Author: melindacooksey

Well That Esculated Quickly. 

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So in my last blog on Thursday I said how my hair felt like it was starting to come out. A little too much was in the brush and my head / hair was starting to hurt! Well, it’s Sunday and I’m not going to lie… As I knew I was going out I didn’t wash my hair from then to now; in a shameful attempt to keep the hair on my head! 

Well I had a lovely weekend! Bought another wig! A brown one to accompany my blonde one I got Thursday (as well as two hats). 

I even road tested my blonde locks on Saturday night and felt amazing! It’s bizarre how much good or bad hair can make you feel! And when you are trying to keep your hair on your head and the wind and everything scares you, you don’t feel great about yourself! Well I didn’t anyway! I felt unsure, embarrassed and ugly to be honest! 

Wearing a wig on Saturday night made me feel me again, blonde long locks and it wasn’t too hard to wear… I think this is thanks to years of wearing clip in extensions; I have literally had hair and head training for cancer treatment! 

But the Sunday night wash was a turbulent affair! I brushed it first, and loads came out! And then I gave in and went for it and ran my hair under the shower barely rubbing it, but fatel mistake I tipped my head upside down! I do this sometimes when I’m a bit stressed … It makes me feel better! Which it did make me feel better, until doing this created the biggest knot in hair history amazing considering how much hair I have lost! 

So we (Cass and me) tried to condition it out, brush it out, rewash and deep condition it, comb it, blow dry and comb it and finally cut it out! Yes that happened! 

My head actually really hurts so i have begged Dionne round to shave my head this evening! So for my 31st birthday on Tuesday I will be bald! 

I am now a grade 3! WTF! I feel hideous and I look like a little thug! But at least it hurts a bit less! Thanks to Dionne for taking care of my head! 

It is all a bit emotionally to be honest and hard to deal with. No matter how you prep yourself for the fact it is only hair, it’s only hair but, it is your identity and being bald was never on my to do list of hair styles!  

And what I really want to know is why is the hair on my head falling out and the hair on my arms is just there … Strong and firmly in place! WTF!

Anyway, when I have a bit of make up on I will show my shaved head! I’m currently not up to showing off my head-style!   

All gone   

 

  Blonde in Blackpool 

Me, Cass and my wig 😁😂 

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow. 

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So, I had my beautiful Frankie do last week. And day 13 post chemo one…. And I think it is starting to come out. 

My hair actually felt tender this morning, you know that feeling when you have your hair in a high pony tail and then you take it down and it is a bit sore. That is how it felt. 

I brushed it and a lot came out for short hair, and then I just gently touched my hair and about 10 hairs came out! So even though I had seemingly convinced myself my hair would remain… I think today Thursday 14th May (just 5 days before I turn 31) is the start of the need for extra hoovering and no touching of hair! 

Anyone dare put me in a head lock and rub my head to see if it falls out and I will cut your hair off!

No but I admit I shed about 20 tears before Cassie made a joke and I couldn’t feel sorry for myself anymore! 

So today means …. Wig, scalf, hat and earring shopping in the pouring rain.  

 I am going to be a  Mystic meg  look – a – like at the and end of this. 

God I hope my head isn’t really white and I don’t look ugly bald! The fear is real! 

Monday = Game Face.

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Soooooo….. This weekend I went a bit AWOL (absent without leave), the plans I made I chickened out from, so I didn’t drive to London to see all the GALAXY GIRLS pull cars, sprint and then strut their stuff on stage. I desperately wanted to go but was also scared stiff to stray to far from home by myself and drive for that long. I think this first time round I am questioning myself all the time as to what I can and can’t do. I feel like I let friends down and I’m really sorry about that.

It’s all a bit of a testing ground. My second round will definitely be easier to judge as I will have done it once. So I’m trying to let myself off for not going and supporting all the girls as I know I will be there next time and it was just too soon for me.

So I was a bit upset with myself all weekend and was a grump but agreed to go out for a bite to eat Saturday night with Cassie to cheer me up and ended up staying out until sunrise! Seriously I haven’t done that since before Christmas.

And I know, I know I’m on treatment and I shouldn’t party! But actually why not? I drank, I danced, I laughed, I had a good time. And the nurses say you can have a drink just most people don’t want to due to the metallic taste, but I don’t have that this time round so I drank while I can!! It was great to let my hair down and meet new people and chat old athletics stories to a fellow former athlete!

So Sunday was spent recovering and eating a disgraceful veggie pizza, but Monday morning I woke up, early, and headed to Hereford to the Haven, an amazing charity who offer support to women with Breast Cancer. I had a hypnotherapy session followed by yoga.

