So Tired.

I have mentioned chemo fatigue once or twice in this blog, I may even have stupidly promised to try to describe what it is like. Well here goes.
Most chemo patients will experience fatigue and lethargy in the weeks and months after their treatment, a few, such as myself, are prone to getting a few days of extremely heavy fatigue. In many ways this type of fatigue is the hardest thing I have to cope with during the course of my treatment, even though it only lasts a few days before dropping away to the 'normal' chemo fatigue.
These extreme events occur  soon after the chemo finishes as my body desperately grabs the resources (mostly protein) it needs from wherever it can to rebuild my immune system. Trouble is, it's needs are so high that it inspite of being fed a high protein diet it is still almost impossible to eat enough to feed the machine, especially when your stomach is doing circus tricks. In response to the deficit my body starts raiding itself to get what it needs, my body is literally robbing Peter, not to pay Paul, but to pay Peter. Bugger Paul.
One of the biggest available stores of protein is in the muscle, so that's what gets consumed by the body in it's search for resources, which is why extreme fatigue events coincide with weight loss and why I feel so damn weak and soooooo damn tired.

The hardest thing about the fatigue is that there is simply no relief from it and the world collapses into a very small existence where it becomes a battle to meet my most basic needs, i.e:
Bladder: Hi brain, I think need to pee in the next hour and a half, so lets start working on this now.
Brain: zzzzz
Bladder: zzzz
Body: zzzzz
Brain: (20 minutes later): zzz-wha? zz whazzat? Hey body, wake up I think you need to pee.
Body: zzzz
Brain (30 minutes latter): Yep you definitely need to pee, WAKEY WAKEY BODY.
Bladder: Come on Brain, I told you to start getting body ready ages ago!
Brain: How come I have to do all the work? Body, wake up!
Body: zzz
Brain: Body? Helloooo, anybody there? We gotta wee.
Body (20 minutes later): zzz-wha? Right, got it but how come I have to do all the work?
Brain: Right everyone, lets think this through so we get the job done.
Everyone else: ...(silence)...
Brain: sigh
Bladder: groan
Brain: Ok, left leg,are you awake...?
Left leg: zzz
Body: zzz
Brain zzz
Bladder: GAH!!!!
Nurse: Peter, wake up, Peter? It's time for your 2am Obs and blood test.
Everybody: AH CRAP!

And so it goes through the fog of half sleep until, in the end we just make it.

In other words, the little things, plus sleep become all consuming, there is no room or energy for any of the 'distractions' that help me get through the day and through the days, I don't have the concentration available to read, write, hold a conversation, browse the interwebs, respond to emails, write this drivel or even just let my mind wander at the wonder of the universe (one of my favourite pastimes). Hell, even the lamest and least challenging of tv is out of the question, but then, it was always going to be anyway, so no great loss there. God tv sucks. For a few days life becomes all about hospital and the illness, thankfully it only lasts a few days each cycle.
Cheers, Pete

Hi all, it's been a few days...
I had a couple of days when I was extremely tired, I'm still pretty fatigued at the moment so blog updates could come a bit slower over the next week or so (was that a cheer I heard!!). Other than the fatigue things are going along as per plan.
Chemo is finished for this cycle and we also completed the stem cell transplant without any dramas on Wednesday (word is that I smelt of garlic instead of creamed corn this time), so now we wait for my little helpers to work their magic again.
Generally I am feeling Ok, I have had a couple of afternoons back at the apartment, which is a huge help.

Cheers, Pete.


Please note that the recovery in the neutrophils and white blood cells that can be seen in the graph today is just due to an injection that I had, treue recovery is about ten days away.

Day three of second cycle of high dose chemo.

I have just finished my last infusion of high dose chemo for this cycle, so that is another step down the road towards what we hope will be a cure. Doing the chemo itself is not too bad, side effects on day one were barely noticeably, on day two I had a bit of tiredness and I went of my food a bit, day three featured heavier fatigue, the onset of some nausea and the start of the unique queasyness that chemo brings. All of which is par for the course and either manageable or tolerable.
The tricky part will come a few days later when my blood counts crash, but we will deal with that then.

Hospital can be a boring place when things are going ok, so when my nutritionist asked if I wanted to volunteer to be the guinea pig for her lecture to a bunch of post grad students today I said yes.
Being talked about then poked and prodded by a bunch of students was a different way to spend an hour,  and it was kind of ironic after my ranting about generation Y yesterday, but it broke up my day nicely.
Cheers, Pete.

