I've just about had the worst day I've had for a very long time. And nothing happened.
I turned up for chemo. The moment I walk into the unit, I feel sick. Really sick. I run to the toilets and they are occupied, so I run outside and start ... crying.
I haven't done much crying since all this happened. I used to cry a lot, but for some reason, I don't really cry about cancer. I cry about chemo though.
A nurse comes out and does the stroking the arm thing, encouraging me to let it out. Which I do. This is now officially the most amount I have cried about my situation. The timing is not idea.
I return to the unit. The sickness is stronger. Officially, it's called 'anticipatory nausea' and officially it is fucking nuts. My whole body is as sick as if I've had chemo. I need to keep a sick bowl by my bed as the nurse starts to take my blood from my PICC line.
I now have a wait - regular readers will know that my white blood cells are useless at regenerating themselves in 2 week and invariably I get sent home. Having low white cells is known as being neutrophenic. My blood is sent 'upstairs' for testing - the results take about 90 mins to come back and determine if I am 'well' enough to have chemo.
As I wait there, I am feel rougher and rougher. As you can see from my mobile rant earlier, the environment doesn't help. Sick. Sick. Sick.
I see another patient who started having treatment after me and is on his last treament today. He has had the same 'ABVD' drug treatment. Although he displayed little of my symptons at first, his experience of anticipatory nausea is starting to echo mine. He talks of the how looking at the blue NHS lunch boxes makes him sick and how each treatment is worse. Mercifully for him, his treatment has been relatively short and today should be the last. It would appear I'm walking a much longer road than him. I wish him well and hope, for his sake, I never see him again.
After an hour or so, I'm told the news. I am neutrophenic again and am being sent home. Another 5k of NHS chemo drugs to be poured down the plughole. That stuff doesn't keep. They sensibly realise that from now on, I'm to have my blood test the day before, so the drugs will only be ordered if I am able to take them. I reckon I've been responsible for about £20,000 worth of chemo wastage. If you're reading this in America, you'll now see how us Britian's could not understand your resistance to Obama's health reform. As flawed and cash starved as it can be, the NHS is a bloody miracle. You should be grateful you have a president who sees it the same way. I would be screwed right now, if it wasn't for the NHS.
Mental exercise: Imagine you have a mentally damanding test to do. You are nervous. Very anxious. You don't want to do it. Perhaps it involved some physical danger, like jumping off something high or getting into a bath with spiders - whatever freaks you out. You are full of fear. Full of anxiety. You feel slightly sick. At the last moment, just as your anxiety is at it's highest, you are told you don't have to do it. The anxiety drops, the fear dissapates and relief rushes in.
So I'm told I don't have to have chemo. But the sickness doesn't drop, doesn't dissipate, there's no relief. I'm still feeling very, very sick. Shortly after, the nurse detaches my line and flushes it with some saline. I grab my sick bowl and wretch furiously into it.
Finally I get to leave. To suck down some fresh air. That should help. It doesn't. I am still sick.
I have a plan. To eat. A dear friend takes me to a pub, where I have a vegetarian chilli with rice, followed by a huge piece of chocolate cake and icecream. The plan is to change my body chemistry, the smells, the tastes, the feelings - yet, although I enjoy the meal, as I walk back out into the carpark, I realise I'm still feeling sick,
So, I go home. I take a handful of anti-nausea tablets and go to bed. At 2:00pm. I fall asleep in a heartbeat and the next thing it is 8:30pm.
I still feel sick, but slightly better. As I write this, I feel sick.
I feel as sick as if I have had chemo.
The insanity of this situation is hugely apparent to me. Today, I went to a hospital, had some blood taken from me (didn't even need a needle, direct out of my PICC) and then I was sent home.
I feel like I've been through an emotional wringer. I never realised that anticipatory nausea could be so devastating. It's now 22:30 and I still feel ... sick.
I've been given some Lorazepam for next time, to take before I return to the unit, to help, to sedate. I pray that it does for this is getting out of control.
My spleen feels big, treatment is delayed again. Nothing is very great news and does lead me to the same conclusion, that, at this rate, in time I will in time be looking at a full splenectomy and all that goes with it.
We shall see .. but for now, I sign off still feeling sick, yet knowing that nothing has happened to me to make me feel this way.
Insanity. Pure, insanity.
Showing posts with label nausea. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nausea. Show all posts
Thursday, 25 March 2010
Tuesday, 9 February 2010
chemo session 3
I've had enough of chemo. I hate it. With a passion.