The hypnotherapy isn’t someone making me do a chicken dance it is a lovely lady called Laura, who talks to me about what I want to achieve from the session, and makes me realise I have all the skills to tackle everything but I just need to apply them. She was talking to me whilst I visualised today about snakes and ladders. And you know what, it stuck with me, life is just like snakes and ladders you get an opportunity and you climb up and feel totally in control, and sometimes a set back comes along and you feel out of control on the slippery snake then you balance, plod along and another ladder is set out I front of you. It was a great analogy for life.

And in Yoga I have really progressed.,I actually managed to touch my hands at my back today and did downward dog, which I haven’t done since my operation. It’s hard when you go from being super fit to super crap at everything but I felt like I made progress and that is great for me.

So today I have game face on, I’ve got back in the kitchen since my first chemo and cooked some simple food, done yoga, worked on my head, and I feel great for it! It really is the simple things that keep you happy and just well …. YOU! I am post chemo day 10 and feeling good. I might have thought at times I couldn’t do this but today I feel like I can!

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Frankie Ain’t Got Nothing On Me.

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Well ok she has, she’s a beaut! But I went with it and got Dionne to chop off my hair, and to my amazement I like it. My neck is cold, and there is hair in my eyes but I will get used to that.

I have been told I need to use a hair dryer now! And actually style it.. High heat and low speed and no parting. How I’m going to manage this I don’t know but I am going to give it a shot.

But all in all, even if the worst doesn’t happen and I don’t have a bald head this will be far easier than desperately seeking out a hair bobble mid- sick bucket moment. So it’s a win from me!

And if not now… When can you play with your hair……

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Double Jab.

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Thanks to my kickboxing nurse I got a double jab of my white blood cell booster injection (filgrastim) this afternoon. Oh apparently I moved and the needle came out and so she had to jab me twice in the stomach, whilst laughing at my pain! 😂 There is no need to the randomness of this girl!

But that is three days of white blood cell boosters out of seven done, and the end of some of my anti-nausea drugs today, which scares me. As I’m still struggling with food and feeling sick here and there. So I guess it is wait and see and then call the hospital if I need more help.

Haircut day tomorrow and I’m feeling nervous, the last time I had short brown hair I was 21 starting my first proper office job and trying to look sophisticated, needless to say it didn’t work, I cried all week until my hairdresser could put some blonde highlights throughout and I then I grew it for the next 5 years, and bleached it religiously!

I’m trying not to bleach my hair but I’m not sure I can do short and dark, but I have managed long and dark hair for the past month or so.

I think from my Facebook page pole ( Melinda Cooksey – Toxin Free Living) it is the frankie do that is the most popular! Although it is the most dramatic so I’m not sure I am brave enough to do it.

Why hair is so important to a girl I just don’t know! But it just feels so scary to think I might lose it all and be a baldilocks, what if I get a wig and it is windy and it blows off, or my kickboxing nurse pulls it off my head in the street! (She’d do that to me, and film it!).

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The C word.

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Well yesterday I went for my first chemotherapy treatment, which I won’t lie I was nervous about the last few days, but I decided to go ahead due to several factors: I haven’t been able to research enough about how to keep cancer at bay and feel 100% confident with natural measures, and for my loved ones who have all had major stresses along the way of me saying I won’t have it, so I’m doing it for them and security and my peace of mind.

As I walked in the room everyone stared at me and Cassie, I suppose when you look half the age of everyone else having treatment, even in the treatment room people are intrigued and probably relieved it was the ‘slightly’ older one of the two of us going into the treatment chair! Also me and Cassie caused chaos moving from one chair to another and confusing the nurse.

It’s quite a long process, longer than I was expecting, it was about 30-40 minutes saline flush, then 30 mins anti sickness bag 1, then about 20 mins or so for anti sickness bag 2! Then it was about 1 hour for the 6 syringes of chemo to be pumped into me. The 6 syringes are made up of 2 syringes of each of the 3 types of chemo I have that make up FEC (fluorouracil also called 5FU,
epirubicin, cyclophosphamide). One of the three made my nose run and sneeze and as soon as I stopped having it pumped into me by the nurse I was fine. Then the third one into me burnt as it went in. I have three cycles of this and then three further cycles of T ( Docetaxel).

It felt like it took forever but Cass came to keep me company and all but two of the other people I could see in the room had people wit them.
I apparently looked a bit dopey when it was all finished and I was a little nauseous and had a terrible headache a couple of hours after eating but it went away as I laughed my head of at Googlebox. I so want to be on Googlebox!

