Okay, so yesterday I had my very first chemotherapy treatment. This strange day began, well, strangely. For one thing, my mom and I realized that Pooka (my new puppy) was leaving behind what looked like tiny brown dried flakes of little rice in bed. Moments after scooping these in a little plastic baggie for someone to take to the vet, Rosco (our black and white cocker spaniel) started throwing up a lot. Tiffany Spiecker to the rescue. She arrived at about nine, scooped up the canines and headed toward the vet. Mom and I headed toward the Cancer Center.
Arrived upstairs and this woman a bit too gruffly/coldly/curtly asked me for my "orange card." I didn't have it or at the moment know what she was talking about. She seemed annoyed, and I burst out crying. Luckily the environment grew more nurturing as the nurses realized it was "my first time." A very nice woman named Sarah with a lovely English accent accent led me to "my chair" and undressed the bandaging from the port I had had inserted on Monday. She numbed the area with a spray that made my skin feel cold and sting a tiny bit. Then she inserted a needle into the port and drew a bunch of blood. That needle stick was the only one done that day! Next, Sarah hooked up the IV which would be part of my costume for the next five hours or so. First she ran saline fluide to flush out the port, then steriods, then Benydral (sp?). She also handed me two tablets of Tylonal (sp). She said that all these pre-meds were to help my body deal with the chemo drugs.
I was conversing with the ladies (other patients...most of them were women...hmmm) around me. As the Benydral hit my system, I started to feel very out of it. I thought I was going to fall asleep. But the feeling passed. Then, the chemo meds were ready to go. Sarah brought over a tube of red fluid (the "A") - this chemo drug they call a "push" - because it is pushed in slowly by a nurse through a syringe. She told me that this was the drug that causes patients to lose their hair and she explained to me why. The reason that patients lose their hair is because the chemotherapy goes and attacks all of the cells in the body that are rapidly dividing (such as cancer cells). However, the chemo cannot tell the difference between the "good cells" and the cancer cells. So hair cells are cells that happen to rapidly divide and they get attacked. It makes sense.
Besides having to get up to pee every fifteen minutes or so, for the first few hours, sitting there getting the drugs was not so bad, especially because I was in good company. People came to visit me and the other patients were friendly. Psychologically, within, though, it was weird and intense. I cried quietly for a short bit every once in a while because I could feel the toxins entering my system. My head and cheeks felt weird, my hips would ache. I felt myself becoming weaker. It was during the administration of the fourth and final chemo drug (the "D") (now it was around 5 pm) that I really began to fade. I just didn't feel good and I didn't want to talk. It was a mixture of mild nausea and a head that ached and a body that felt so weak. I just laid there in my blanket, being still and quiet.
The side-by-side story of this day which I began earlier is that Pooka also had it rough, quite rough. Apparently, when the vet gave her the anti-worm medication, she became very sick. She was sick for most of the time that I was at the Cancer Center. Poor baby. The vet said that it was her system flushing out the worms. The reason that Rosco was sick was because of an antibiotic he had been taking which the vet stopped because Rosco is better now. So.....in many ways.....I was not alone yesterday. Pooka has been fine ever since. She slept in her little box last night rather than my arms, just in case she got sick again, but she has been fine. This morning she laid on my stomach, the place on my body that feels slight discomfort. It is like she knows. Animals are amazing.
Anyway, I feel much, much better compared to yesterday at the Cancer Center. I started to feel better as soon as I got home (besides the overall exhaustion). True, my body feels strange, like there is something foreign working its way through it, but I am comfortable. My dad's hanging out with me today, as well as the four canines I love.
Thank you for your support, love, friendship, faith, and prayers everyone!!!!
