This inpatient session wasn’t as nearly as hard as the first one. Although by the end I was getting restless, 4 days is much more doable than 6. I still have the same outpatient cycle this coming week as I did the first time, but I am much more ready for it this go around. I am in the middle of my search for a new hobby. I have considered building model cars/ planes and even things like knitting. I have to find something to do so that when I get “chemo- brain” as one nurse called it, I can still occupy my time and not just sit around and get bored. I am glad I am getting out today, I was starting to have weird dreams last night, that was one of the hardest parts of the first round was the strange dreams I was having. I would wake up and be out of it for a little bit, one time I had to pull up membership reports on my computer to convince myself I was really awake and pull my mind back into the real world.
Barring any major setbacks like another infection, I fully plan on going to work after my blood counts go back up. It will most likely only be for a day or two, but it will be nice to get back and help out where ever I can.
Monday june 27, 2011
Ugh, I thought I would feel better this time, but nope. I took myself to my dr’s appointment today and that was a mistake. I felt fine most of the day because I was inside my own little box, once I got outside I started having hot flashes and everything hit me all at once. Luckily for me, my appointment took all of 5 minutes, but I will definitely not be taking myself to any more appointments the day after a chemo treatment. Im going to have to stay in my box of an apartment for a while longer from now on. So if you want to see me that’s where ill be. When I get the energy I will get up, but especially the first couple days after a treatment, don’t expect much from me. The fact that I can’t do anything is starting to annoy me, but as long as I don’t get sick this time, ill be a happy camper.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Monday, June 20, 2011
One down, Eleven to go
Been gone for a minute, but now I’m back again. The last 3 weeks have been anything but normal for me and if they are a sign of what is yet to come, chemo is going to be a physical and emotional roller-coaster ride from hell.
I started to write this post in a lot of little segments, I decided about ¾ of the way through to start over. I decided giving a straight account of what was happening day by day was boring and a waste of all of our time. I mean the length on something like that was going to unreal, plus I’ve always been a cliff notes kind of reader, browsing the highlights can be much more fun than reading the entire text.
I went into this first treatment feeling so confident about how I would handle it. I thought to myself, “this is going to be the easy one”. I was confident in the facts that this chemo would be the easy because I was already so healthy that my body can handle whatever they throw my way. Looking back on it now, I can honestly say that if every chemo is as hardcore as the last one, I don’t know how I am going to make it through the next nine months. Never in my life have I felt so beaten and weak. The past couple of weeks have made my body feel like it is tear itself apart from the inside out. One thing that has been running through my mind for the past week or so is that sometimes it’s incredibly hard to find strength in pain. Finally getting done with outpatient chemo and then immediately getting sick was almost the event that broke me. Being admitted back to the hospital for another week was the last thing I needed at the time. After the first day my hospital room started to close in. It felt similar to my room in Malawi, my room that I often referred to as my cell. The one good thing that kept my spirits up were the nurses. I mean don’t get me wrong it was great to have my family around, but the nurses and their positive attitudes make me feel a lot better about my situation.
I wrote a few tidbits while I was in the hospital for chemo, the only one that is really worth sharing was my description about my hypersensitive reaction to my first drug, rituxan. Everything started off normal, but when the rate the medicine was given was increased my body had a bit of a freak out, enjoy:
At first I thought I had to go to the bathroom #2, but that didn’t work and the pain got worse. My nurses were very very good, and most important of all the didn’t freak out when they saw how much pain I was in. Calm, cool and collective. The session lasted about 45 minutes. It was the second worst pains I have ever had in my life. In between crying and being short of breath, the nurses were there for me and tried their best to keep me calm. Later in the day, one of the nurses mentioned that I wasn’t cursing through the entire thing and that made me think about all of it. I was still trying to be respectful for the other people in the room. I said the letter F a few times and they said, let it out we have heard it all before, that was comforting, but I still had no intention to be loud and obnoxious even though I had unbelievable pain. That always pisses me off, when someone is working as fast as they possibly can, doing everything they can for you and someone else is screaming at them or in their direction, and/ or they are saying hurry up move faster, blah blah blah. That’s not who I am, and I will be disappointed if that’s who I ever turn out to be.