After sleeping for an hour a wave of sickness came across me and I ran to the toilet with my hoody in hand so that I didn’t freeze, but I wasn’t sick and then the bowl was brought out and around 12.15 I was sick, I managed to give myself whiplash, reaching for the bowl so fast, cried and sobbed that I couldn’t do this to Cass, who had to convince me I wasn’t dying and I was just being sick! Then I had relief for around 30 minutes and then the pain kicked in again and sickness again and then my period started, great! So not only am sick when I’m not sick I have period pains. Not the best combination you could imagine!

I carry on on my hourly cycle of sickness until about 6 am in the morning when I eventually stop. And then I slept for an hour and took a cocktail of pills I had been given, and had a green smoothie with added vitamin c at lunch time.

I haven’t much fancied food, I feel sick most the time and have a what feels like a constant headache but as the day goes on and I am getting better.

I had my first injection today to boost my white blood cells, at least they said I was thin, haha, that was a nice compliment as I feel so fat at the moment, not that it is important what I weigh at the moment. For the rest of the week Cassie will do my injections for me, they showed her what to do, to save a district nurse coming out to me daily . I could do them myself but I’m really not great with the thought of injecting myself!

Anyway hopefully there is no sickness tonight, and on a plus I did use my Fushi organic carrot oil that Fiona brought me a couple of days ago, so although I am not allowed sunbeds 😩 I rubbed that on my face and looked nice and tanned. Plus you can eat it as well! It’s packed full of vitamins A, B, C, D & E as well as Beta Carotene. So all round it’s good for me, organic and made me look brown….slightly orange to start with 😂 but it settled down.

So cross fingers for a better night! And no begging for it to be over. And apparently it gets bad day 4 -7 so I hope that isn’t the case for me!

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Little Pinkie 

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A mini post for the evening, after going for a bike ride! Yes I’m 6 weeks post op and trying to do a little bit of light exercise befor me chemo starts, and hopefully throughout, I looked at my Unchipped nails and thought this non- toxic nail varnish is amazing! 

I have Fluorescent pink non- toxic nails! It’s made from pure water and bees wax and is like a gel finish from a new company called little ondine. 

I tried a different minimised toxin nail varnish but honestly it wasn’t a patch on these that are completely toxic free. 

I now have 3 colours (silver glitter, fluorescent pink and green), I also have the secret base and top coat that adds shine and I reckon keeps them staying on for longer! 

I painted my nails Monday, it’s now Thursday and they are still perfect! 

I cannot recommend these nail polishes enough, they are Melinda proof which is a feat in itself and toxic free and an amazing range of colours!  

 

That Sick Feeling

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That sick feeling just won’t leave me alone at the moment. I know I need my anxiety to just go away, but currently it is at an all time high. Im trying to work and struggling to keep my focus off the dreaded C word. Then when I try to think about it and make a decision, I can’t and procrastinate about other things.

As dramatic as it sounds I feel so frightened to make a decision about what to do as I know it affects other people, and I don’t have the energy to fight my corner at the moment. Honestly I just want someone to tell me what to do. I want a genie to tell me it’s all ok and that I’ll be alive in 5 / 10 /15 years time. That life will be perfect, and I will be on a beach somewhere and this will be a distant memory.

Do I risk a second tumour with egg harvesting or just rely on fate that if I am due children it will happen?

Do I have chemo or not. The test results did not help me as I had hoped they would. I was told I would get a percentage so I had in my head these markers of when I would and wouldn’t have chemo. My results sit in the intermediate risk group. I have a score of 28. And the low return risk is 0-17, intermediate risk of return is 18-30 and high risk is 31+

The scale goes up to 100 so on the face of it; is 28 directly equivalent to 28% return? Or is 28 high in the intermediate group and therefore more medium – high risk as only 3 points off the high risk score of 31 ? I just don’t know so will ask tomorrow when I see my oncologist.

Other factors affect it they keep telling me …. Size of the cancer and my age. But chemo isn’t full proof. It’s not a magic wand that stops you having cancer again. And on top of this, It has so many potential side effects I find it difficult to agree to it, I don’t want to be suffering with brittle teeth and bones in 10 years time, I want to be back running around like a kid again, competing in masters athletics competitions, looking after a family. But on the other hand micronutrients, immunomodulation and toxin free living aren’t full proof either. And I can’t find any directly comparable studies. So I can’t put them against each other. (I know I am airy fairy on the outside but I have a weirdly scientific mind and just want facts and figures, not a game of pot luck).
Or do I combine immunomodulation (wholistic therapies like hypnotherapy, herbs, vitamins) with conventional therapy like chemo, radio and tamoxifen.

