Mrs Henry Lafayette Dubose

oh, feelings, you are unwelcome. a quick snatching of some medicines, and back to the book, the happy narrative distraction. do not revisit me, delicious spaghetti on toast dinner! you must continue your journey down into the bellypits, forge on bravely though nothing is right. you must be the fibrous saviour of the intestinal tract! lord knows cupasoup isn't up to the challenge. may you be strong and unyielding whatever those gastric juices throw at you, and you will be generously rewarded. good luck wriggly sirs! the path is yours for the staking!

to post, or not to post

i haven't posted in ages because i've been pretty sad. the chemo seems to be stretching boundlessly ahead (around february); the chance of metastases is high (around 40%); and i've been sick.

it's not all bad. i've made a pretty good recovery from surgery in that i'm walking and bending reasonably, trying to decrease pain meds etc. steve puts vitamin e on my scar as often as we remember but it's still pretty mean.

since the last post i had cisp/dox again, got really sick, got an infection, got readmitted to hospital, had antibiotics, got out, went back for methotrexate, got out, and now i'm going back for ifos/etop. i'm grumpy because it has unfortunately ended up like almost three straight weeks of hospital, which has been really tough. i've had lots of yuckie roommates too; the exploding poo guy, the poo in the bed guy, the guy who demands things of my guests. hopefully this week will be less eventful/gross.

i've never had ifos/etop before, it's the new chemo they've added since the surgery. it's five consecutive days of chemo followed by 2 weeks off. the side effects aren't necessarily too bad, hopefully it will be better tolerated than cisp/dox. i'm pretty nervous.

there were a couple of fuckups last week. the first was when a newish nurse took my bloods without first turning off the second infusion, which meant that the blood was diluted. when the results came back, the doctors panicked and ordered not one but three transfusions, each of which comes with the risk of hepatitis or hiv. it was only because one of my regular nurses was switched to nights, and was surprised by this very unusual effect, that it was investigated further. they took my bloods again properly and they were fine. so i nearly had three bags of blood i didn't need.

the second fuck up was with people who don't know how to access ports, and i won't go into it because it's gross and long winded, but i ended up being "reneedled" which is way grosser than you think, two times more than necessary. not happy.

so i'm nervous to be going back this week. it just seems like the more time you spend in hospital, the more chance something is going to go seriously wrong and you get aids. epic fail. but in better news, next saturday my puppy is arriving.

this isn't much of a post but at least now everyone knows what's happening. when i get some pizazz back i promise i'll be all in your face with jokes and photos of puppy and new shit.

lots of love jes

ps metamucil rules

some more news

spoke to dr lisa orme, consulting oncologist today regarding the pathology of the tumour. the news was as such:

the tumour had an intermediate response to chemo. ideally, the tumour would have been more than 90% dead when it was removed, and the result was around 85-90%, which is ok, not the worst response, but not enough of a response to be sure about sticking with the same chemo medicines. the decision now is whether or not to add complementary medicines, called IE for now, to the treatment regime. the upside of this would be an increased chance of killing all the cancer so nothing metastesises or recurs. the downside would be the other possible side effects, including some kidney toxicity i think, and the treatment would be over 40 weeks instead of 26 weeks (6-9 months).

the oncologists and my surgeon are going to meet, discuss and formulate a recommendation on wednesday, and i suppose i'll go with it.

heading back into pmac for cisplatin/doxorubicin tomorrow.

xox

post-surgical blues

so much has happened!


SURGERY.
it all went swimmingly, so i hear. i had a general anaesthetic and a spinal block, which was gross. my family were all present when i was being wheeled into the optheatre, and i became very distressed so they offered me sedation straight up, because you have to be awake for the needle in the spine before they can give you the general. so they pumped some sedation into my arm, and you're supposed to sit up while they spike your spine but i got too dizzy so they put a pillow on my knees and i curled over. i can remember the needle but not the pain, so i assume there wasn't much, then they told me to lie down and i guess the general must have happened because next thing i knew it was 5hrs later and i was in recovery.

i had a little bit of pain in recovery but they hooked me up with something and i slept for a while. the first night out i spent in the high dependency ward next door to a man who was either snoring, vomiting or hawking snot at a high volume the entire night. fortunately i could go back to the normal ward the next day for the rest of the stay.