Overall the past few weeks have been quite the learning experience. Like I said before I felt weak and beaten, but not broken. It has taken a lot of thought and personal time, but I have gotten stronger over the past few weeks. I registered with the Mid- American chapter of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, I have started to reach out. I have fully admitted to myself that I have Cancer. I have come a long way from the random times that I would break down in tears trying to convince myself this was all just a bad dream. I know now this is not a bad dream, this is my life and I have to use the strength I have, however little that may be sometimes and fight with it. One down, eleven to go.
P.S. For all of you that are planning on losing your hair with me, get ready, my shedding has begun.
Also, don’t forget to donate to Laura Park’s Team in Training, and go out and buy your 2011 Zoo memberships! Thank you so very much to the people that went out and got their Zoo membership or donated to Laura after my first post. I will try to keep in touch more, round two of chemo starts on Thursday; wish me luck.
I started to write this post in a lot of little segments, I decided about ¾ of the way through to start over. I decided giving a straight account of what was happening day by day was boring and a waste of all of our time. I mean the length on something like that was going to unreal, plus I’ve always been a cliff notes kind of reader, browsing the highlights can be much more fun than reading the entire text.
I went into this first treatment feeling so confident about how I would handle it. I thought to myself, “this is going to be the easy one”. I was confident in the facts that this chemo would be the easy because I was already so healthy that my body can handle whatever they throw my way. Looking back on it now, I can honestly say that if every chemo is as hardcore as the last one, I don’t know how I am going to make it through the next nine months. Never in my life have I felt so beaten and weak. The past couple of weeks have made my body feel like it is tear itself apart from the inside out. One thing that has been running through my mind for the past week or so is that sometimes it’s incredibly hard to find strength in pain. Finally getting done with outpatient chemo and then immediately getting sick was almost the event that broke me. Being admitted back to the hospital for another week was the last thing I needed at the time. After the first day my hospital room started to close in. It felt similar to my room in Malawi, my room that I often referred to as my cell. The one good thing that kept my spirits up were the nurses. I mean don’t get me wrong it was great to have my family around, but the nurses and their positive attitudes make me feel a lot better about my situation.
I wrote a few tidbits while I was in the hospital for chemo, the only one that is really worth sharing was my description about my hypersensitive reaction to my first drug, rituxan. Everything started off normal, but when the rate the medicine was given was increased my body had a bit of a freak out, enjoy:
At first I thought I had to go to the bathroom #2, but that didn’t work and the pain got worse. My nurses were very very good, and most important of all the didn’t freak out when they saw how much pain I was in. Calm, cool and collective. The session lasted about 45 minutes. It was the second worst pains I have ever had in my life. In between crying and being short of breath, the nurses were there for me and tried their best to keep me calm. Later in the day, one of the nurses mentioned that I wasn’t cursing through the entire thing and that made me think about all of it. I was still trying to be respectful for the other people in the room. I said the letter F a few times and they said, let it out we have heard it all before, that was comforting, but I still had no intention to be loud and obnoxious even though I had unbelievable pain. That always pisses me off, when someone is working as fast as they possibly can, doing everything they can for you and someone else is screaming at them or in their direction, and/ or they are saying hurry up move faster, blah blah blah. That’s not who I am, and I will be disappointed if that’s who I ever turn out to be.
Overall the past few weeks have been quite the learning experience. Like I said before I felt weak and beaten, but not broken. It has taken a lot of thought and personal time, but I have gotten stronger over the past few weeks. I registered with the Mid- American chapter of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, I have started to reach out. I have fully admitted to myself that I have Cancer. I have come a long way from the random times that I would break down in tears trying to convince myself this was all just a bad dream. I know now this is not a bad dream, this is my life and I have to use the strength I have, however little that may be sometimes and fight with it. One down, eleven to go.
P.S. For all of you that are planning on losing your hair with me, get ready, my shedding has begun.
Also, don’t forget to donate to Laura Park’s Team in Training, and go out and buy your 2011 Zoo memberships! Thank you so very much to the people that went out and got their Zoo membership or donated to Laura after my first post. I will try to keep in touch more, round two of chemo starts on Thursday; wish me luck.
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