Still clotting along

I took most of Thursday to simply chill out and relax, as well as catch up on the sleep I didn't get in the hospital. As it turned out, I did need the energy, since I ended up spending all afternoon yesterday at the Cancer Center.

First, I had a visit with my poison man. He seemed to agree that they kept me in the hospital only to be overly cautious (and because the ER folks don't really understand what chemo and Neulasta do to the girl's blood!). Oh well, here goes nothing. But the main thing is that I don't have a serious medial issue, which is a good thing. 

The main reason for the appointment was to simply get my monthly checkup, and to get me ready for the T part of my 'cocktail' -- Taxol. As of next Thursday, I will be on a different chemotherapy drug than before. According to my poison man, Taxol is much easier to tolerate than AC, but I'm holding my breath a bit until I'm sure it's true for me. After all, I seem to be very 'special' and not react like most other people.

Anyway, Dr. V says that nausea should be even less of an issue than it was before, that the Taxol doesn't affect the blood as much, and that the 'worst' thing could be bone and/or muscle pains lasting a few days (which supposedly occur in only 20% of people), which respond to Tylenol. However, since the taxol needs to be dissolved in Cremophore, a toxic castor oil derivative, to be able to penetrate into cells and kill them, allergic reactions are common. So I will need to premedicate with FIVE (!!!!!) decadrons the night before and the morning of chemo. Yikes, I have a feeling this will give me seriously sleepless nights. So far, the highest dosage of decadron I'd been on was two in the morning and two at night, which was enough to give me a serious flush and keep me from sleeping at night... I'll let you know how that goes. Oh, and keep your fingers crossed that I don't have a terrible allergic reaction to that Taxol...

Another point I brought up during the meeting was that although the pain in my DVT affected arm had initially gotten better, it had reappeared that morning. This prompted him to order another doppler scan to evaluate how the thrombosis had changed in the two weeks since I was diagnosed. Again, we had a wait a few hours, but they scanned me the same day. Luckily I got the same nice technician (who even stayed longer just to keep me from waiting any more). Turns out, the thrombus hasn't grown, which is good, but it hasn't shrunk any, which is not so good. According to the technician, the head of radiology (who had officially interpreted the results of my scan) immediately called Dr. V to urge him to do something about the thrombus. I was then sent down the hall again back to Dr. V. 

However, the only 'change' that came out of this is that Dr. V thinks I now do not need the twice daily injections of lovenox any more, but can switch to once daily injection of 1.5 times the dosage I previously took. Once some baseline bloodwork has been done I can then be switched to Coumadin. In principle the once daily dosage is a nice idea. In practice, however, they gave me the wrong prescription when they faxed in an order for me to the mailorder pharmacy place from which my insurance requires me to to obtain certain medications. The order was the for twice a day dosage, not for the once daily dose. So now I have three thousand dollars' worth of medication that will be largely wasted, even if I use two syringes to inject myself each to in order to get the correct amount of medication into my body. Argh!!! Even if my copay was only $ 25, this really bugs me a huge waste. But the pharmacy won't take back medications, so I'm stuck. Next time, think ahead please, people!!!

Today I'm trying to get some more rest in, as yesterday was tiring for me. On Monday I will go to an ACS sponsored "Look good feel better" workshop, which will teach makeup tricks, as well as wig and scarf advice. That should be fun and I'm very much looking forward to it. I will definitely need some help figuring out false eyelashes, as my own are getting thinner and thinner than their own initially thin selves. But until then, I have a nice weekend to relax with DH. 

I had to stop writing in the middle of this post to rush to the kitchen, where DH is currently working away on a big pot of shrimp and sausage jambalaya, as I heard a pained cry. Wielding the knife to vigorously had resulted in a gushing cut to DH's finger, unfortunately. It wasn't big, but it sure was a gusher, so I rushed to get some gauze, blood stiller, and a bandaid. Those baby aspirins DH's been taking sure do seem to thin his blood! Luckily, the bloodstiller I keep around for when I cut the dog's toenails and accidentally clip the quick worked like a charm to close down that gusher. (Don't worry, that stuff is actually made for human use, but I use it both on my human and my canine guys.) So more clotting today, but at least it was the good kind...

Ah, seems this household is never without a bit of drama for long!

To prevent further mishaps, I took over the remainder of the chopping duties. After all, I'm only on heparin, so what's the worst that could happen???