HOSPITAL.
the nurses at the mercy private have a higher rate of retardedness, i would not recommend going there. my spinal block wore off after 24hrs and the pain, oh the pain, was bad, and it took 18 nurses and 1 hour to set up the intraveinous morphine, during which time i cried, screamed, writhed and my mother abused health professionals. the iv morphine comes with a button, and you administer your own pain relief as often as you need it, with as little as 5 minute intervals. i didn't find morphine as awesome as i'd hoped, but 3 to 4 pushes in 20 minutes put me to sleep, which was good enough.

i was on morphine for a couple of days. the second day out, my surgeon, the lovely gerard powell, visited me and shouted at all the nurses for not doing their jobs properly. apparently i should have been out of bed already, starting movement. so that's what i did from day 3 onwards. the first walk was excruciating, but i soon realised that a lot of the pain was due to the splint holding my leg straight, as it tied over the wound in a particularly sore place. once i removed the splint i found walking easier, though my knee could take no weight, it just gave way. i also lost all use of my quads, so i couldn't lift my leg at all. to get in and out of bed was impossible without somebody lifting my right leg out for me. this was not fun.

sidenote, the tubes in and out of my body when i woke up included: drain tubes in leg, canula with iv fluids (later morphine) in wrist, catheter, nasal canular. 36 staples in incision!!!!

i will include staple photos soon.

the tubes were removed progressively over my stay and i was released from mercy horrorspital about 5 days after surgery.


SINCE HOSPITAL.
i have enjoyed a cocktail of delicious pain relief medication. my leg has strengthened to the point where i can take some quick steps, and lift it in and out of bed sometimes. the pain is still really bad, and i'm scared that it will be for a long time/ever. i don't know how i can stop taking the meds when i feel like they're hardly working anyway. but i guess i'll speak to the specialists about that. it would be easier if my surgeon was more receptive to questions, but that's how surgeons are apparently.

people have been bringing me lots of tv, which has been awesome. true blood, season 3 30 rock, season 2 flight of the conchords have been my favourite friends. they're making me have weird dreams though so i need to go back to reading. steve bought me twilight and guys, i'm pretty sure it sucks. the majority is wrong again.


LOOKING FORWARD.
tactlessly, my hair has started to grow back in the time since i last had chemo. tomorrow i have my first post-op petermac appointment, where i will hopefully be given information regarding the percentage necrosis (deadness) of the tumour they removed, and therefore how much more chemo i need to have, and what type. they've indicated it will probably be another 6-9 months of chemo but tomorrow they should know for sure. then i suppose i'll be admitted next week!

other than chemo, it's all physio and exercises for a while yet. i'm very unstable moving, and very sore. i can't bend my leg past about 45 degrees, so i can't really sit comfortably in a car or a tute or on a chair. it's so easy to think that you would just keep practising but it hurts so much. i think i'll ask about different pain relief because this stuff isn't really cutting the mustard.

we've almost settled on our puppy choice. it's called a new g dog (possibly sponsored by telstra) which is a 4way cross between a cavalier, a bichon frise, a poodle and a schnauzer. they're supposed to be really strong with good temperaments. anyone have an opinion on this?


sorry for such a long and largely unfunny post. it sounds worse than it is, i'm feeling better and stronger every day. my family and steve are doing amazing jobs looking after me, and i have received so many awesome presents and flowers, thank you everyone!! really keeping my spirits up.

hope to be out and about again soon, i miss having stuff to do!

lots of love,
the bionic woman
xox

surgery

today is wednesday july 22 and i'm heading into the mercy hospital tonight for surgery tomorrow. the surgery will take approximately 4 hours, under general anaesthetic and possibly with a spinal epidural, which means i'll wake up with "no legs", which will be quite scary but better in the long run. they're replacing the bottom third of my femur and my knee with titanium, and i'll have a 20 inch scar down to the middle of my shin. i'm nervous i suppose, but there doesn't seem to be any point in thinking about it in any great depth, as it's going to happen regardless.

i should be home in two weeks, maybe less, depending on my progress. apparently i'll be sent home when i can walk on my crutches, which seems like a good sign because i thought i'd have to be in a wheelchair for a while.

i will text everyone tomorrow when i wake up to say that i'm ok.

