Thursday, October 6, 2016

The Good, the Bad and the Hair Loss

Woke up this morning to the first snow in Monument this season. Very nice. Hoss thought the cold weather and the snow was great - just what a collie would ask for. This is pretty early for a first snow.  Wonder what that says about the pending winter season? Heard on the radio yesterday that Loveland Ski Area had fired up their snow-making machines as snow started falling in the high country. In my family, it’s time to get those snowboards waxed and ready to go!

I am still feeling pretty good after my first round of Rituxan infusions in August.  The RA symptoms are quite diminished and I am able to do many things I could not do during my biologic-fee, super flare summer. Wish I could say that all of the pleurisy issues had also packed up and left, but no. The breathing stuff is slowly getting better but seems determined to hang around for the fall months. Ugh.

I have discovered that there are some interesting Rituxan side effects, at least for me. The biggest negative is that I am losing a lot of hair every day in my brush.  This has been going on for a while and I can tell that my hair is getting thinner.  Right now my hair is fairly long and it started out pretty thick, too. Good thing! I may actually have to get about 6 to 8 inches trimmed to take the weight off of my hair and make it look more full again. I am taking folic acid already for the potential hair loss from the weekly Methotrexate and hoping that this hair attrition slows down and stops soon.

I have noticed that I blog less when I am feeling better. That is a good thing.

Hope this hair loss thing slows down soon! Otherwise it is a crew cut for me. Not sure what I think about that possibility...


Susan