Just checked out my CA-125 results from yesterday. It is at 11 once again so good news there.

Another 4 week visit today. I met with another research fellow and she also had a high school student who was shadowing her. Apparently I am a model patient (and an easy one to work with) so they like to have all the newer/student doctors see me and read through my chart.

This visit was a little harder for me because my baby has started kindergarten and she needs to be driven to school right after lunchtime. Thankfully there is another little girl in her class from our neighborhood so MJ was able to get a ride with her and we will be carpooling from now on. It also worked out that my 12 year old hasn't started school yet so she was able to watch MJ until she was picked up for school. I asked the scheduler to give me afternoon appointments from here on out. Apparently the afternoon ones are easier to get because most people want a morning appointment so they can have their chemotherapy on the same day. I don't have to deal with that right now so I will be switching to afternoon appointments.

I found out a couple of days ago that my neighbor's cancer had spread more than they were hoping. She had her surgery and was diagnosed with stage 3C ovarian cancer - just one step better than my diagnosis. They were hoping that it hadn't spread that much... I went to the hospital today to visit with her. This whole experience has been bringing back a lot of memories and emotions from almost 4 years ago. I can't believe that it has been that long! They also found out that she does not have the BRCA-1 mutation - which surprised everyone. That will make her experience and treatment a little different than mine was. She will meet with her oncologist next week to decide on a chemo treatment schedule. (I will only give brief updates here about my neighbor because I don't want to share too much of what is her story.)

My CA-125 number this week was back down to 11.

My husband left for scout camp yesterday and M&M and Blondie left for YW camp this morning.

Today is Blondie's 12th birthday - my 3rd child! They are growing up too quickly!

Everything went fine with my appointment today. My scans looked good once again. Today is the surgery date for my neighbor - hoping for the best for her.

I had another scan today. Things were uneventful with the scan once again.

My CA-125 number was at 12 this week. I am not worried about it bouncing around like this though. I asked my doctor about it one time and she said that the bouncing around is fine - it is if the number started doubling each time that she would start to get concerned.

The other day my husband and I were talking about how we felt strongly for some reason to move to the house that we are in and we were wondering what that reason was. Then a day or two later we were at church and I was up on the stand because I was playing the organ for Sacrament Meeting when the bishop went up to the pulpit and announced that a neighbor of ours that had just had a baby had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer. My husband and I just looked at each other and I had an overwhelming feeling come over me that this is one of the reasons that we are in this house at this time - so that I can help be there to support our neighbor and her family. After church DH and I went to the hospital to visit with her and I had written her a letter beforehand about some of my experiences and feelings at the time. I also gave her my contact info and the link to this blog and told her to feel free to call me anytime for help or with questions.

Today at my appointment I talked with my doctor and nurse practitioner about my neighbor and they gave me some contact info so she can try to get in to the doctors at Huntsman. Other than that my appointment went fine. It is nice having the older kids out of school now so I don't have to find someone to watch MJ for me.

My CA-125 number this week is 11!

Had my 4 week appointment today. Everything looked fine with my CT scans. I am one of only a couple of patients still on the study that I am on. My doctor is hoping that pretty soon here they will let me space my scans further apart. Since my last appointment I have started trying to cut down more and more on the anti-nausea drug that I am taking. Right now I am down to taking a quarter of a pill before I take the veliparib.

Routine CT scan today. Nothing out of the normal to report.

The office called me yesterday and said that the machine for testing the CA-125 number was down for some maintenance so I would have to wait another day for the results from the test.  I checked online today and my number has risen slightly to 12 (from 10 the last couple of times).  Hopefully that is nothing to worry about yet.  Hopefully it will not continue to go up like happened a little over a year ago now...

Had my 4 week appt today again. I had to wait a long time for them to even call me back for my lab work today. After waiting for about 20 minutes I went and asked at the receptionist desk and they said that they were just really busy and would get me back as soon as they could.  I ended up finally getting called back for the labs and by the time I saw the doctor it was about an hour past my appointment time.  (Usually they are pretty close to schedule and I am usually called back for my labs within 5 minutes of checking in at the front desk.)

I met with another resident fellow today. I'm never sure what to say to them because I really don't have any symptoms to complain about and not much to really discuss with them.  After that the doctor came in and I let her know that my surgeon is moving.  We think it would just be easier to transfer my care up to Huntsman so we are not having to send results back and forth between the two offices.

I also asked the doctor if I could ever be considered in remission. I have people ask me all the time and I am never really sure what to say to them.  She said that yes I can tell people that I am in remission - since I have no evidence of disease and my CA-125 number is within normal levels.  She said that I am just receiving maintenance therapy for the cancer - we are not actively treating any cancer.  So "YEA" I am in remission!!

I had a mammogram today.  It went pretty quickly and then the technician said that the doctor was going to look at the scans while I was waiting in case there was something of concern on the scan that they wanted to take another look at.  So after waiting for a few minutes back in the waiting room, the technician came out and said that things looked good and that I could go home.  That was kind of nice - better than the last time when I had to come back a couple of days later to do some rescans.

I had my 6 month appt with my surgeon today.  She said that she is moving at the end of June so this will probably be my last time seeing her.  Her husband got a new job in Michigan so she is transferring to a practice out of the University of Toledo.  She said that I can either transfer my care to one of her partners in the office or just transfer to one of the doctors at Huntsman.  Other than that everything went fine for my appt.

My CA-125 number is still at 10 this time around.

Went in for my 4 week appt today.  I asked the doctor about the labs that they wanted to draw on Monday and they were a little confused by it too.  Apparently I could have had them draw my labs on Monday but they have to do the study labs right before my appointment so it doesn't really matter either way.  I just couldn't remember if I was allowed to take my study drug on the morning of the regular labs so I didn't want to risk it on Monday.  I am not supposed to take the study drug before the labs for the study are drawn, but apparently it is fine for the other labs.

We also discussed my bone scan briefly and they said that my bone density levels are pretty close to what they were with my last scan and that my vitamin D levels look good so just keep taking the vitamin D supplements.

CT scan today. Things went fine for it.  When I went to get my port accessed, the nurse said that I had lab work for her to draw and I was a little confused because we usually just do it right before my appointment at Huntsman since they have to draw special tubes for the study anyway.  So I told the nurse not to draw them. Other than that, everything went as usual.

The bone density machine finally worked today! The scan went pretty quickly and then I was out of there and back home again.

I had my bone density scan scheduled for this morning.  When I showed up the technician came out and said that she hadn't used the scanner since that last time when it had broken down and when she showed up this morning there was a note on her desk saying that everything was working.  Well, she tried to turn the machine on and it wouldn't even turn on this morning.  So we had to reschedule again! And they gave me another $6 gift card to the eatery again.  Luckily this time I hadn't traveled very far to get there.  So I will cross my fingers that everything will work next week...

I also go my CA-125 test results back and it is at 10 again.