see you soon

important things and unimportant things

firstly, the results of the PET scan:

as a result of my oncologist BEING ON HOLIDAY, i couldn't get the most informed person to interpret the results of my scan, and had to accost poor ward nurses/doctors/patients to break down what they said and meant. the results can't really be used on their own anyway, so it's hard to make any conclusions, but here it is.

the PET scan measures cell activity, that is, how much is going on inside the cells. what they can tell me is that the tumour has had a partial response to chemo. as compared to a complete response, where it would be all dead, or no response, where activity levels would be the same or higher than they were before chemo.

without the mri and a biopsy it's hard to know any more than this. but it means that the tumour has in some way been affected, it might be 10% dead or it might be 60% dead, we don't know yet. they'll work that out when they cut it out, and they'll decide whether to push ahead with the same chemo regime or try different drugs. any response is better than no response, so good news.

and now for two less important but more funny things that have happened:

1) anthony this one is for you
after my PET, for which i had to fast, i seriously thought i was going to pass out from hungries and plummeting blood sugar levels, so i convinced father to stop over at subway on the way home. footlong chicken teriyaki, ranch sauce, old english cheese, the works. it was amazing and i ate the whole thing.
flash forward 8 hours and my tummy is not feeling great, me and steve are hanging out in my room trying to watch a movie while my stomach attempts to asphyxiate both of us with the most astounding farttastic sounds and smells. except the thing is, they actually didn't smell like farts. they smelled EXACTLY like subway. not just kind of dense and foody, they smelled like the very same sandwich i ate, and steve agreed, so it's true ok! they actually made me more hungry, which i think is how they get you, conniving old subway. and then i did a poo which looked like a footlong so you guys can come around with the frankincense and myrrh like whenever you get around to it.

2)

by some happy twist of events, i am now sharing my hospital room with grandma yetta. if you don't know what that means you should be pleased, because it means that between now and 1997 you have probably lived a full and interesting life where you did not watch reruns of the nanny. hell, you might not have watched it the first time around. i don't know, you're certainly not me. but for us foxtellers who still enjoy the ever-growing unpcness of the show based around the premise of "how funny it would be for a nice normal englishman to live with a jew?!?!?!", grandma yetta is a big deal. and she really is! obviously it's not the real yetta, but she's got a full length lycra leopard print gown, a smoker's cough and a chest full of mucus to back it up, and if she whacks on the transitions lenses i'm going to go mental. there's not really any story to this but it lifts my spirits.


so as you can tell, i'm fine, chilling in my little hospital bed, EXCRETING so i can go home. should be done late on sunday. reading harry potter, watching SVU, everything is a-ok.

still alive!

i turned on blogging, in my mind, over the last couple of weeks.  because i felt too sick and too shitty and it didn't seem to be productive. however, i immediately felt the repressive effects of not writing and took a whole heap more valium.  so i'll write again, and force it out, like a morphine poo.

had methotrexate last week, did my first little spew, i was fine but it made me extremely grumpy, the results of which were (and i would appreciate any explanation of this) refusing all my favourite things, books and dvds and friends, in favour of watching all the football television available on free to air on a regular weekend.  not limited to actual games, i also watched every conception of before/after/during/next to the game, as well as the vfl.  i now have opinions on football and have completed my descent into the unwashed masses.  goodbye bachelor of arts...

i'm going back in today (right now, technically, so must run) for more methotrexate, and i had my PET scan yesterday, so stay posted for updates on how and where the cancer is mucking around now.  should get that information this afternoon.

also, can anybody recommend any full albums that really profoundly affected them when they heard it? i want something new to listen to that really captured a zeitgeist of whatever, even if it seems really dated now, like hating the man or thatcher or commercialism.  any suggestions would be appreciated.

see you soon slaggies

insanity is a luxury of the healthy

people often say to me, you remember that band aqua, they were quite good, and i think yes, they were quite good and i did quite like them in the 90s as a smaller person and for a short time in the 2000s when i was working on gymbus and that was the entire soundtrack.  but you forget, you do, HOW GOOD THEY ACTUALLY ARE. seriously. i need them on my ipod. it is impossible to be sad through the harmonies. impossible.  my favourites are dr jones, cartoon heroes, my oh my, roses are red, lollypop... let me know if i've forgotten any classics.

anyway, if this blog was called "insane ramblings of jes" i'm pretty sure it would have a much smaller readership, so i'll leave that for the moment.

