… and counting. Yesterday at noon, I recevied my first wave of chemo – a ‘cocktail’ of Paraplatin, Navelbine and saline solution to flush the line. Well, first of all came a shot of cortisone (to stave off infections) and something to cut any nausea I might fall prey to.
Actually, all of the preps took more time than the actual administering of the drugs – I even dozed off inbetween the times the nurse came to my bed for any reason. She had two other patients to look after and since this was her first week on her own, I think she was a bit run off her feet.
When all was done, Richard and I headed on to my Dad’s place where we had a nice dinner and stayed the night. We had been out of bed before 5AM to be at the hospital in time (290 km one-way) so it was really nice to cut the trip home in two, so to say.
I had prepared myself for the possibility that I would suffer from each and every side effect possible – but so far (touch wood) I’m feeling just fine!
No nausea, my appetite is great and no aches or pains. Apparently there may be a type of delayed nausea after 24-48 hours (still a possibility) and then all the rest will manifest itself over time. I’m not naive enough to believe that I’ll go unscathed through all this, so I’ve read up on it all.
The most serious is, of course, the effect chemo has on your bloodcount. Anemia, poor coagulation and healing is nothing you wish for, but with the lowered resitance to infections and viruses is what I need to be wary of. The instructions are quite clear – a temperature, severe shivers, coughs and infected wounds are all signs to be taken seriously. No ‘….naah, I’ll get better if I sleep’ or other heroics!
In my next post I will try and recount some of all that brought me upp to this. I promise to keep it brief – no need to give a blow-by-blow, but merely sort of a resumé of events and more of a presentation of me.
Oh, and I forgot – AC stands for adenocarcinoma, just in case you haven’t already guessed that!
