Well...I may have chemo brain these days and forget things that I am in the middle of doing or forget names or forget where I am driving to when in the car....but my drug addled brain tells me that if I am in the second day of Treatment #11 out of 12 that equals 92% of the way there!!!! YIPPPPPPEEEEEE!!!!!!!
And it cannot be over soon enough...
So my Dad came into town to spend the day with me yesterday and take me to the hospital and join me in the treatment room (hopefully if all pans out with the bloodwork). A shout out to Dad - if I didn't have him there and was alone yesterday I probably would have ended up falling asleep early on into treatment and slept through the afternoon in the clinic but we ended up talking about everything from Ontario politics, the XL Foods beef recall, the US Presidential election, cancer, family stuff, Victoria's pregnancy, etc. Thanks, Dad for being with me yesterday. You have no idea how much it means to me to have someone there with me on the next step in the journey....when I look around at the other patients in the treatment room it always hits me square in the face that I am the youngest person in the room and by quite a few years. But I try not to dwell on that fact but it does strike me every time.
The bloodwork came back positive for treatment (Thank, God! - he must have heard my prayers ;-) ) after the week delay. And as my good friend and fellow battler, Barb so eloquently articulates throughout her blog Bring it On! http://barb-james.blogspot.ca/ delays in treatment, bloodwork challenges that introduce things like transfusions (in her case) or bone marrow injections (in my case), all fuel our anxiety. And you as you read me say that may struggle to understand in my case why it is so anxiety-evoking especially in light of the really positive news I have received over the past few weeks in terms of surveillance tests (CEA, CT scan)...but I don't want to give the bad cells, those f#$%ers ANY opportunity to do their dirty work. One week delay in treatment means in my mind that every day that goes by I lose the opportunity to continue to punish them, to have the chemo drugs doing their job, and to keep those bad guys at bay.
My platelets rebounded to a healthy 133 from 59 last week (75 is the absolute lowest count where treatment is a no go decision) and my neutrophils rebounded to a great 2.6 count (up from 1.88). The platelets were the big concern and short of platelet transfusions there is really no intervention that will increase these counts...just time for them to recover naturally. So Treatment #11 was a GO. Because of the week delay I didn't recognize any of the other patients in the treatment room as I am now on my third different treatment schedule - started with every other Thursday, to a Monday schedule to now an alternating Monday schedule.
I don't know whether it is because of the week delay or what but this one is really hitting me hard. Last night when I came home from the hospital I was sooooooo flippin' tired that I napped for hours until Victoria had dinner ready. I was able to eat dinner (and what a healthy dinner it was - baked salmon, sauteed spinach, and brown basmati rice with a cup of matcha green tea) and pretty much laid on the couch all evening not feeling so great....but last night's sleep was AWFUL. My stomach was more sour than ever....in fact to the point of needing to spend hours by the toilet in anticipation of vomiting but thankfully it never got to that point. I was sooooo weak and feeling crappy that I left the bed so Victoria wasn't exposed to me and ended up laying on the couch trying to sleep. Sleep was broken with bouts of nausea and just feeling completely shitty. But I managed to sleep after Victoria left for work this morning to now so I thought I would take advantage of the little energy I have today to update you all.
And btw...my Oncologist is not taking any chances with my neutrophils despite only having one last treatment to go. I am undergoing another round of 5 daily injections of Neupogen to stimulate my bone marrow (these injections have really been taking their toll on me with the bone pain in my spine, hips, skull and neck). But oh well....last round of injections. Bring 'em on.
So that's it for now....I am wiped. Just typing is a challenge these days (and you can forget about holding a pen or pencil and writing legibly). I will post later with a message completely unrelated to my cancer and my treatments....stay tuned and thanks for stopping by.
I will leave this post with the words/lyrics from the band Europe and their song The Final Countdown:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyggY_R3jU8
It's the final countdown
The final countdown
The final countdown
(The final countdown)
Ohh ho ohh
The final countdown, oh ho
It's the final countdown
The final countdown
The final countdown
(The final countdown)
Ohh
It's the final countdown
We're leaving together
The final countdown
We'll all miss her so
It's the final countdown
(The final countdown)
Ohh, it's the final countdown
Yea
And it cannot be over soon enough...
