The Past Three Weeks and Session 2 Chemo

 

It was three weeks today since I have had my first chemo. I pulled out of fatigue after days 4-7, the bloody noses are mostly at night and improving, but the mouth sores have continued to get worse and stay for 4-5 days. My hair is still there...but thinning daily. My scalp itches and hurts really bad if I touch my head. I actually took a lint brush and rolled it all over my head to see what came out. Yep, it's coming out. Bald on top but it's all for the long term good. It's amazing how much heat you lose through your head. When I take my chemo beanies off, my head gets COLD! I feel a chill on top. How do you bald guys get use to that? (We just do, says E. and his brother, and his son)

I imagine that this week will be the turning point for the hair loss. Most commonly, people say that at two weeks they lost it all. I'm at the third week, so it's coming for sure.

I felt so much better at the second week mark, I managed to get three days of subbing in for a special education teacher. She has small groups all day long, and it was the perfect job to earn a little extra to help with bills, get back to working with kids, get some hugs ( I did!) and have a purpose to get outside of the inside of my head where it's really easy to stay, so I can  stop thinking about my disease for a bit. Working with going into a classroom (that's called "pushing in" and focusing on just a few kids, then pulling other small groups to the special ed classroom at other times) was really was a great way to test out my stamina and not exhaust myself as much as taking one class for the entire day. I felt great and hope to get a few days in each month teaching. 

This past week I noticed that where they punctured the skin to enter the body to place the port wasn't looking right. It developed a bright red concentric circle around the puncture wound, which had never completely healed right after the Dec. 13th surgery. There was a scab that never sloughed off, and the slightly pink skin around it had changed color to tomato red. That's not a good sign. I called the oncologist, and based on the description of what I was experiencing, sight unseen, he said to go to the emergency room and get it checked out. This was at 4:30 PM.

So off we went. The closest hospital in my network was Elkhart Beacon near downtown Elkhart. There were 27 people ahead of me and it was going to be HOURS and HOURS of waiting. Luckily, we have at three choices. Choice #2, we headed to Beacon Hospital in Granger. There wasn't a long wait at all. At the front desk, we were told it was a good thing we picked the Granger location. At the South Bend location, our choice #3, where I usually get my chemo treatments, there was a 40 patient backup in the emergency room.  We stayed at Granger. While we were at the Beacon Hospital in Granger, there was a shooting at a local grocery store (one I shop at occasionally), three people died, a 19 year old store employee and a middle aged man with a big heart....then the shooter as well. Two cops were injured and were taken to South Bend Beacon Memorial, where they ended up closing the emergency room to any outsiders for two hours due to the police and investigations, we think....The injured officers were brought from the Elkhart scene to South Bend. We had just passed that Elkhart grocery store one hour earlier on our way to the first hospital. We wondered why they didn't take the officers to the closest hospital in Elkhart? We were thinking that maybe there were more sophisticated trauma center services at the South Bend location?

PS. Follow-up to the grocery store shooting near us....one of the cops shot (he is in the hospital with some serious injuries but survived) is one of Eldy's son's former students. Some apartments we looked at before we chose the one we are in, were right in the line of gunfire at the grocery store shooting. One of the store's victims was a 19 year old store employee. Cars parked at the grocery store had bullet holes and windows shot out. Eldy's grandson works at another of the store's locations for a part time job when home from school. Life is so short, and so random....This really hit close to home.   

Hope you can follow all that, the different locations of where everything happened. My brain is starting to get a lot foggier with my thought processing! There is such a thing as "chemo brain" but my brain was pretty befuddled at age 74 before starting all this, so I don't know.

The emergency room doctor was amazing. He was so thoughtful, kind and concerned about everything going on with me. He gave me a prescription for an antibiotic, told me to watch and wait to see if the red injection spot gets any worse. The actual port location looks very good. If the injection spot appears to be worsening, then I am to start the antibiotic. He said my body appears to be handling the inflammation and slight infection on its own for the time being. He gave me a powerful lidocaine gel to swish around in my mouth for the sores and an RX for it. He said it was ok to continue to use the saline nasal rinse to help with the blood clots. He took his time and was so very thorough. I'm sure that will be a big bill! But worth it to me to feel comforted and concerns well taken care of.

Once I was done, we headed back home and by this time it was 8:00 PM. almost time for my bedtime! I go to bed so early because I have to get up to go to the bathroom during the night, and in addition, that is when I have at least one spontaneous nosebleed, so I'm pretty tired the next day most days. The next morning I was due to go back to South Bend for chemo session #2.

January 28th, chemo session #2. We left at 8:00 AM. for the 9:00 AM appointment. First they draw labs to make sure your white cell and red cell counts can handle chemo. They check liver and kidney function and glucose levels as well--my glucose level was 113, non fasting. That's pretty good considering I have been eating chocolate chip cookies, ice cream and not worrying about sugar levels because I HAVE AN APPETITE! WOOT WOOT! I NEED CALORIES! And I crave sweets! Gotta back off from that really quickly as steroids will kick in and shoot the sugar up to close to 200 the next three days. Then, you are cleared for chemo if lab results look good. Inbetween, I met with the oncologist. He was VERY happy with my bloodwork. He said numbers were much better than he expected. I guess he thought things would be out of whack a bit. He said my body is responding VERY well to all interventions that we are doing. Just to clarify, I am getting chemotherapy (Docetaxel) and two estrogen targeted immunotherapies (Herceptin and Perjeta) in my infusions at this point in time. He said that problematic port injection spot is mildly infected and he does want me to start the antibiotics. He said I had a rough time with side effects the first time around so he was going to adjust the chemo down 25% and give me yet another nausea medication, Olanzpine, which will cause sleepiness. Take it at night, said the doc. Onwards to the treatment for today.....

The first chemo session in its entirety was from 9:00 in the morning till 5:00 PM. Today, the session was from 9:00 and I was done by 3:00. Once they see how you tolerate chemo, the drip can proceed a little more quickly, and there is far less checking in with me, as I tolerated the first session with no problems. I had a nice little nap, I ordered a cheeseburger and jello, I had great conversations with the nurses, I drank two little protein booster ices, and chilled out. Honestly, I can say, I really look forward to going there for a day that makes me slow down, take it easy, order off a menu (even if it is hospital food!) which they bring to the infusion room (pod) and be a little pampered by wonderful, caring nurses who are so patient in answering all my crazy questions about this and that. They even warm provided cotton blankets should you need a light cover to rest and nap.

I'm hoping to not have a repeat of needing IV's, but diarrhea has already kicked in, since I got back home, so we shall see. Trying to get back to drinking a ton of water all day to help flush out the bad stuff. I had gotten a little careless this past week about downing over 90 recommended ounces of fluid every day, so back to the water regimen it is. I guess your body excretes the chemicals for 5-7 days after treatment, so the more water/fluids you drink, the better. Since we only have one bathroom for the two of us, we take extra precautions. I double flush and clean daily with disinfectant.

I hope the effects of chemo are not cumulative. They say you get more and more fatigued as you go through sessions, but I'm hoping since the oncologist dialed the chemo back a bit, I may get through the next week with not so many problems as before, so I am going to think positively. So glad to have the good news that the bloodwork is excellent. Hope that continues as well. It's a roller coaster, really...you take the good with the bad, and things can change in a heartbeat. Thanks for checking in to see how I am....so grateful for the love and prayers and good thoughts coming my way. It is such a comfort, really! It really has boosted my spirits...

                                        Love, Jeannie