i came out of hospital on sunday, it's now tuesday and i'm heading back in tomorrow morning at 10am.  it's not really long enough to have heaps of fun or fully recover from the indignities of four days of bed-riddenness, but it's still fricking great to be at home, with all the delicious foods and comfortable beds.  last week, and again tomorrow i'm having methotrexate, which is administered over four hours, and they let you out once the levels of it in your blood drop to a certain level, which takes about four days.  before that it's dangerous to your kidneys so you have to stay connected to the drip, which is annoying but tolerable.

the side effects were completely different to the cisp/doxo that i had 3 weeks ago.  that was all nausea, dizziness, heartburn, tinnitus etc, and this one so far has had very little nausea.  the most prominent side effects this time were aching chest pains, which the doctors think

 had something to do with inflammation, and they sort of extended down my arms and legs, so it was painful even to sit on a cushion on a funny angle.  headaches, too, and hot flu

shes.  so overall much more mild than last time.  hoping

 that this week will be similar, long but relatively easy to tolerate.  then next wednesday is cisp/doxo again then a break.

my hair, however, is all but gone.  even though it's enormously self absorbed, i'll include some photos:

what

how

i can't get this stupid photo

when will things learn to cooperate with me

shit to work

why is my text going all over the place

how infuriating.

i think we're back to normal now?  in no particular order, as the photos refused to be told, these include 

a) two normal photos of my fluffy duck hair

b) one of my silly "granny has escaped from the home" wig, in black and white, a kind of "ooooh mr president" or "i do declare" (not that i have any inkling of the historical contexts of either of these quotes) glamour shot

c) an impression of macaulay culkin circa home alone/alone with michael jackson

d) an image of my head as a deranged pokemon with aspirations for world domination

you can assign the annotations as you see fit.

this post really is off the rails. i apologise if you're not following and we anticipate that normal posting will resume shortly.

so the point is, i am kinda bald. which is fine because i don't really notice it and my head feels much better this way, but bad because it's really shiny and obvious and everyone seems to feel a bit sad when they see it.  not to worry, though.  i have hats and scarves and wigs.

thanks to everyone who sent over stuff this week: food, stuff for the ds, TULIPS, everything i'm forgetting.  your support means so much and i wouldn't get through these weeks without it.

i think i'll read angels and demons this week.  the russell brand autobiography really is good.

miss you all, have a good week. xox

looking forward

i can touch my own scalp!  i can touch it!  it feels very strange, like the head of a baby, quite nice in a creepy womb regressive way.  yesterday i took to it with scissors and made it into a kind of sinead oconnor plus mohawk thing, because the pain and the malting was becoming unbearable, the malting made me have to wear hats all the time and the hats contributed to the headaches, so enough was enough!  and i cut it all up.  it looked quite cool 90s rebellion for a couple of minutes, but today the mohawk started falling out so i guess i'll have to face up to the true shape of my head very soon...

i am heading back into hospital tomorrow, for a four night stay, to get my first dose of methotrexate.  the next three weeks will be pretty intense: four night admission from tomorrow (wed), four night admission from wednesday week, and 3ish night admission from the following wednesday.  chances are you won't see or hear much from me over this time, so don't panic, everything is probably still going as planned and expected.

i'm much better prepared for hospital this time.  last time, post surgery and still reeling from the shock of the diagnosis, was very difficult.  but thanks to the two weeks of recovery my body is feeling really ace, tip top shape and ready for the fight.  i've put on a few kilos in preparation, i've shaved my head (that's part of the psych up, i'm thinking natalie portman, don't shoot me down) and i'm ready.  and thanks to the extreme generosity of friends and family, i have magazines, a NINTENDO DSi WITH HEAPS OF GAMES OH NO NERDY, books, dvds, nicer trackies and cardies, chocolates... you get the picture.  i'm as ready as i'll ever be.

i'm wrestling with my 3000 word essay at the moment, and possibly going to stay up all night trying to get it done, especially if i keep writing blogs and going on facebook instead of pulling it all together.  i've really thrown myself into this one and it's been a pretty torturous process but i'm hoping that the finished product will be something i can be proud of.  for self-encouragement purposes i was word-counting my notes, then making a percentage of the overall word limit, so when i'd done 900 ish words i had this encouraging "you're 28% finished!!!" headline, except my notes just kept on going and now i'm 120% done (!!!) and still haven't technically written a sentence i can submit.  hoo boy, it's going to be a long night.

