Tag: hospital

Side effects may include the following

Posted on by Steph

I’m tired.

This week has been a long one. On Tuesday, I was at the hospital almost the entire day, dealing with various appointments and consultations, and an unfortunate mix-up with my blood. I had to hear more things about my “prognosis being slightly worse” because of my age and “greater chances of it coming back” because of X, Y, and Z, and blah blah blah, and again process the idea of more treatment, which is starting to feel never-ending. It is difficult not to get upset after these types of conversations. My typical routine is to get through it, keep myself composed, ask all the right questions, and then go home and scream and cry and shout “I don’t want to dieeeeeee!” and hyperventilate for a minute or two. Then after exhausting myself, I usually put some crap on the TV like The Bachelor (my saving grace as of late) and distract myself until the next wave of panic hits for one reason or another.

Needless to say, it is exhausting. I keep telling people that I am bored. But it’s not the bored you are thinking of, where I have nothing to do. In fact, I often feel like I have too much to do and not enough time. It is more a case of an overall boredom with cancer. I am bored of dealing with it, talking about it, stressing about it. Bored. I want to be focused on something else. I would rather be complaining about the cold that many people on my Facebook seem to have. I would rather be staring at a wall, watching paint dry, or scratching my fingernails across a chalkboard. Essentially, I would rather be doing almost anything. That is where I’m at.

I have been experiencing some bad pains in my back the past couple days. For the average person, back pain would be of little concern. But anyone who has or had cancer can tell you that any new type of pain can be a cause for alarm. It is nearly impossible not to quickly jump to the conclusion that bad pain means the cancer has spread. I wish my brain did not go there, to such a dark place. I wish I could brush off pain the way other people are lucky enough to be able to do. But I can’t. Will I ever be able to? I’m not sure. But for right now, I am really hoping the pain gets better, because I don’t need a new worry to add to the list. The list is getting awfully long, my friends.

Tomorrow I go for my next chemo, which involves a new regimen. The infusions will take a total of 5 hours. With the typical wait times, I will likely be in the hospital all day. Please feel free to suggest fun things to do while sitting in a chemo chair for 5 hours.

The new chemo involves a drug which is typically known as one of the more horrendous chemo drugs one can receive. Fun possible side effects include neuropathy, debilitating mouth sores, terrible body pains and aches, loss of nails, and extreme fatigue, among others. As my oncologist said, I don’t think you’re going to like it too much. I should mention that over the next few days, or possibly week, I likely won’t be too great at responding to any emails or messages. Know that if I don’t answer you, I am most likely lying under my covers in the dark listening to some sort of “Songs for sad emo wussies” playlist on Songza.

I will also be starting my first round of the drug that will hopefully have a life-saving effect on me. And in addition, I start my clinical trial drug, where I will either be receiving a real drug, or a placebo. I will not know. Please cross your fingers for me that I receive the real deal. My chemo drug also has a tendency to cause severe allergic reactions, which is why I am currently hopped up on steroids and will be for the next couple days. So please cross your fingers as well that I don’t have a severe reaction when they start the drug. In fact, cross your toes too, if you have the ability to do that. Lots of happy thoughts tomorrow, if you can spare some.

On a slightly cheerier note, this week was a really great one in the I’m-a-cancer-patient-so-I-get-lots-of-gifts arena. I received a handmade tshirt from an old schoolmate (and former prom queen, hollaaa!) who now lives in New Zealand. She somehow created a stencil of me wearing a scarf and incorporated a cupcake theme and painted it on, and the whole thing was beyond impressive to me. I wore it to the hospital yesterday, proudly. I also got another package from the The Canary Islands (yes, many of my friends live in weird, exotic locales) which included a super soft sleep mask that I will likely bring with me tomorrow in hopes that it induces a nice chemo coma. And I got some more pretty nail polishes from my new pen pal, who volunteers to send me things through an organization, out of the goodness of her kind heart. On the food side, I have some soup, mashed potatoes, cookies and more goodies waiting for me. You all have no idea how much these things brighten my day. Well, hopefully you do. Because I just told you.

