Bad week….bad attitude….a lot of difficulty managing my expectations. I felt so good for two days after getting the Taxol and I completely believed that this chemo would be much different, much easier, and my life would go back to being a lot more manageable. So when I hit the wall on Wednesday afternoon I had a hard time believing it. That is until on Friday I was in major pain, no appetite, sore throat, earache and heavy fatigue. All I could do was cry and sleep. This wasn’t the way it’s supposed to be – I already did the hard chemo – this is supposed to be the easy chemo. What a bill of goods I bought!!
Finally emailed the Dr on Thursday night and got a call on Friday. “Belle” felt like a guardian angel….she was calm, practical and reassuring. Told me that managing the side effects is one of the most important things they can do for me and obviously they weren’t doing a very good job…of course I also didn’t let them know what was going on because that’s what I do.
I hate the idea of being a bald, pale, wimpy, pill-popping, whiny, bitchy cancer woman. Belle reassured me that the pills are only as long as the treatment lasts and once the treatments are done I won’t need them anymore. According to her Vicodine is a beefed up aspirin – codeine and aspirin – ok I can manage that and it does help. Beside the pain is debilitating. Shooting pains in my low back, my abdomen, my right hip, left ankle, and right wrist….so far. Its like someone is stabbing you with a hot nail and just as you are ready to say stop – it does…but it leaves a weird painful echo in the bone that lasts for another few minutes. Then it moves on to somewhere else.
She also told me to get Glutamine and double the dose – take 3 times a day. When Ron read through the info on it he was as surprised as I was to discover this is a standard treatment for chemo patients. Its an amino acid that helps build protein and manages bone and joint pain. Considering the fact that depleted protein is a major issue (I look like an atrophied shell of myself) you’d think I would have heard of this before now. Anyway – adding that to the regimen. Also did a little yoga – stretching and breathing. I feel like I can’t get a good deep breath and also have a tickle at the bottom of my lungs which usually signals a cough coming on – so don’t want that to happen.
When I woke up this morning I decided enough is enough! Its time to get organized. I am going to try and create a log sheet that I have to check off each day – glutamine 3x per day ….check, multi, calcium, fish oil…check, 20 min walk…check, plus whatever else I need to be taking…. I’m hoping just the exercise of checking things off will help with the out of control feelings I’m having.
I also owe Ron an apology. Yesterday I wanted him to stay home and take care of me - and kept him from playing golf. I can be such a baby sometimes. He is such a good guy and works hard all week. I was just in such a bad place…but then when he settled in I felt really guilty and tried to tell him to go play. Of course I started feeling better around the same time so that just made the guilt worse….oh brother. Bald, wimpy, pill popping, whiny, bitchy AND guilty cancer woman….I need to go find a corner. Well thank god I still have my sense of humor…I hope he does too.
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