Day 106
August seems to have rolled on in
and right over me. What started out as excited anticipation of my last two
major chemo cycles, in an instant, dissipated into thin-air. I had just
passionately presented my case for returning to school full time this semester.
As I saw it, there was no reason to put it off. I had been living outside of
normal for months now, and I was anxious to get back to anything that resembled
my old life, B.C. I was certain that I could handle the workload, and although
my doctor was noncommittal, and my husband argued against the idea, I smugly
believed that I would win the discussion. What was there to dispute?
At my 5th cycle appointment,
we also carried on, yet another conversation concerning reducing the dosage of
my most toxic chemo drug. In previous discussions, I had been resistant to
change anything that I believed could have possibly been a contributing factor to
our forward progress. Why fool with success? I proposed, that since I was the
one who had to deal with the side effects, as well as the end results, my vote
should carry more weight. I had won the war of words three weeks before, and
now, I believed I had even more ammunition. God had been very, very good to me,
and thankfully, my latest scans had been encouraging; no new tumors, and those
that were pre-existing were continuing to decrease in size. After only four
cycles, my new tumor marker numbers were smile inducing, having dropped from a
high of close to 400, to a new low nearer 90 . I could never have imagined these
results when we began down this path, and I didn’t want anything to stop the
roll I was on.
This time however, I was not to get
my way. The only up side I could see was that I could accept the logic behind
the change. My oncologist was determined to minimally reduce my most caustic
chemo in order to spare me long-term implications. His tact was explained, as
changing our focus from a sprint to a marathon. He didn’t want me to win the
sprint, but loose the marathon due to depletion of valuable resources, such as
bone marrow. I could find some level of agreement there. After months of
operating with a short sighted view, he was prepared to visit the possibility
that we may be dealing with this as a chronic issue, many years from now. I was
unhappy with the reduction, but thrilled, and thankful to be thinking that we
were now possibly talking in years.
And so, began my 5th
cycle. We were reducing my harshest drug, but looking farther out into the
future. It was a deal I could live with. That day chemo clinic had a happy
feeling running through it with a lot of chatter, and laughing going on in the
midst of our group poisoning. It was not lost on me that cancer patients, as a
group, are an unusually pleasant, caring, and happy lot. Whether it is our
common struggle, or the harsh fact that we have all been given a big heads up
to the precarious nature of life, it seems that each of them is more concerned
by the patient next to them than themselves.
I had worked through all of my
pre-treatments, received my first bag of chemo, and was beginning to work on my
second, when I began to experience an odd sensation. Something was going
terribly wrong, as within minutes, I had gone from light-hearted chatter to
struggling to maintain consciousness. I heard my nurse declare that she could not find my blood
pressure, not comforting words to hear as you fight to stay cognizant. I have
no memory of my short trip to the emergency room, nor most of my stay there. The
fog cleared a few days later, by then, I had become a guest of St. E. The plan
was for me to be there a few more days. I could deal with that, but by Sunday
afternoon, it became apparent that something had changed. Walking across the
room caused extreme shortness of breath, and inexplicitly I began setting off
my cardiac monitors. After a seemingly endless night, testing revealed a pulmonary
embolus. Add five more days to my stay, two new drugs to the mix, and as the
oncologist correctly stated, a lot of paperwork for the clinical trial.
Throughout the entire ordeal, my
main concern remained whether I would be able to continue in my clinical trial
or whether my detour had violated the study’s protocol. Everyone I spoke to
seemed to have another opinion as to whether I could continue. Emails, phone
calls, and paperwork literally flew around the world as the determination was
made, and subsequently altered, and adjusted. Finally, a week after our
adventure had began, I was given permission to restart my trial drug. My
understanding is that I may move forward, but can not make up lost time,
however, it seems that this may be open to interpretation from the powers that
be. Never the less, I am happy to be home, regaining my strength, and settling
back into my routine. I cannot thank my family and friends enough for their
outpouring of caring, prayers, and support. I am hopeful that we can continue
on in an uneventful fashion from here on out. I’ll do my best not to
incorporate so much drama into future cycles. Fingers crossed.