That’s all I wish to share for right now. Think of me tomorrow, with my hands and feet submerged in buckets of ice (something I have to do to try to prevent finger and feet problems). Hopefully that creates an interesting picture for you.

See you on the other side.

Today.

A day in the life

Posted on by Steph

People often ask me what my day was like, and I usually say something like, “Had an appointment, eating dinner now” because it can be tiring to actually go over all the details of each day, with each person. But I know some people are genuinely curious as to what happens when I go to all these exciting appointments. So here was my day today:

I drank a huge, disgusting cup of barium sulfate. This was in preparation for a CT scan later in the day. It was orange flavoured, the type of flavour that tastes nothing like an actual orange, but you know that that is what it’s trying to be. Not very pleasant.

My brother shows up. Then my mom shows up, not knowing my brother is over, and I make him jump out of the shadows and scare her. She screams a good horror movie scream. This was by far the highlight of the day, although I’m really hopeful no permanent damage to my mother was done.

Off to the hospital where I take a number to do some blood work. Then over to put my name on a waiting list for an ECG so I can wait for that at the same time I wait for the blood work, because I’m sneaky like that. A nurse in the ECG area tells me she can just do my blood right there. I say OK, although I feel a bit uneasy about this weird change of events. Should I trust her to take my blood, even though she’s not from the blood lab? Is this against protocol? Will the blood lab people come yell at me for letting her do it, like a child taking candy from a stranger?

She takes my blood. She pokes around a bit and has some trouble and makes comments about the small size of my veins. She pokes some more and takes her sweet time and keeps commenting about the difficulties she is having. After she finally finishes, she asks me if they know what’s wrong with me. Yes, breast cancer. She shakes her head and looks sad and mentions how young I am. She means well, but I don’t appreciate those types of reactions. I move on to the ECG.

I lay down and get a bunch of electrodes attached to my skin. I feel like I am in some sci-fi movie, although I can’t remember which one. The technician does something and prints out a piece of paper and it’s done. No pain involved, which makes me very happy. We chat for a bit, and he is nice. I can tell he feels bad for me, but it doesn’t bother me as much. Probably because he didn’t prick me a bunch of times with a sharp needle.

I wander around with my mom for a bit. We go meet my study nurse and I fill out some forms about how much pain I’ve been having, what kind of pain, and many other questions of the sort. I realize I have been feeling pretty good. I also feel a bit sad over the realization that my answers will likely be a bit different the next time I answer those exact same questions.

I check in for my CT scan and drink the second half of the pasty liquid. I change into a hospital gown. I loathe hospital gowns because I instantly feel like just another sick person when I put one on. I go into the room for the scan, and the technician tells me I will need an injection. More pokes. I tell him it has to be in the same side I just gave blood from, as I have had lymph nodes removed on my other side, and therefore should avoid any injury to that arm. He tries to insert the needle in a new spot. He fiddles around for awhile, and I think the injection is over. That was easy, I think. Wrong! He missed the vein. Poked the wrong spot. It hasn’t even happened. I am getting tired. And a bit frustrated. And my arm is starting to swell.

He eventually gets it right and I do the scans. The injection puts a metallic taste in my mouth. I hear a calming robot woman’s voice: Hold breath. Breathe normally. Hold breath. Breathe normally. I wonder if I will receive some sort of award for my excellent ability to hold my breath, and then breathe normally.

I don’t receive any such award. Instead I bring my arms back down, and see blood all over. Is that normal? I ask. I’m pretty sure that is not normal. I’m pretty sure I will try to get a different technician the next time around.

I meet my mom in the waiting room, and we are both unhappy to see the blue bruising beginning on my arm. It hurts, a lot. I go home and hold some frozen carrots on it to ease the swelling. These carrots have been sitting in my freezer for ages. I have no idea where the frozen carrots came from or how they got there, but today they finally seemed to serve a purpose.

And there you have it! Always exciting, never dull. The life of a cancer patient.