Cancer is quite expensive. Today I will have a nurse come and she is going to give me an injection. The purpose of the injection is to help out with my white blood cells so that they do not drop too much. If my lab work comes back with concerns then it delays my treatments and it is not necessarily something that I want to do. My next treatment is right before we head off to Timmins for Tournament of Champions and if there is a delay and I need to delay a day for treatment it would mean that my disconnect is on Friday. I would then end up missing half of the tournament if I can find a ride up there. I also need to remember to bring up my face masks so that I can avoid people. So far it seems that the hardest day right now is the Thursday of the treatment day and Friday so far is not too bad. My hands are quite cold and i use to have gloves in my office and for some reason I can not find them at the moment. I have my heater on in my office and the weather outside is actually much warmer, but my body feels so much colder. My hands are freezing as are my feet. This was expected but it makes it a bit tricky to type and I am going to need to figure out what I need to do in order to get around that part of it.
Yesterday I was in no shape to drive to my appointment so Mel’s aunt ended up taking me which was appreciated. She was quiet through it all and let me have fun with my shenanigans. I am not sure if Mel will always be able to go with me but there are a lot of people that offered to go with me in order to give me food and snacks. I am not sure if I need that but the support is greatly appreciated. Last night I also had a delivery of proper Ukrainian cabbage rolls from my childhood. I was smart and only had 1 small one as my night time snack and then 2 for my 3am meal. They are as delicious as I remember and remind me of growing up. When I was working at Vale we went to Deluxe once and I ordered a burger to go along with my chicken fingers and my coworker asked me if it was good. I was honest and said no, they are not good burgers but they reminded me of my childhood. Kind of how sometimes I want that crappy burger that we used to eat in the high school cafeteria. It is nostalgic and I want to remember that taste. In the downtown mall there use to be an IGA there and they sold pizza by the slice facing the outside. I still remember that flavour and crave it at times. By no stretch of the imagination was it the best pizza, but it reminds me of my childhood.
I started the bread making process with Olivier this morning and he helped me with the original morning folds. Tomorrow morning I will take them out of the fridge after cold fermenting and we will start shaping the bread. He seems to be enjoying it and I have explained the process. This morning the bread was all shaggy and wet, but by the end of the day it was right and much smoother. If this goes well then I am going to start making sourdough bread with him. Tomorrow our dinner is charcuterie and we have some nice cultured butter as well. I am going to let him shape his own baguette and hopefully it will turn out all right and if not that is ok.
My home care nurse came by and we chatted and she gave me my injection. It was pretty easy to do and I should be able to do it myself if I was strong enough. It is designed so old people can do it and if you have arthritis. I just have zero strength so I struggle pushing it into my abdomen. If I try into my leg I think it would be easier but the whole process is rather painless and easy to do. She is going to check up on me once every two weeks as opposed to weekly. I am listed as palliative and she said we do not need to do anything for end of life care because I seem to be doing quite well. That was good to hear. So far things are going well, I still get some discomfort in my abdomen if I am up and doing things for awhile. I am trying to stretch out my muscles there as it feels like a muscle issue to me right now. With controlled breathing and concentration I can reduce the discomfort so I will test it out and see how it works.
I had an OTN call scheduled with my social worker but after 30 minutes she did not show up. As I am always early I was on the call for 45 minutes and she did not join so I left. I have some other appointments and it is not something that I really cared about so I figured that I was going to leave as I do not see it as that big of an impact on me. Something that I have appreciated a lot throughout this is the support from Mel and how proactive she is with everything. She is always ahead of the game and looking for other opportunities, planning of arranging with the different groups. My energy is limited this week and I nap for at least 2 hours at some point. Generally at 4pm at the end of the work day as I am fatigued from starting at 7am and then at 7pm again for night time respite. She has been corresponding with every one and making all sorts of arrangements so that I do not need to and I appreciate that I can concentrate on myself. She has the sniffles today so she seems to be getting sick. In order to prevent me from getting sick she will sleep elsewhere tonight as my immune system is quite compromised.
Q