Hi Kim,

I had a similar regimen in 2020 for TNBC. I have had no reoccurrences and my lab work and scans have dropped to just every 6 months. My oncologist now hugs me after every meeting!!

The pain should stop with the first doses, especially with the weekly taxel first. The TNBC went to my skin in the weeks between diagnosis and chemo and it was so painful but the first chemo session knocked that out.

1. Your center should have warm blankets. I brought a laptop to watch movies. With the taxel I had they mainline Benadryl through your port/IV in case of allergic reactions, so I mostly dozed.

2. I had a great book, The Cancer Fighting Kitchen, for recipes. You can have family and friends do recipes right out of the book and there's lots to help tweak recipes when your taste center is off from chemo.

3. Most centers have donated wigs and hats and scarves - I got my hats there.

4. The cascade of medicines is a lot - like the chemo will destroy your white blood cells, so you get an on-body to replenish your WB cells, but the on-body causes bone aches, so they'll give you Claritin...

You can forget why you are taking what, but they do all help. I skipped my constipation medicine, thinking I'd be fine since I was so young and healthy and ate well - huge mistake.

It's tough having a "bad" version of a "good" cancer - even the few friends who were still doing meals through radiation and reconstruction really didn't understand how fast/far the cancer had spread and how much work was needed to get rid of all of it.

You got this, and we are with you.