104 degrees in Portland

Hello everyone

Ken and I have been up on Portland and are heading home now. We live in Bandon, which is on the ocean and its kind of a 50 degree kind of place.

In the winter the temperature averages highs in the 50s and lows in the 40s.  In the summer the temperature averages lows in the 50s and highs in the 60s. So we spend a lot of time in the 50s, which I have just decided is a great place to go through chemo and radiation.  Portland was 104 degrees today, which by my standards is twice as hot as I am used to. 

Sweating is something I usually do not have to deal with, and clearly takes some planning for. Open wounds seem to be aggravated by sweating, and its harder to maintain hydration.  So we are going to go home and stay home.

I cannot imagine how someone who has just had chemo must feel  on a day like today, with the nausea etc, my heart goes out to those who are ill in this heat.

As scheduled my hair started to fall out two days ago.  In fact it is not actually "falling" out because it is too short to fall. It seems to need some weight for it to fall out. If I give it a tug though it comes out. It seems to be mainly at the back for now.

I wanted to explain also how it grew in because that was kind of interesting.  Throughout the chemo in April and May, (after it fell out) it actually grew in a weird sort of way.  There were very sparse white hairs with bent ends on them. I kept telling everyone (especially Ken) "this is not my hair!" He kept wanting to rub the top of my head, heck everyone wants to!!!!!  When my REAL hair started to come in, (about 7 weeks after the last chemo) at first I thought I had dirt on my head from gardening. It grew in just as if I had just shaved it.  Not like the white peach fuzz.

Unfortunately the sparse white strands are mixed in with the dark ones creating a "grey" appearance. Not that I am not grey, I am, just not THAT grey.

 There was this ad on TV years ago with this blond with gorgeous hair, and the caption was "does she or doesn't she, only her hairdresser knows for sure"

Well now everyone knows. :)......for sure.  All my secrets.

Ken and I were just talking about how many weird interesting bits there are to chemo. For instance, the hair grew back on one leg but not the other.  Try to explain that one medically.

Well the temperature has dropped from 104 down to 61 as we drove from I5 to the coast (60 miles, directly west) (most of the drop that last 10 miles).

I feel like I may be coming down with a cold, think I will go home and have a hot bath.  

PS the reason we are taking all these pictures of me is that we are trying to get one we can use for the booklet in my cd cover.  Trying to capture the "the look", with my Annie Lennox hairdo, at least that is who Irene told me I looked like today..

This one was taken today in Portland, and I thought it showed the weird white hairs better.

love and peace

Janet Bates

jankenb  @ gmail.com