Lymphemo #4 B

Two to go! I was a little queasy the whole session today. I was fasting to get a fair glucose number from the blood draw. It was 127 which isn’t alarming but a little high (norm=65-110). I have some diabetes history on my Dad’s side of the family so I wanted to make sure I wasn’t exposing yet another health concern. I took the P on an empty stomach but had a P&J as soon as the blood draw was done. Not sure if this affected the overall experience but I was very tired the whole day and my stomach was not cool. Anyway, it is in the books, no other complications except one…

When I'm receiving the drugs, my feet get tingly and hot…then the odor begins. My feet stink to high heaven for some reason and no one else can smell them. What the...?. I have survived most of my adult life with a rather compromised sense of smell. It is a joke with my family because I can smell what I call low tones (rotten garbage, wet dogs, flatulence, etc.) but have a hard time smelling high tones (perfume, hand lotion, flowers, etc.). Since chemo started, I have a new lease on life with an added sense of smell. Of course, I’m taking the good with the bad. Our black lab, Poppy Seed Gelato (Poppy) found a deer carcass in the field next door and spent the better part of last week eating between meals. I couldn’t be in the same room with her given the smell of death. The gas was “to die for”; does that phrase work here? We took a family hike on Sunday to locate the beast and most of the hind end was missing. I pried it from the ground…someone had extracted the antlers with a hacksaw and I wasn’t in enough of a CSI mood to determine the cause of death. Eric, barn help extraordinaire, and I hauled the carcass to the dumpster and loaded the frozen mess into the safety of a temporary tomb to avoid any further desecration. I think that is illegal but Poppy’s rank scent could also be considered illegal so we are even.

Having said all that, I forgot to mention that the Onc said, “Don’t be surprised if you lose your new found sense of smell after the treatments.” Great. That’s one side effect I would like to keep…along with a lack of ear and nose hair.

Lymphemo #4 A

Spoke with the Onc this morning and he is pleased with my progress. As he mentioned in the vmail, everything is shrinking as expected. My occasional cough is most likely allergy related and not lymph node related. We discussed the ongoing frequency of appointments following the last treatment (#6) and other minutiae.

I will have a final CT scan 3 weeks after the last treatment to make sure everything is reduced to the point that we are all comfortable. I may not receive a PET scan. We have to play that by ear. I will have appointments every 3 months for roughly 2 years. The frequency will change to every 6 mos until year 5 p.c. (post-chemo). We then go into yearly visit mode. If I can get through 2 years, prognosis is good, if I can get through year 5, chances are, if I get cancer again, it will be another site or flavor.

One thing we discussed was my displeasure at not being allowed to give blood. I also mentioned donating organs. His responded with a slight grin, “that wouldn’t be a good idea.” So I regretfully scratched off the little heart sticker on my driver’s license.

We forgot the Prednisone (P) script again so my Dad graciously drove to the pharmacy and brought it to me just before my treatment. “Have a good infusion,” he said as we parted. Rituxan is flowing at 50 ml/hr with 7 ml to go before they up the flow. The entire bag is 250 ml. R is the juice that caused me to react allergically so they step the rate of flow to give my body time to adjust.

Very crowded in at LHCP today. They are keeping Liz hopping.

Voicemail 2.20.2009 6pm

“Paul, Onc here, nothing urgent. I just wanted to call to say the scans looked really, really good. You’ve had an excellent response. The lymph nodes in the chest are completely back to normal and the other nodes are significantly smaller. I just thought I’d give you some good news with all the bad news these days…you have some good stuff. Have a great weekend and I’ll talk to you on Tuesday.”

Cool.

CT Scan Midway

Again, I should apologize for my withering blog activity. Certainly it is not a sign that I am headed downhill. Quite the opposite, as I feel much better headed into the third week. I arrived on Tuesday for the CT Scan that will show my treatment progress. This is routine now. Choke down a liter of barium sulfate. The first half liter I tried to flavor with some instant tea flavoring we had in the house, Tangerine whatnot, to reference the ‘08 election, “lipstick on a pig.” There is a business opportunity for someone to improve the flavor of this barium sulfate drink and to coat prednisone pills with something. I finished the final swallows as we drove to LHCP. As always, very little wait time, and I climb aboard the rolling plank. After you are under the sheet, they ask you to slide down your pants. At least she asked me to…hmmm. I’ll have to ask if that is protocol. The technician and I discuss whether or not to infuse the contrast through my port or through the traditional inner arm bruise method. A qualified nurse will need to be called in if I want to use the port and we cannot leave the line in for my blood work upstairs so I opt for expedition and choose inner right arm bruising. She did not disappoint as a quarter size bruise popped up almost immediately. Nice.

125 ml of metallic tasting, body warming sensation later, I was holding my breath at the direction of the robotic voice and sliding back and forth through the doughnut hole on the flannel sheeted plank.  10 minutes tops.

We head upstairs to the infusion center and yet another blood draw. In no time, Liz heads out to say hello and everything looks great. The neutro count is 1.24, on the low side but remember, after Lymphemo #1 I was down to .15. We will see her in a week for Lymphemo #4 and to discuss my progress.

Oh, one more thing, I’ve lost most of the hair inside my nose so my nagging allergic drip has taken a surprising turn. With no speed bumps along the way, every quick flip of the head can produce a lawn sprinkler like response. Eh, maybe TMI.