I wish to be free

From my couch to yours, I wish every one of you a peaceful, healing, safe and happy 2014. 

Thanks for tuning in. 

With an abundance of love,

Liz B.

New York City's Boob Blogger