It's Tuesday morning. 06:30. I want to go to work, but I still feel sick and I ache. The background sickness is still more foreground than background and frankly, I've had enough.
It was a tough session. A session that I'm going to find it hard to write about without making myself feel sicker but my lack of blogging is playing on my mind, like some unfinished homework.
The session was pretty much the same as before, but the last drug, the one that causes me all the "vein pain" (dacarbazine), was twice as painful as before. I can't describe why or what was different, but I felt something wasn't right. One two occasions I demanded the treatment was stopped and in fact, due to time constraints (they are not allowed to administer drugs after 5:00pm, as there are no doctors help in the event of a reaction), I only managed to get 50% of this drug in me. I was hoping this would result in 50% less sickness, but that was not to be.
To confirm my suspicions that something wasn't right, my vein continues to hurt even today. Not all the time, but very periodically ... a sharp pain that shoots into my hand and up my wrist... whilst in itself the pain is not unbearable, it brings with it the sense, the feeling, the taste and the sickness of the treatment ... it's like I'm still having the drug administered into the vein. Hence, five days later and I'm still feeling horrible.
I blame my brain. It's started making all kinds of connections to feeling sick. From now on, Ready Salted Crisps are off my diet list, as are 'egg on brown' sandwiches. Why? I was eating them during my last treatment and had to stop half way through, as I felt horrible. Now, the thought of those crisps actually brings on a very strong feeling of nausea. I guess this is no different from drinking a litre bottle spirits as a kid and spending the next three days feeling like death - just the thought or smell of it will turn your stomach.
The problem I face is that it's getting worse every trip. I actually fear the place now. I'm internally fighting against going back. The most depressing thought I have is that I still have not managed to do a "every two weeks" stint - as each time I have been delayed by my low white blood cells. The thought that by the time I'm back on my feet, it will be a mere 7 days before I return is crushing.
Speaking of the "every two weeks" thing, I have been given a solution to my low white-cell count problem. As of this coming Friday, Saturday and Sunday, I am supposed to impale a 3 inch needle in my gut and push the plunger - to give myself a bone marrow boost.
This is not going to happen.
What is going to happen, is that I will spent 45 minutes standing naked in front of a mirror, shouting at myself for being such a pathetically unmanly human being as I stand poised to plunge the needle but unable to move my arm, before finally getting dressed and crawling on my hands and knees to a nurse in my treatment centre, begging her to put my out of my pathetic misery. It will take her 5 seconds.
Be sure to come back Friday for that blog of frustration.
Since I started this miserable blog, I've had to open a window to suck down some fresh air and drink some lemon and ginger tea. Because I feel sick.
Christ, I'm sick of chemo.
Absolutely sick of it.
It's Tuesday morning. 06:30. I want to go to work, but I still feel sick and I ache. The background sickness is still more foreground than background and frankly, I've had enough.
It was a tough session. A session that I'm going to find it hard to write about without making myself feel sicker but my lack of blogging is playing on my mind, like some unfinished homework.
The session was pretty much the same as before, but the last drug, the one that causes me all the "vein pain" (dacarbazine), was twice as painful as before. I can't describe why or what was different, but I felt something wasn't right. One two occasions I demanded the treatment was stopped and in fact, due to time constraints (they are not allowed to administer drugs after 5:00pm, as there are no doctors help in the event of a reaction), I only managed to get 50% of this drug in me. I was hoping this would result in 50% less sickness, but that was not to be.
To confirm my suspicions that something wasn't right, my vein continues to hurt even today. Not all the time, but very periodically ... a sharp pain that shoots into my hand and up my wrist... whilst in itself the pain is not unbearable, it brings with it the sense, the feeling, the taste and the sickness of the treatment ... it's like I'm still having the drug administered into the vein. Hence, five days later and I'm still feeling horrible.
I blame my brain. It's started making all kinds of connections to feeling sick. From now on, Ready Salted Crisps are off my diet list, as are 'egg on brown' sandwiches. Why? I was eating them during my last treatment and had to stop half way through, as I felt horrible. Now, the thought of those crisps actually brings on a very strong feeling of nausea. I guess this is no different from drinking a litre bottle spirits as a kid and spending the next three days feeling like death - just the thought or smell of it will turn your stomach.
The problem I face is that it's getting worse every trip. I actually fear the place now. I'm internally fighting against going back. The most depressing thought I have is that I still have not managed to do a "every two weeks" stint - as each time I have been delayed by my low white blood cells. The thought that by the time I'm back on my feet, it will be a mere 7 days before I return is crushing.