So my Dad came into town to spend the day with me yesterday and take me to the hospital and join me in the treatment room (hopefully if all pans out with the bloodwork). A shout out to Dad - if I didn't have him there and was alone yesterday I probably would have ended up falling asleep early on into treatment and slept through the afternoon in the clinic but we ended up talking about everything from Ontario politics, the XL Foods beef recall, the US Presidential election, cancer, family stuff, Victoria's pregnancy, etc. Thanks, Dad for being with me yesterday. You have no idea how much it means to me to have someone there with me on the next step in the journey....when I look around at the other patients in the treatment room it always hits me square in the face that I am the youngest person in the room and by quite a few years. But I try not to dwell on that fact but it does strike me every time.
The bloodwork came back positive for treatment (Thank, God! - he must have heard my prayers ;-) ) after the week delay. And as my good friend and fellow battler, Barb so eloquently articulates throughout her blog Bring it On! http://barb-james.blogspot.ca/ delays in treatment, bloodwork challenges that introduce things like transfusions (in her case) or bone marrow injections (in my case), all fuel our anxiety. And you as you read me say that may struggle to understand in my case why it is so anxiety-evoking especially in light of the really positive news I have received over the past few weeks in terms of surveillance tests (CEA, CT scan)...but I don't want to give the bad cells, those f#$%ers ANY opportunity to do their dirty work. One week delay in treatment means in my mind that every day that goes by I lose the opportunity to continue to punish them, to have the chemo drugs doing their job, and to keep those bad guys at bay.
My platelets rebounded to a healthy 133 from 59 last week (75 is the absolute lowest count where treatment is a no go decision) and my neutrophils rebounded to a great 2.6 count (up from 1.88). The platelets were the big concern and short of platelet transfusions there is really no intervention that will increase these counts...just time for them to recover naturally. So Treatment #11 was a GO. Because of the week delay I didn't recognize any of the other patients in the treatment room as I am now on my third different treatment schedule - started with every other Thursday, to a Monday schedule to now an alternating Monday schedule.
I don't know whether it is because of the week delay or what but this one is really hitting me hard. Last night when I came home from the hospital I was sooooooo flippin' tired that I napped for hours until Victoria had dinner ready. I was able to eat dinner (and what a healthy dinner it was - baked salmon, sauteed spinach, and brown basmati rice with a cup of matcha green tea) and pretty much laid on the couch all evening not feeling so great....but last night's sleep was AWFUL. My stomach was more sour than ever....in fact to the point of needing to spend hours by the toilet in anticipation of vomiting but thankfully it never got to that point. I was sooooo weak and feeling crappy that I left the bed so Victoria wasn't exposed to me and ended up laying on the couch trying to sleep. Sleep was broken with bouts of nausea and just feeling completely shitty. But I managed to sleep after Victoria left for work this morning to now so I thought I would take advantage of the little energy I have today to update you all.
And btw...my Oncologist is not taking any chances with my neutrophils despite only having one last treatment to go. I am undergoing another round of 5 daily injections of Neupogen to stimulate my bone marrow (these injections have really been taking their toll on me with the bone pain in my spine, hips, skull and neck). But oh well....last round of injections. Bring 'em on.
So that's it for now....I am wiped. Just typing is a challenge these days (and you can forget about holding a pen or pencil and writing legibly). I will post later with a message completely unrelated to my cancer and my treatments....stay tuned and thanks for stopping by.
I will leave this post with the words/lyrics from the band Europe and their song The Final Countdown:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyggY_R3jU8
It's the final countdown
The final countdown
The final countdown
(The final countdown)
Ohh ho ohh
The final countdown, oh ho
It's the final countdown
The final countdown
The final countdown
(The final countdown)
Ohh
It's the final countdown
We're leaving together
The final countdown
We'll all miss her so
It's the final countdown
(The final countdown)
Ohh, it's the final countdown
Yea
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