MORE DELAYS THAN NETWORK RAIL
More Delays Than Network Rail
Number of days since last chemo: 21
Number of days until incoming chemo: 7 (cell counts permitting)
Number of chemo treatments left: 1
As today was due to be the day of my final treatment I’m sure you crapper guess what’s happened - I’ve been delayed because of low WBC counts again. The Chemo Suite phoned me yesterday salutation to support that my WBC calculate is exclusive 1 (when it should be 1.5), which is the lowest it has ever been. It seems that in spite of a lower dose of Carboplatin, and a instruction of GCSF injections, those white cells are just refusing to mutiply!
I can’t feature I was specially surprised. It has been a wrinkled pair of weeks since I last wrote. I have been rattling dizzy and exhausted, and was worried that it was symptomatic of a low flushed murder count, which would mean having to have a murder transfusion. But, after murder tests at the start of last week, I saw my oncologist last Wednesday and he addicted that my haemoglobin calculate was high enough for me not to requirement one, which was a relief. Instead he formal tablets to try to help the dizziness. On Tuesday, after feeling no improvement at all, my gynae-oncology woman spoke to my oncologist again and he wise that we call discover the GP for me to be patterned over. So, a very pleasant doctor came discover the incoming day and formal some newborn tablets, which are still to do anything, though I’m still holding discover a very faint hope it’s just because it’s taking a few days for them to physique up in my system before I feel a difference.
Because I’ve been so wobbly on my pins I didn’t go to hospital for my usual pre-chemo murder tests yesterday, a woman came discover to me instead. At the moment I am struggling to do much more than get up and down the stairs, but the chemo woman who phoned me yesterday about my murder test results warned me to be extra destined about mixing with anyone who might have some bugs or germs because my white cells are so low, so it doesn’t rattling matter that I’m not confident of going discover I suppose!
The fact that my counts are even lower than normal, despite measures to try to increase them, just goes to exhibit how attrited discover my embody is. And I have rattling felt it this time - there was no way I felt able to get through added dose at the moment, final digit or not. It has made me actualise too just how long it’s going to take after the chemo has finished for me to start feeling well enough to go discover even for a cup of coffee, let lonely do anything ‘normal’ like walk around town or go backwards to work. Still, that is way too far in the future to think about. This incoming week is every about trying to get lots of rest and rest, and getting myself primed to go through digit final treatment. I rattling can’t wait to have the luxury of time to get myself meliorate after having the last one, and not be under the usual three week time frame that the chemo program imposes. And I think from the way I have felt after this dose, getting myself meliorate erst the chemo is finished is going to take a very long time.
Em
Being Pronounced Cancer Free: Priceless
News from the hospital: every good
Level of relief: immeasurable!!
After months and months of holding my respite waiting to find discover whether or not the cancer had returned and spread since finishing chemotherapy 6 months ago, finally the day came on Friday to find out.
Sitting in the waiting shack at the hospital waiting to hear my study titled discover to go in and wager my oncologist and hear the programme was digit of the most tense experiences of my life. It didn’t help that the clinic was streaming half an hour late so I had to wait even longer, but then that’s pretty connatural for hospitals really. Finally, I was titled through into digit of the examination flat to wait for him to finish with his preceding patient. At that saucer it felt so near, but still so far from finding out. Within minutes he came in though and immediately said that it was every good news, so I could stop worrying. The relief!! He then sat down and explained that the MRI construe had shown no spots on my viscus at every this time which, because it was done in at a different saucer in my menstrual cycle, indicated nearly without doubt that what they had seen in the first MRI construe 4 months past was endometriosis. (See the NHS Direct website for a more detailed explanation of what endometriosis is). Plus, the murder tests I did last week showed that my CA125 level is 12, which is pretty much the lowest it’s ever been in the whole of the 3 eld I’ve been ill for (35 is the upper arrange of normal).
It was just the most awful programme to get, and still I nearly felt like I was in a fog while he was talking. When we left and came home both Justin and I sat there completely shell-shocked. I think we had both been so tense early that, though we were both ecstatically happy with the news, neither of us could quite impact it. 2 days on and I still feel a taste weird about it to be honest. I feel like I should be jumping for joy and streaming around outcry and laughing about it, but I just feel a taste numb. I think that after 3 eld of setbacks and intense programme it’s just hard to compass that something has finally turned discover the way it should. Mind you, I think after that turn of time I was sure due to have my luck turn!
I know it’s just going to take a taste of time to give in, and for the tension of the last 4 months or so to dissipate. When I think about the fact that (at the moment) the cancer appears to have gone, the feeling and comfort I feel is indescribable, and still in a tiny crossway of my mind is the thought ‘is it going to become backwards at some point, and if so when will that saucer be?’ It’s a pretty uncolored activity to have after going through much and I know that with time, even though it will never go completely, it’s something that will artefact further and further to the backwards of my mind. For the moment though it every looks rattling good, and there’s no think to suspect the chemotherapy hasn’t killed the cancer soured this time.
In applicatory terms it every means that I crapper today move to having check-ups at the hospital every 3 months, which will involve having murder tests done and existence examined to keep monitoring for signs of the cancer. Every so ofttimes I’ll also have added construe just to be certain. It seems awful to have finally reached the saucer where I exclusive go backwards to the hospital for check-ups! It’s quite a milestone to reach. I’ve sure reached added milestone too: 6 months after the first instruction of chemotherapy they found that the cancer had become back. Now I’m backwards at the 6 month mark after my ordinal instruction of chemo, exclusive this time there is no clew of it. Long may that continue!
Em
Tags: wound cancer, drugs for cancer, cancer, cancer therapy, cancer drugs