Speaking of the "every two weeks" thing, I have been given a solution to my low white-cell count problem. As of this coming Friday, Saturday and Sunday, I am supposed to impale a 3 inch needle in my gut and push the plunger - to give myself a bone marrow boost.
This is not going to happen.
What is going to happen, is that I will spent 45 minutes standing naked in front of a mirror, shouting at myself for being such a pathetically unmanly human being as I stand poised to plunge the needle but unable to move my arm, before finally getting dressed and crawling on my hands and knees to a nurse in my treatment centre, begging her to put my out of my pathetic misery. It will take her 5 seconds.
Be sure to come back Friday for that blog of frustration.
Since I started this miserable blog, I've had to open a window to suck down some fresh air and drink some lemon and ginger tea. Because I feel sick.
Christ, I'm sick of chemo.
Absolutely sick of it.
Saturday, 16 January 2010
chemo session 2
I find it hard to write a blog after chemo without feeling sick - odd thing, but whenever I think about 'those bags' that go into my arm, it brings on my nausea. So I've just eaten some toast and am trying to bang this one out. It won't be a very entertaining blog, I'm afraid.
The chemo session was looooooong. I arrived at 10am and didn't leave until 5:30pm. Crickey. As usual, finding a vein was a headache - four attempts in one arm, two in the other. I think we got through eleven needels (one batch was blunt!). I do not like needles at all and this was a pretty traumatic 30 minutes.
Once the vein was found and my tube was in, there was a lot of waiting. I had my PSP with me, so watched most of a movie. Pre-med didn't start until 1:00pm - I was given a lot of antihistamines to stop the shaking I had last time. Administration of the drugs was pretty quick, until that last dreaded bag which gives me so much "vein pain" as it goes in - they turn the drip-speed down and that's where the time went.
My dear ol' dad turned up, despite all the warnings I could give him, ridiculously early. So he sat there and ranted aimlessly for hours. He's not 'old'-old but he's managed to bugger-up one ear and should have a hearing aid, but he 'forgets' it, so half of what I say and what the nurses say is completely lost on him and he's always behind the flow of the conversation. I want to kill him after 30 mins.
The meds went in OK, but as we reached the end, that familiar feeling of nausea set it. Horrible, However, I have been given extra anti-sickness drugs as the nurses were fully aware of my problem with nausea.
I was sick once that night and again the next morning, but apart from that, I've felt 'fine'. The nausea comes in waves - it's always there in the background and then suddenly it ramps up ... and then fades. The less I think about it, the better (writing this blog is actually bloody horrible, as all I'm thinking about is how sick I feel).
But the good news is that apart from that, so far, no other side effects. I've slept well, possibly better than I have done for a while. I am not ghostly white, which is good. My ol' man, who has stayed at my flat since Thursday night, has described the difference as 'amazing'. And I guess it is.
So, I wonder why the difference - well, three things are in my favour. Before the my first session, I had not long had an operation with general anaesthetic, which does hang around in the body and make you feel pretty flaky. I had also had that horrible bone-marrow scrape and on top of the whirlwind of news, I remember I was looking and feeling pretty hellish before the treatment. Also, this time I've had three weeks of recovery time (which won't happen again, sadly) and was feeling strong before the treatment. Finally, perhaps my body has not had such a shock this time around. I have a history of being able to adapt to drugs fairly quickly, although normally the drugs I took didn't makes me feel like death for six days - well, maybe they did, but not before making me feel like a golden God for a night.
So, the last day and a half has been spent on the sofa watching films with my dad, with the volume on 95/100 whilst he still struggles to hear the dialog. I took my dad to the pub, sorted him out with somewhere to smoke and basically looked after him ... hang on a minute. What's wrong with this picture?
Today, Saturday, I've woken again to 'just nausea', so I've released my father of his parental responsibilities this morning, which I suspect he was relieved about, but not before we fed the ducks. The flat is my own my again. And exhale.
So, I'm home alone - wondering if this is the extent on the side-effects I'll get. I'll be lucky ... I'm fully expecting an attack on the immune system that will drain me, but so far, so good ... oh yes, I can't work out if I need a haircut or my hair has started to fall out ... it's breaking a lot in a shower and the bathroom seems to have a lot of hair hanging around. Might be time to have a chat with my hair dresser.
