Chemo is supposed to get more difficult each time, but this last one was a piece of cake. I have a bit of numbness in my fingers and toes (this is normal), but other than that, none of the expected pain happened. Weird.
Today, I’m in for a bone scan to make sure no cancer has spread to my bones. Because the type of cancer is as aggressive as it gets, my oncologist wanted to monitor me closely to be safe. I went in at 10:00 this morning to get injected with radioactive dye, then I left to get some work done from the car, and drink my coffee. I’ll be going back shortly for the actual scan, which will take about 30 minutes.
The scan itself is pretty boring. They will restrain my hands and feet so I don’t move and mess up the image, then the machine will make a very slow pass over my entire body over about 30 minutes. If there is any cancer in my bones (hopefully not), the radioactive dye will collect there and it would show up on the scan. The scan also picks up old injuries, so I had to give the tech a list so they know what to expect on the scan.
Other than that, I have a couple of meetings later, and I’ll probably watch Game of Thrones this evening.
When I got up this morning on World Cancer Awareness Day, I got some work out of the way. I was going to take a sick day for the full day, but things came up, and continued to do so during my treatment. So I guess I’ll be switching that to a half day. It never ends. ?
About an hour before the chemo, I had to take two anti-nausea medications and dexamethasone, which is a pretty powerful steroid. I had quite a large dose of it. It helps you to not feel too bad for a couple of days after the chemo, but it sucks when the steroids wear off, so I hear.
My appointment for another mammogram was moved from 12:45 to 13:00, followed by chemo at 13:20. Unfortunately, I had to wait almost half an hour to go in, so I was late to chemo by 20 minutes. No big deal though, as they knew I was already at the hospital.
I had to do another mammogram on the left (unaffected) side because the CT scan showed something. However, I was given the all clear there today. Good news. The mammogram equipment at this hospital is better than the equipment that was used back in November, so that’s reassuring.
When I got to the hospital, the nurse showed me around the chemo suite. Everyone is super friendly. The suite is quite nice with soft reclining chairs and a table to use my iPad if I want to get some work done, or watch a movie. There’s also a TV mounted above every chair, along with snacks and drinks.
Most of the people there were in their 60s and 70s, but I did see someone who looked to be in her 20s, and also someone who was around my age. It sucks for anyone, but I’m sure it especially sucks for the woman in her 20s. Also, everyone was there alone, which also sucks. The nurses are all amazing, but most of us would want someone to chat with to just pass the time. The nurses certainly do chat, but they also have other patients to see.
I had two friends do cool stuff for me. One made me a Spotify playlist to use for my chemo, and the other one got me a gorgeous plush plague nurse. He knows me too well. What he didn’t know is that I already ordered the matching plague doctor. So now I will have a pair whenever that shows up. The nurses loved it. ?
Accompanied by my plague nurse. ??⚕️ ?
The nurse explained everything as she went, which was great. She took the bandage off my port and cleaned the area, then she inserted the needle into the port on my chest. Even though it was done 8 days ago, there was zero pain. I had to look to see if she had even done it. Sure enough, there was a line coming out of the port. She covered it up with a clear bandage and got to work.
Blood was drawn from the port to make sure it works, then it was flushed with saline so that the blood wouldn’t clot in the port. From there, the nurse administered the doxorubicin (AKA red devil) with a giant syringe attached to the port line. We chatted for the 10 minutes it took for her to do that manual injection. The reason it’s done that way, is because doxorubicin can damage tissue if for some reason it doesn’t go straight into a vein. Because I have a port, the risk is almost 0, but they are still careful.
Next up, a bag of cyclophosphamide solution was connected to a pump. This was administered pretty much the same way saline is administered by IV. The whole process took 45 minutes, and I was given a beautiful knitted blanket to keep. Volunteers make these blankets, which is amazing.
At the moment, I feel totally normal. I know some people get tired later on in the evening on the first day, so we’ll see what happens. I have my pyjamas on, so I’m ready to go to bed at any time if need be.
Tomorrow, a home care nurse will come in to give me the $1600 Lapelga injection. I’m taking Claritin to hopefully stave off the bone pain. I’m allergic to Tylenol, so I don’t have many non-opioid options available. Advil and Aleve aren’t the best things to take because they can cause other issues.
So yeah. That’s about it for now. I’ll see what happens over the next 4 or 5 days. I spoke to a family member who had the same treatment, and she said that she did quite well through the treatment. Fingers crossed.
I had to get up at 05:45 today to make it to the hospital by 06:45. Yuck. I have a bone scan, ECG, and bloodwork to do.
When I went into the nuclear medicine area to get even more radioactive substances injected into my body, I heard one of the staff grumbling about Mondays. I laughed to myself because obviously today is Tuesday! Right? It dawned on me that I just feel that way because I was here yesterday. Oops.
I’m supposed to drink a lot of water to flush the radioactive tracer out of my kidneys, so I went to Tim Hortons to get some tea. Their coffee is too disgusting to smell, let alone drink. The folks in Nuclear Imaging let me hide out in an area alone so I could drink my tea.
When I got to the Cardio-Pulmonary Department, the receptionist was venting about her husband’s ex, and how the ex never picks the kid up on Sundays because she drinks too much. The other receptionist said she shouldn’t be dragging the kid into it, which was fun to hear them debate. ?
The ECG was interesting to watch. There was a student doing the procedure on me, so I asked her a few questions to make sure she actually knew what she was doing. (hah)
Other than that, the bone scan was pretty boring. I had to get strapped into place on a bed so I wouldn’t move my hands or feet, then the scanner moved me through over a 17-minute period. After that, the scanner went around my torso, which took probably 25 minutes or so. I fell asleep a few times since I had to get up so early, so yeah. This procedure is not scary or painful at all.
After that, I had to get bloodwork done at the cancer centre by swiping my patient card at the kiosk for the first time. I guess it’s official now. Everything in the bloodwork looks great, and my hemoglobin is almost at the maximum of the range. That’s crazy, since it was less than half of what the minimum should be 10 years ago.
Once my bloodwork was done, I heard someone saying an anglicized version of my middle name. Since the name is very uncommon around these parts, I asked the phlebotomist if maybe someone mixed something up and is calling me. Sure enough, a woman walked in and said that it was her name, and because they don’t use accents, nobody ever knows how to say it. I laughed and told her that’s my middle name, complete with the accents. I also thought to myself, that I am really glad my parents didn’t reverse my middle and first names. People screw my name up enough as is.
Here is the culprit before being sent off to the lab and sliced into (hopefully painful) pieces. And yes, I totally made a Fight Club reference in the title of this post. Sorry, not sorry. ?