but the thing about all of this is, i'm looking forward.  not just in a positive envisionment=realisation way, but in a really pragmatic way.  it might be easy to whinge and say i want my life to go "back" to what it was before, when it was simpler and normal, but realistically i want to go forward.  i'm thinking into the future on the other side of this experience.  i don't want to eliminate the experience because i want to take it with me, but i need to know there is an end in sight.  i'm working so hard on this essay because i want to do my honours in this subject.  i want to get my degree and have really learned and thought about the world, and i'll take this experience on as another learning challenge.  so forward thinking, everybody!  nostalgia is a waste of time and energy.

hope you're all well and busy, and i'll write again as soon as i feel well.  every day the cancer gets a little bit more fucked. :)

hair :(

hair started falling out in the shower today.  fortunately so far i haven't had the burning scalp and itchy sore head that other people have warned me about.  i woke up this morning with a bad headache and when i got in the shower it just sort of started coming out in my hands as i washed it.

i had a few quick tears of panic that i wasnt ready to be the bald "cancer girl" to everyone yet; so far i've been able to avoid feeling like everyone who sees me knows, and the crutches could be for anything.  i know that being bald will mean i have to deal with more staring and the fact that more people will know or guess immediately when they see me.  which might not be too bad, as it means probably less people will say what have you done to your knee? which can be quite awkward.  but on the other hand, people won't recognise me straight away and then there'll be the whole, oh, you look so different! and i'll be able to see the cogs turning slowly as they think, oh dear i've gotten myself into something awkward here, and i'll have to laugh it off and eugh annoyingness.

but what can you do.  i've got a couple of beanies (good luck it's winter) and i'll try to pick up a few more.  so far i'm not keen on a bandana but i might get there.  and mum is looking into a cheap wig, maybe just for going to the shops and stuff so i don't have to be stared at by children and old people and people without social skills.

i just pulled my hair back into a ponytail when i got out of the shower and cut the whole ponytail off, so now i have a messy spazzy bob for the moment.  i'll see how bad the falling out is over the next couple of days and might shave it before i go back into hospital, we'll see how it goes.  it's not a good feeling but it's not the worst and i'll be ok.  just don't stare when you see me!!

day 11

today is saturday, may 9, day 11 of chemo cycle, next admission may 20.

feeling great today. woke up with a blood nose, but other than that feel pretty much normal; normal energy, normal appetite, no nausea, no desperation to get back to bed.  it's frustrating because i want to do something today but i am limited by

a) can't drive

b) can't walk far

c) can't stand up for long periods of time

which is basically the problem with everything. i really wanted to go out last night, and there was a gig at the hifi bar to which a few people were going, but logistically i knew that the hifi bar has a big old staircase and no chairs. so even though i feel fine it would have been impractical.  i need ideas guys!  what can i do to fill my time?

it's such a weird feeling because everytime i've left the house so far it has been this kind of tokenistic, you can do it affair with no point where i just move to a different location, sit down for an hour, then go home again and sit down and say well that was exhausting.  i'd love to be able to do something that has a point and is useful, like go to the supermarket.  i really miss driving.  maybe if i go for night time drives it won't be as dangerous.  the actual act of driving and normal feet on pedals apparently isn't dangerous, it's the risk that i would need to slam on breaks and sudden forceful weightbearing would shatter my knee.  so maybe night time driving.

this post is weird so far.

more generally:

i still have my hair, though it is malting and i'm scared to brush it. i want to just put it in a ponytail and cut the ponytail off and have some kind of crazy short jagged thing but i am aware that to everyone else it will seem like an awkward emo "oh is this how she's dealing with it..." kind of affair.  but it's not, or at least it isn't until the tears start flowing and i'm pulling it out in chunks going why why why my beautiful hair like repunzel. joke. obviously. ugh. cancer irony is being totally ruined by this experience!