Right, i'm not writing anymore because it just makes me feel ill and 'the football' is on ... my day plan is to watch the two Premiership games on TV, plus Man Utd on the internet. Feel free to join me, call me, come over this weekend ... and thanks again for all the txts etc. Very kind.
Love you all.
The chemo session was looooooong. I arrived at 10am and didn't leave until 5:30pm. Crickey. As usual, finding a vein was a headache - four attempts in one arm, two in the other. I think we got through eleven needels (one batch was blunt!). I do not like needles at all and this was a pretty traumatic 30 minutes.
Once the vein was found and my tube was in, there was a lot of waiting. I had my PSP with me, so watched most of a movie. Pre-med didn't start until 1:00pm - I was given a lot of antihistamines to stop the shaking I had last time. Administration of the drugs was pretty quick, until that last dreaded bag which gives me so much "vein pain" as it goes in - they turn the drip-speed down and that's where the time went.
My dear ol' dad turned up, despite all the warnings I could give him, ridiculously early. So he sat there and ranted aimlessly for hours. He's not 'old'-old but he's managed to bugger-up one ear and should have a hearing aid, but he 'forgets' it, so half of what I say and what the nurses say is completely lost on him and he's always behind the flow of the conversation. I want to kill him after 30 mins.
The meds went in OK, but as we reached the end, that familiar feeling of nausea set it. Horrible, However, I have been given extra anti-sickness drugs as the nurses were fully aware of my problem with nausea.
I was sick once that night and again the next morning, but apart from that, I've felt 'fine'. The nausea comes in waves - it's always there in the background and then suddenly it ramps up ... and then fades. The less I think about it, the better (writing this blog is actually bloody horrible, as all I'm thinking about is how sick I feel).
But the good news is that apart from that, so far, no other side effects. I've slept well, possibly better than I have done for a while. I am not ghostly white, which is good. My ol' man, who has stayed at my flat since Thursday night, has described the difference as 'amazing'. And I guess it is.
So, I wonder why the difference - well, three things are in my favour. Before the my first session, I had not long had an operation with general anaesthetic, which does hang around in the body and make you feel pretty flaky. I had also had that horrible bone-marrow scrape and on top of the whirlwind of news, I remember I was looking and feeling pretty hellish before the treatment. Also, this time I've had three weeks of recovery time (which won't happen again, sadly) and was feeling strong before the treatment. Finally, perhaps my body has not had such a shock this time around. I have a history of being able to adapt to drugs fairly quickly, although normally the drugs I took didn't makes me feel like death for six days - well, maybe they did, but not before making me feel like a golden God for a night.
So, the last day and a half has been spent on the sofa watching films with my dad, with the volume on 95/100 whilst he still struggles to hear the dialog. I took my dad to the pub, sorted him out with somewhere to smoke and basically looked after him ... hang on a minute. What's wrong with this picture?
Today, Saturday, I've woken again to 'just nausea', so I've released my father of his parental responsibilities this morning, which I suspect he was relieved about, but not before we fed the ducks. The flat is my own my again. And exhale.
So, I'm home alone - wondering if this is the extent on the side-effects I'll get. I'll be lucky ... I'm fully expecting an attack on the immune system that will drain me, but so far, so good ... oh yes, I can't work out if I need a haircut or my hair has started to fall out ... it's breaking a lot in a shower and the bathroom seems to have a lot of hair hanging around. Might be time to have a chat with my hair dresser.
Right, i'm not writing anymore because it just makes me feel ill and 'the football' is on ... my day plan is to watch the two Premiership games on TV, plus Man Utd on the internet. Feel free to join me, call me, come over this weekend ... and thanks again for all the txts etc. Very kind.
Love you all.
Sunday, 27 December 2009
moaning
First of all, this is not going to be my best work, in regard to writing. I don't apologise for this, because it has just taken about 1 hour to muster the energy to plug in the laptop and logon, so think yourself lucky you're not staring at the previous blog entry.
I am back at home now, after my dad dropped me off, showing off some pretty good parenting skills for someone without a great track record of this sort of thing.
So, back on the sofa, in front of my HD TV with Sky HD. If I die here, I will die happy. I would hate to die in front on a non-HD TV with no Sky. That would be the modern equalivent of being run down by a bus with dirty underpants on.
Right then - a run down of my moans. I'm not sure where we left off on Christmas Day, but I started being sick before dinner, which was less insulting than doing it afterwards. I did manage to eat my dads traditional Christmas Dinner of monkfish and scallops, with all the roast trimmings.
