New Chemo Day 6

It's Tuesday morning and with the first kind of chemo, this day has typically been one of the worst.  But, so far this chemo has been quite different.  I keep trying to analyze the differences, but this is the first round of the new stuff, and I have learned that each round has its own little twist, so I will just share how I have been feeling since Thursday and we'll see how it is going forward.

First, I don't have to go back the day after the chemo to get the Neulasta shot!  Yay.   That is a slow shot that was never fun, so I am happy that is over.  Second, the pre meds are totally different, and do not include steroids anymore.  Big yay for that.  With the first chemo, I was getting nausea med plus steroids through the port before the chemo, and the steroids were given to extend the time that the nausea meds worked.  Then I had to follow that up with oral steroids for three days.  These helped contribute to the shakes (I think) and definitely affected my sleep.  That is all done!  Now, I have to rely on the nausea pills alone, and so far so good.  Third, the Magic Mouth Wash that I mentioned last time really is magic.  It made a big difference in the mouth sores the very same day I began using it.  By Friday they were either gone or a non issue.  Another very good thing.

You might remember that the first time I did the chemo the nurses ran the drugs slower than normal, so that they could check for any reactions.  We had to do that again on Thursday, but it seemed even slower than the first time.  Typically, I arrive at 9:30 (bloodwork 1st then I see the doc or PA) and am leaving by 1:00 or 1:30.  We were there for SIX hours on Thursday and my friend who drove me and I had to scramble to find someone else to pick up our kiddos from school, etc.  I felt terrible for her, but we didn't see many other options by the time we learned how much longer the whole thing would take.  Anyway, once again my red blood numbers were down to their lowest point yet, but apparently they won't take such a big hit with the new chemo.  They are not expected to bounce back, but we were told they shouldn't continue to drop and might begin to rebound as we go through chemo #2.  I was reminded that this is a big part of why I am so tired all the time.

With the new chemo, the pre meds were much "lighter" in my opinion.  I was given Tylenol, Pepcid, Ativan and Benadryl through the IV.  The nurse said they are to help my body accept the new chemo without any allergic reaction.  The funny thing was that the only drug I had any allergic reaction to all day long was the Benadryl.  As soon as it started I instantly said my head feels weird.  I could feel a spinning at the back of my head and then it got heavy and I immediately felt "off."  Then I recognized this as my feeling before I faint, and for those of you who have been reading since the beginning you know I was scared then because I do not like to faint (though I am prone to it).  Almost immediately I felt the weird tingling in my elbows and knees, felt the heat rush up from my chest to my face, then things started to go black from the far peripheral vision and move forward.  I really don't know what happened to the nurse (this was the first time that I felt a little unimpressed with a Piedmont nurse), but my friend was awesome and jumped out of her chair and grabbed my hand, knelt down and told me to start breathing deeply.  She counted and talked me through breathing in and out and the black finally began to recede.  That is such a strange and scary feeling if you have never felt a faint coming on.  I was so glad we were able to stop it and get calm again and move on.  Kudos to Kati for being fabulous and super helpful!  This Thursday I plan to make sure I have the Ativan (calming med) BEFORE the Benadryl, and also talk with the nurse about whether I can just take the Benadryl orally or if she has any other idea how to handle the Benadryl issue.

So the rest of the time there was fine, just really long.  I usually don't turn around and look at the bag of medicine, but I did many times on Thursday just to see if it was moving at all.  People came after us, then left, and we kept sitting there.  I think there were three different people in the chair near mine in the time we were there.  This Thursday they will run the chemo drugs at half speed (they were at quarter speed last Thursday, I believe), then next week we will be up to full speed.  I am not complaining, since I know this is the safest way to go and you never know when someone might have a bad reaction.  They tell me to watch for things like shortness of breath, itching/ticking in the throat, any kind of burning and of course rashes/hives.  So far so good.

Here is what the chemo drugs look like when the arrive.  The first time I saw them it was like, yikes.  Sort of scary looking.  They don't keep these just laying around.  The safety protocol requires two nurses to be present to hook up the drugs and verify that I am the correct patient for them.  

Here I am with R2 and fingers in the ice.  I only did this while one of the drugs ran, but it still felt like a long time.  I love this awesome blanket that my sweet friends from back in the playgroup days gave!  It kept me cozy and arm.

I also had my toes covered with ice (I ended up taking off the socks since I was afraid my toes might not be cold enough to help).  Also, I might not have mentioned it but it is very evident in this picture, I was retaining a ton of water leading into this chemo.  

Let's see, what else?  I am super thankful that I still have a few eye lashes left and quite a lot of eye brows.  Goodness knows I was blessed with an abundance of eyebrow hair!  Someone should dig out an old photo of my fabulous unibrow.  Anyway - I will NEVER complain about it again.  When the time comes for my hair to grow back, I will gratefully pluck, wax and do whatever I need to do in total silence going forward.  If I was really brave I would grow back the unibrow just to show that I can.  :)

Overall, this chemo seems better than the first.  I have not been nauseated, and nausea is simply the worst.  I have been more tired early on than I was with the first.  And this tired is different.  It feels worse than just sleepy tired....it feels more like I have a bad cold or maybe even the flu tired.  My mornings have started off ok, but then after lunch my head feels heavy, and my eyes want to close.  I think this is probably because there are also cold symptoms happening.  My nose was runny pretty consistently with the first chemo for the last few weeks, but this is worse.  My nose is REALLY runny, all day long, and my eyes are watering, and my throat is sore.  When I wake up in the morning my eyes are glued shut.  It is gross.  And the night sweats are more consistent.  But that is the only thing interrupting my sleep at this point, so it could be worse.  Poor Chris, though.  I barely ever remember much, but he describes me thrashing around to get out of the covers and later piling on the covers to warm up.  Oops.  I have had a few episodes of what I perceive to be neuropathy (numbness and tingling in my finger tips), but it hasn't lasted too long.  I also have had shooting pains in various places, but I don't know that I can write that off to chemo.  They told me to expect weird aches and pains, but that sometimes happened before cancer, so who knows?!?    

I felt good enough to attend soccer games this weekend, so that was great.  It took me an hour to comb out R2 after being out in the wind on Saturday.  My mother turned 70 on Saturday and my brother was out from TX, so we were able to get together and celebrate, so that was good, too.  Finally, Chris and I began the search for a plastic surgeon yesterday.  We scheduled the appointment with our regular surgeon for early November, but he would like us to have selected our reconstruction surgeon by that time.  There is a lot we need to educate ourselves on, and so that will be our job this week.  

I believe that is the update.  Thanks so much for reading and following along.  Your support is a constant encouragement to me, as well as Chris.  Have a great day!