The treatment always starts with an anti-nausea drip. Then they proceed to the other drug combinations … individual little bags hung on to the mobile stand. They added the new drug this time as my BP was well under check. Gary often will joke with the nurses whether they would like him to give the bags a squeeze every so often. On the other hand, there are tons of magazines, I took my knitting, Gary had the Kindle so we go well equipped. We then met Marie and Rick who had finished up their treatment (they stayed in one of the rooms). M and R drive in from Vegas to have her treatments – 5 hour drive and they stay overnight for one night before the treatment. She is on a 2 week on 2 week off regimen as her body cannot tolerate all the drugs.
The one drug which I have in the infusion pump 7 days a week 24 hours a day (looking for ideas for a name for this pump as it’s at my side all the time) had Marie in Emerg for a number of days. As a result, she is on the pill version which is not as effective and likely extends her recovery, which she told me depresses her at times. Rick was able to give Gary a quick overview of the Samsung Galaxy II (or III?) as we will still have to decide what to get once the company issued BBerry stops.
We were having such a noisy discussion that Fay, one of our nurses came to bid us good day as she was leaving. My drip had been completed … about 10 mins before and my Pump had been refilled for another 7 days. Fortunately, Lisa the receptionist was still there so we got a 1 pm appt for next week. Leaving, I felt a bit light headed so made sure I held on to Gary. By the time we got home and into the apt., I was fine. This is probably the closest I will get to feeling what it’s like to “do drugs”. I slept for the first few hours and when I woke up it was supper time. I’m beginning to see some habits forming during this period of my life … and it seems to be Pizza .. Gary’s love. Well, since it was already 7.30 pm it did not take long for us to figure that the easiest thing would be to order a pizza. I asked for a multigrain crust but these were not available. We settled for a veggie pizza. Guess what’s for lunch today!! Could be worse, I guess.
With the new drug added to the combo, I was expecting a few new side effects. The biggest impact is that I barely had two hours of sleep all night. It felt as if my system was in overdrive. At 3 am I decided to get out of bed and watched TV, read and knitted a bit. I fell asleep around 5 am on the couch, went to bed at around 6 and was up by 7.30 am. I’m hoping I’ll sleep today but feel ok for the time being. No nausea at this point. One new side effect is that I noticed my fingertips tingling a bit when I took anything cold from the fridge to prepare our smoothies. The tingling was a question which Dr. Bill asked whether I had from Round 1 but looks like it has been delayed or triggered with the new drug completing the combo. More side effects are likely to surface in the next day or so.
I leave you with a saying that appeared in my fortune cookie at our first dinner at a Chinese restaurant in LA, which we thought quite appropriate.
“If you want the rainbow, you have to tolerate the rain”.
For those of you who did not receive the first update, I came across this saying by Vivian Green in a magazine on the plane enroute to LA.
“Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass….
It’s about learning to dance in the rain!”
So, it appears that a common thread so far seems to be pizza and rain.
Thank you all for your continued support and emails. We still have a long road to travel and Gary and I are grateful that you are all at our side.
We send you our love from a sunny and beautifully cloudless LA.
Maureen and (Gary)