 

Day one of second cycle of high dose chemo.

Warning, the first half dozen paragraphs of this post feature nothing but silly ramblings on my part, I have no idea why I am posting it, I might be bored, it might be the chemo. Robyn might make me delete it.
Medical stuff is further down the page.

Well I obviously have not found a doppelganger to do my chemo for me, who would have thought it would be so hard to find someone? I mean come on people, all you have to do is lie around all day!
Sigh, I blame Gen Y, for no other reason than I am not one of them, so I can. You would think that lying around all day would appeal to gen y in particular. Don't you gen y kids go complaining about my picking on you, I'm old, therefore I am not going to listen anyway. Instead I will just tell you a long winded story that has no point, like the one below:

Speaking about doppelgangers reminds me of something that happened to Robyn and I a couple of years ago. I think it was the year of 2008, which the UN appropriately declared to be the year of the potato (really!!) as the following events took place:

• The use of social networking overtook the use of email for the first time due to all you narcissistic brats having too much time on your hands!
• The price of petroleum hit US$100 a barrel for the first time.
• Lots of bankers managed to screw the entire global economy without any apparent long term consequences to themselves apart from the handing out off a golden parachute here and there.
• Armed fighting broke out in Lebanon (really, it started that long ago).
• The Pope attends world youth day, make of that what you will...
• New Kids on the block made a comeback.
• Justin Beiber was 'discovered' by a 'talent manager' named Scooter Braun...

In a failed attempt to remain oblivious to the tragic events above we used to frequent Vic Market. One of our regular stops was at a store that sold West African food, possibly Nigerian, but I can't remember (chemo can do that to you). The store was regularly operated by a cheerful man of African ancestry who one day asked us what our relationship was. We told him we are married (don't panic Mum, we aren't! It's just easier to tell people that, really!). At this he burst laughing and said amid his guffaws "But you look so similar! Ha ha ha ha, I thought you were brother and sister! Ha ha ha ha!" We laughed too as we were somewhat lost for words, no one had said anything said similar to us before, nor have they since. Nonetheless we began to make a careful comparison of our respective family trees on the trip home. The investigations got more serious after we discovered that our bottom front teeth share similar angles and extent of crookedness. Thankfully I can report that our family trees only begin to merge around common ancestors about 128,363 years ago, the deviates involved were named Grunt and Ugh and we are assured by the fossil evidence that they were just trying to keep warm... Really. It is not the reason we moved to Tasmania. Please stop asking. I told you this story would be pointless didn't I!!
Maybe it's just the case that us whities all look alike to recently arrived Africans... Who knew?!

Anyway, best I get back to the boring medical stuff before I get myself in more trouble (I hope everyone took the above in the spirit it was meant, i.e. a bit of fun).
I had the first dose of the second cycle of high dose chemotherapy today. All went well with my only symptoms being a touch more nausea and a bit more fatigue plus a few other minor things hanging over from the previous cycle.
Like last time, complications are unlikely to be troublesome until my blood counts start to drop right off on around day 6. Also like last time, we will remain vigilant for problems and deal with things as they occur rather than worrying to much about what might happen, because worrying would be a waste of time that I could otherwise spend writing stupid blog posts.
This cycle of chemo is exactly the same as the last:

• 2am to 10am: Pre chemo hydration of normal saline with added potassium and magnesium.
• 10am to 10:30am: Pre chemo medications, mostly anti-nausea meds and a diuretic.
• 10:30am to 11:30am: 1st chemo drug (etoposide).
• 11:30am to 12:30pm: 2nd chemo drug (carboplatin).
• 12:30 pm to 2:30am: Post chemo hydration of normal saline with added potassium and magnesium
• Day two and three: Repeat the above (no break between post and pre hydration for subsequent days).
• Day four: Hydration all day.
• Day five: Stem cell transfusion.
• Day 6 to day 19: Monitor and manage side effects.
• Day 20: Planned discharge from hospital (sooner if things are good, later if they are not, last time I was discharged on day 18).
• Readmission to hospital for the start of cycle three as soon as it is safe to do so, (last time I was readmitted on day 22, which becomes day 1 of the next cycle).

Cheers, Pete.