there are these two men, ~ 75 years old, who live in our street.  they share a flat and everyone assumes that they are probably gay.  but when they walk to and from the shops they always always always do this weird, contrived thing where they walk 100 metres apart.  i don't know if at the shops they meet up, and one leaves a minute before the other, or if it's a stand at the corner and wait while other one moves an unsuspicious, ungay distance away and then walk kind of scenario.  but it's really weird.  i just sit here at my front window and watch, one goes past at 11.51, and the other at 11.53.  a couple of times every day.  actually starting to worry that i am becoming rear window like character with crutches observing neighbours and soon going to end up in tangled web of deception or similar.  hm, wouldn't be the worst thing in the world.

the overall point of this pointless update is that i am well. bored and well, reading the da vinci code (very exciting), finished both the bridget joneses.  any good book suggestions?  any good outing suggestions?  think i might venture into the city tonight, if anyone is going to be around.

next rounds of chemo:

methatrixate or something

may 20-24

may 27-31

cisplatin and doxorubicin or something

june 3-5

then another two weeks break

surgery vaguely planned for julyish

day 5

day 5 after chemo, feeling ok. can't do much. sorry i haven't replied to messages and calls. mostly just lying down and feeling weird. haven't had any inspirational thoughts to share! ate a fair bit today which was good. think i might be going insane, or the ghost is back. i'm still going though~

operated

feel a bit like a pin cushion. had all my surgery yesterday, 5 incisions, feel pretty shitty and pained. came home last night and heading into peter mac now. whole body looks and feels ridiculous. chemo today or tomorrow. hopefully out by sunday. xox

cancer my subscription

i think i've finished all my scans now.  i had an LVEF on friday to check heart function, and today i had a PET scan with another radioactive injection (getting stronger every day!!).  there was a spider in the scan room and steve pointed out that since he's been exposed to so much radiation, there's a good chance he's the one who bit spiderman.  good things to remember in case one day the world needs a hero.

tomorrow i am having surgery at the royal women's hospital in carlton.  i'll be admitted at 7am for a laparoscopy, to check out my ovaries before chemo, and to put in the port, which is the instrument that goes in a big vein in my chest so they can put the chemo drugs straight in instead of fucking around with canulae.  individually they are day procedures but having both at once means i might have to stay overnight.  then i have a bed booked at peter maccallum on wednesday and chemo finally gets going.

there's a good chance i'll stay in hospital until the weekend, which for some reason seems like the most objectionable part of the ordeal.  what the fuck is there to do in hospital?  i'll probably have to share a room with seven geriatrics who can only watch "as time goes by" because everything is too colourful and confusing and nobody likes overstimulated confused old people, and it will be lights out at 8pm and that thing on my finger will keep beeping and flashing and it will be boring until i start being sick when it will be gross.  yeah guys, i'll keep you posted.

i'm shitty at the moment but that always happens at night for some reason, tomorrow morning i'll be bright as a button until they flood my veins with happy sleepy liquid and start slicing around the place.  hopefully i'll have internet in hospital and i'll let you know how it goes.  have a nice week everyone!

GFR

today i had a gfr scan to check the function of my kidneys.  it was pretty gross, the nurse fucked up the canula and couldn't get a vein which was scary and painful.  my nervous system cracked the shits and tried really hard to send me unconscious, but i resisted.  the nurse freaked out and called some big dude called mark, who came in all looking all important and fixed it up.

they took blood four times over four hours, and i had an additional pathology blood test to check something else, not sure what.  i sat opposite a guy with tattoos, who looked about 65 but when he gave his birthday he was only 48.  scary.  they couldn't find a vein in him either but he was manly about it.  mum kept standing in my view so i wouldn't peer at other people, which is apparently rude but also interesting.  they never seemed to close doors anyway, so people kept peering and grinning at me.  according to the nurse that's a good sign.  i don't know why.

then they took photos of my kidneys eating radioactive medicine, which mum reported as exciting, but i couldn't see.  it wasn't noisy or claustrophobic under the camera like in the mri machine so that was good.

ok, one day down.  chemo still not scheduled.  peter mac very chaotic.  more tomorrow.

welcome

hello everybody.

this is my cancer blog.  for those who don't know, i was diagnosed with a kind of bone cancer last week.  it is confined to my knee, specifically the medial femoral condyle, but unfortunately it has weakened the bone so much that it fractured. so now i'm on crutches (very annoying) and will be until around august/september i think, when i'll be having surgery to remove the tumour and part of the knee. my inferior kneebone will be replaced with some kind of superior android metal knee, and i will accordingly become very powerful. this is the upside.