Home Sweet Home

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Plus one picc line, a few pounds, and a lot of medication, but it feels SO good to be home. 

The treatment went pretty well this time.  The first day was, as expected, the toughest.  Before they start the chemo everyday a nurse comes in and gives premeds, which for me was Tylenol, Benadryl, and steroids.  And let me tell you, you haven’t experienced Benadryl until you’ve had it injected directly into your bloodstream.  That stuff is powerful.  It only takes a few seconds before your head feels like it weighs 50 lbs.  Which can be a good thing when you’re about to start 6 hours of chemo.  Only problem is, that lovely sleepy feeling is followed by a high dose of steroids, which do NOT make you sleepy.  Quite the opposite.  Every sound is perfectly clear and sounds like it’s happening inside your ear.  And your legs act like they’re about to take off and run a marathon.  Like they just don’t understand why you’re laying down when they’ve got miles to run.  And thus the battle begins between your groggy head and your twitchy legs.  The good news is, your body quickly gets used to the medicine and by day two all these symptoms are less. 

By the end of day one’s treatment, I had chills and was starting to get a fever and back pains.  I also needed a blood transfusion because hemoglobin had dropped to 6.7 (normal range is 12-15).  But you can’t have a transfusion when you have a high fever, so I had to take Tylenol and wait until my fever went down to get a transfusion.  And it eventually did.  And those 2 units of blood were glorious.  The next morning I felt so much stronger, I never got another fever, and the next three days of treatment were a walk in the park in comparison. 

My next objective is recovery.  While I didn’t have as many side effects from the chemo as I did the first time around, I do feel more drained this time and I’m looking forward to sleeping at home and hopefully getting some energy back.  There will be lots of movie marathons on the menu for me this week, I think :)

Thank you SO much for all of your prayers and words of support this past week.  I felt and appreciated every one of them.  Never for a moment did I feel like I was alone in this.  Thank you again for reading :) 

Love,

Kelsey