And on top of this the time is ticking on my appointment for the fertility institute. Which I have now postponed until after my oncologist appointment.
I just couldn’t start the fertility treatment today to preserve my chances of a child it was too much to deal with. Do I go with an increase risk of a further tumour else where or just leave my body alone and hope. I’ve always wanted kids so I find it tough to decide. I want to safe guard kids in the future but also I want to protect myself at the same time.

It’s tough, and I used to think trying to not eat chocolate on a comp – prep diet was hard!!

Baby Maker.

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So first thing this morning, I visited the Women’s Hospital in Birmingham. I still can’t drive so had to get a lift with Cassie, who got up at the crack of dawn to come get me, I have to admit I feel like a proper burden at times!
So we park the car (£4.50 for hospital parking…seriously?!?) and walk out to be faced by the Cancer Centre, I see cancer more and more since my diagnosis, I see so many posters, adverts, I even watched a film that was meant to be a comedy about it … It wasn’t funny by the way, so Netflix need to sort that description out!

Anyway back to the point of my blog, I got probed and prodded, literally, scanned and more blood tests, they must have a whole blood bank from me now. And for the first time given lots of information without asking, and a projected time line.

Now I have to get my head in gear to decided if it is worth harvesting my eggs, In case chemotherapy takes away my fertility for the future and balancing this against the risk of increasing the spread of cancer. I could set of another tumour if I go ahead. My deadline is Wednesday 10am. My first injection will be that day if I choose this path and do I want another operation under general anaesthetic. Will it just happen if it is meant to be?

There are so many things to consider with this, my life is a whirlwind, in every which way, my head doesn’t switch off. And I can only imagine tonight will be another sleepless night for me, my head is in future mode which is weird as most people, including myself tend to look at the past more than future, so it’s a strange feeling to be future dominant.

Is it worth it??? Is a baby in the future worth the risk of setting off more cancer? And then the percentages are decreased for me potentially, as they aren’t allowed to wait for the right time in my cycle, due to my ‘circumstances.’ It’s a case of now has to be the right time.

So to help my decision I called my onchologist’s secretary today asking for my test results from my oncho test. They are in! Eeeekkkkkk. But she isn’t allowed to give me them. Booooo!
So I have asked to be called before Wednesday by my onchologist. I see my him Thursday to determine my treatment pathway, but knowing the results would really help with this decision.

How am I feeling? In one word: Sick. I have these nasty feeling butterflies in my stomach that won’t leave me alone. It’s like when I used to race, all through warming up, I would feel like I was going to be sick, I would be so nervous, it’s that but for longer than an hour!

So I’m waiting for a phone call now. Im not leaving my phones for even a second today. I ate my green soup for lunch, that was yummy and organic, I will post a recipe for it later this week.

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A Proud Day. The Fight Was Worth It.

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So sometimes life can feel like a constant battle, yep, I testify to that statement! It can feel like everything and everyone is against you, and nothing goes in your favour. But it isn’t and they aren’t!
Fact is, whatever it concerns, if you know what you want, you will get it by using positive affirmations. Drown yourself in negativity and you will get bad results, and then when you wonder why that didn’t work for me, why don’t I get the cash, the relationship, the car I want? Well, you would if you just know what you want, believe you deserve it and ask for it and you will receive it. If you haven’t read the secret, or watched the movie, go check it out on netflics tonight.
So I have plenty of things I want, but the most crucial at the moment, is to do with my decision making, I have constantly said to everyone, I need a percentage, I need facts and figures to make my decision. I can’t go ahead with chemotherapy on the basis that I’m young, it just isn’t enough for me.
But I have asked, pushed, fought my corner all the way along with the NHS. And honourably ever request and argument I have given they have conceded too, they probably see my name on paper now and get as anxious as I do about going in to see them. I might be scared on the inside but I do my best to act fierce to them and I am so pleased to say they have put me forward for the genomic cancer test. It is expensive, a whopping £2,800 and is normally privately funded, but I am pleased to say, I am the first person in the country to get it paid for by the NHS, since its introduction into the system on the 30th March. So as this is now part of the system, if you are struggling with a chemotherapy decision, please ask your consultant if you are eligible for the test and if you can have it. Put your foot down, make them understand it is your life and you need to know! If like me you struggle to say it in person, the emotion gets to you, take a few days and compose an email, or letter to the consultant and team.
Knowledge is power! And doing my research has paid off! I find out in 2 weeks how effective chemotherapy will be for me in reducing my risk of getting cancer again.
Life is a funny thing, and I have learned through this that you have to respect and love yourself, I just wish I had sooner!

Genomic test reference:
http://www.cancercenter.com/treatments/genomic-tumor-assessment/

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