The Week After My First Go-'Round

I have been trying for the past week to pinpoint what drug/treatment/hormone issues are causing various results without success. Things are definitely happening throughout my body, however, and I'm creepily fascinated with the weirdness.

So, to quickly recap. Within a 7 day time frame I had a shot to shut down my ovaries and push me into hot flashes, a surgery to implant a port, a boob fill, and my first chemo treatment. I also took three days of steroids, three days of anti-nausea meds plus a smattering of another anti-nausea med as needed, and a super-human dosage of Vitamin D. I think that's all. The hormone issues, to the best of my knowledge, kicked in on Friday at what I think is the same time as the chemo. I have no way to prove this. However, the result was one. crabby. chica.

I can't even say for sure if my reaction over the first few days was physical or mental. A week out, I am apt to say both as I have no doubt that physically I am noticing differences. On Friday I was generally tired and lazy, but expected to be and gave in easily. Friday night was a different story all together. That was my first bout with the "night sweats" or whatever those evil things are called. I was sweating bullets, opening the window, closing the window, turning on the ceiling fan, turning off the ceiling fan, trying to lay on the dry part of the bed... My aunt had warned me about the hot flashes and that they weren't fun - she swears her eyeglasses fog up when she gets them. I had had night sweats before when I was sick, but this wasn't fun. I feel closer to my aunts now - in fact I feel closer to everyone's aunts for that matter.

The anti-nausea medication they had given me was awesome - I wasn't nauseous. Food wasn't tasting the same - and it didn't have the same appeal - but again I am not sure if that's more mental. The physical certainty I have that chemicals are indeed streaming through my body is that the plumbing isn't working as I have taken for granted. I'm not going into great detail here - I trust you get the point. My skin is also turning against me. I hope it's temporary.

They had also talked in the info sessions about the inside of my mouth becoming sensitive - and this just started last night. The entire inside of my mouth feels very strange - and today it got more pronounced and not quite painful, but uncomfortable. It doesn't really hurt as much as it's just not right. It reminds me of burning the roof of my mouth on pizza and the resulting effects, but without the burn pain and all over rather than just the roof. After I ate lunch, it felt unwell.

(Unwell. This is my new favorite adjective. Kelly was driving me home from surgery last week and she asked me if I was ok. I wasn't sure how to answer that because I wasn't ok, but wasn't not ok. I was struggling to find a word - "Um... I'm... Hmm..." "Unwell?" "Yep. Exactly.")

My mom came down for my first treatment and stayed over the weekend, which was great. She gave me the luxury of being sick and taking care of me as only a mom can. I slept a great deal, became hooked on her favorite TV show, and apologized over and over that I was so crabby. At one point, I was so out of sorts that all I wanted to do was cry, but couldn't even muster the energy to even do that correctly. It was pitiful. A general synopsis of my weekend through Tuesday was tired, crabby, and unwell.

I am doing much better now. I feel like I am back to my regular personality and am observing my mental and physical health with curiosity. I am interested to see how the second treatment goes without all the other "stuff" happening at the same time. I also take my second weekly dosage of 50,000 mg of Vitamin D (I know I don't get alot of sun, but seriously...) on Sunday and will find out if that is what caused the burning in my throat.

I have been told to expect tingling and numbness in my fingers and toes, but this hasn't happened yet. I am also expecting my hair to start falling out pretty soon, but not for another week at the earliest. It is strange to me that these chemicals are still in my body - I keep thinking that they wear off in a day or so and that it's similar to taking cold medicine.

Random thought - "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane has been in my head for a week. Every time I take something - "One pill makes you larger aaaaaand one pill makes you small..." but it's the Tom Petty video that I see in my mind.

Another random thought - Abbot Northwestern should have a loyalty parking program. You know, where you get points every time you park in the ramp. When you get x number of points, you can get a free day of parking or a cup of coffee or some sort of little perk. I'm not saying I want a new Bose stereo or anything, but a cup of Caribou (they have one in the hospital, conveniently by the parking ramp) would be a nice value add. I have a friend, S.B., who works for a great loyalty marketing company - let me know, Abbott, I'd be happy to help make that connection... Just 'sayin.

Carrie