At this point, I wasn't actually too bad - but as the afternoon wore on the nausea increased and although I was only sick once more, the nausea didn't go away all day. Or night.
Boxing day was pretty much a repeat. Sick twice. Lots of heavy nausea. My dad did manage to take me to a pub, as that's exactly where any recovering alcoholic with chemotherapy sickness needs to be. However, the soda water did help and I think me ol' man deserved a pint or two, as it can't be a lot of fun waiting on a thinning, white, pasty looking, vomiting person on the sofa - unless it was Kate Moss. He'd probably like that.
I went to bed early - the nights are tough - I hate them. It goes something like this. Dose off. Wake up every 20 mins in a panic, with a mouth as dry the bottom of a parrot cage - gulp water, wake up every 45 minutes to go to the toilet. Repeat about 15 times a night.
Today, I woke up feeling a bit better. The nausea had gone from 8/10 to 6/10 and was a welcome relief. I did manage to get around to see my lovely nan, uncle and family members - all who are (somewhat embarrasingly) reading this blog. It was good to see them, although my contribution to the conversation was a bit limited.
Whilst all this was happening, I was introduced to a new side effect - a sore mouth.
I was warned about this ... it feels really strange - tastes metallic. The inside of my mouth feels sore, raw and eating is a challenge really.
Speaking of which, the appetite has taken a nose dive and I'm must not sure what I want to eat, if anything.
The nausea ramped up again later and ... Oh, Christ - I'm boring myself now. It's fair to say that I'm quite shocked at how RUBBISH I feel after one dose of this stuff and I must confess that I'm really not looking forward to the next few months.
I'm praying that tomorrow I can get out to see Avatar, which I have pre-booked tickets for at the London iMax. I've been looking forward to this for a while. I guess if I puke into a carrier bag whilst watching the film, people will just assume it's the 3D effect.
OK - that's enough of my pity pot. I'll let you go now ... come back soon to hear me moan some more.
Oh yeah, I still have all my hair.
I am back at home now, after my dad dropped me off, showing off some pretty good parenting skills for someone without a great track record of this sort of thing.
So, back on the sofa, in front of my HD TV with Sky HD. If I die here, I will die happy. I would hate to die in front on a non-HD TV with no Sky. That would be the modern equalivent of being run down by a bus with dirty underpants on.
Right then - a run down of my moans. I'm not sure where we left off on Christmas Day, but I started being sick before dinner, which was less insulting than doing it afterwards. I did manage to eat my dads traditional Christmas Dinner of monkfish and scallops, with all the roast trimmings.
At this point, I wasn't actually too bad - but as the afternoon wore on the nausea increased and although I was only sick once more, the nausea didn't go away all day. Or night.
Boxing day was pretty much a repeat. Sick twice. Lots of heavy nausea. My dad did manage to take me to a pub, as that's exactly where any recovering alcoholic with chemotherapy sickness needs to be. However, the soda water did help and I think me ol' man deserved a pint or two, as it can't be a lot of fun waiting on a thinning, white, pasty looking, vomiting person on the sofa - unless it was Kate Moss. He'd probably like that.
I went to bed early - the nights are tough - I hate them. It goes something like this. Dose off. Wake up every 20 mins in a panic, with a mouth as dry the bottom of a parrot cage - gulp water, wake up every 45 minutes to go to the toilet. Repeat about 15 times a night.
Today, I woke up feeling a bit better. The nausea had gone from 8/10 to 6/10 and was a welcome relief. I did manage to get around to see my lovely nan, uncle and family members - all who are (somewhat embarrasingly) reading this blog. It was good to see them, although my contribution to the conversation was a bit limited.
Whilst all this was happening, I was introduced to a new side effect - a sore mouth.
I was warned about this ... it feels really strange - tastes metallic. The inside of my mouth feels sore, raw and eating is a challenge really.
Speaking of which, the appetite has taken a nose dive and I'm must not sure what I want to eat, if anything.
The nausea ramped up again later and ... Oh, Christ - I'm boring myself now. It's fair to say that I'm quite shocked at how RUBBISH I feel after one dose of this stuff and I must confess that I'm really not looking forward to the next few months.
I'm praying that tomorrow I can get out to see Avatar, which I have pre-booked tickets for at the London iMax. I've been looking forward to this for a while. I guess if I puke into a carrier bag whilst watching the film, people will just assume it's the 3D effect.
OK - that's enough of my pity pot. I'll let you go now ... come back soon to hear me moan some more.
Oh yeah, I still have all my hair.
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