Hey everyone =) If you are reading, thank you! I took a brief hiatus from this. Last I wrote I was still in the hospital getting what they call "induction" part of chemo. Once I went home from that I just really wanted to soak it all in. Induction is the first month of treatment I went through. Now I am writing to you from "consolidation". This is the part of my treatment where I come to the hospital and stay 5 days and go home again. I do this three times. The chemo is given every other day at 12 hour intervals. They call it HIDAC. It's similar to what I received before but at a higher dose. This time I'll recover at home with my levels dropping there. Every day I'll be giving myself a slew of medicine one of which is an injection to help my blood counts recover more quickly. I will also be seeing an oncologist outpatient for blood work to make sure everything is going as planned.
Being home was so great. Just getting into the car and driving out of here was such a weird feeling. Believe it or not, I didn't even want to do anything special. I just wanted normal. We hung out, ordered in, spent time together, I put Lillia to bed which I missed so so much. It was GREAT. Over the break home we went out with friends for dinner and I got to celebrate mother's day with my beautiful girl. We played outside, and I did some housework and gardening. I'm excited to get back to that when I get home from this round.
This part of my treatment went a little differently than I expected. I was a lot more homesick than I expected to be. It didn't help that I was stuck with the roommate from hell at first. That made it harder to stay in a positive mood. But James was there for me every bit and helped me get through it and keep my chin up. I don't know what I'd do without his love and support. And logic. These people we unbelievable though you guys. This woman and her husband were SO negative and inconsiderate the whole time. She left her stuff all over the place, she was constantly snoring or hacking up a lung, and they fought right beside me all the time. He came in blaming her for how the past two weeks of his life have been so hard and talking about how he just had no positivity left to give her. Oh and my fav was when he told me come June 5th she was on her own because he had his own problems to deal with. I can NOT imagine treating my best friend that way in a time of need. So much for in sickness and in health. That's why vows are just words unless you mean it, but that's an entirely different tangent my friends.
Anyway, I was finally moved to a private room and things have been better since then. I'm still very homesick, but it's easier to come out of and find something positive to think about or do. I think the first time around I was so focused on the future and just getting through that, that I thought this part would be easier. While this isn't nearly as bad because it's like a 6th of the time in the hospital, it's making me feel like this process will never end. Like my break was just a tease. It's making me come to terms with the fact that this is a life changer. For the next couple months I will be in and out for this and then for the next few YEARS I will have to be monitored with bone marrow biopsies and such. And I feel like I'm missing so much when I'm gone from James and Lillia like this. And I think even more unnerving is how helpless I feel in my own body. I hate that. I'm a bit of a control freak LOL. But on the other hand I try to think, if it's going to be a life changer then one day this will be behind me and I'm going to make it a life change for the better. I will do better by myself so hopefully I and more importantly my family doesn't have to go through this again. That's scary to me too...and I know I keep trailing a bit into the down side, but I'm trying to be brutally honest because part of this is sharing what actually goes through my mind while dealing with this... is what if it comes back? That's in the future though and one step at a time. This is what I mean by life changer though. That thought will always be there.
As far as treatment goes..consolidation has been a bit different. Because it is high dose, the pre-meds are different and there's a lot more of them. Before I had a steroid and alepurinol (not sure if that's the right spelling) to keep ureic acid down. Now I have those as well as eye drops 4 times a day to keep my corneas from being damaged, and a shot daily to keep my blood from clotting. Today I had to take a potassium pill and those are HUMONGOUS. lol.. They also gave me the birth control shot to stop my bleeding (need to keep my blood). That HURT like a mother. Ladies, don't get that shot if you don't have to haha. hey more brutal honesty. I have had no side effects thank goodness but like I mentioned before I will be doing most of my recovery at home. Fully expect to be not much more than tired and OCD about germs for the first week and then back to normal. I'll have to monitor my temp several times a day. I get to go home in the morning and I really really cannot wait. It will be really nice to get back to normal again, even if just for a little while haha.
Well I think I've talked your ears off enough about nothing. I know I promised a blog about hair loss, and don't you worry that pic of my bald head is coming. I really can pull it off ; ) bahaha. So until next time, and thanks for listening to the inner rumblings of my brain. It's a nice release. Take care and love. Heather :)
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