There are better ways to keep yourself occupied than being
sick and tired. But it's something to do.
I started my new chemo regime this week and, to be honest,
it's not too bad. Now the surgery is out of the way and I'm a lot
better after it, it was obviously time for me to have something else to keep me
feeling a bit crap. And so I'm back for a wee whirl on the Chemocoaster here in
the Tumourland Fun Park
I've been on worse rides. As with last year's Temozolomide
regime, I get to take my chemo at home in capsule format, which seems so much
less unpleasant than for those with other cancers who need to go to hospital to sit
for hours with a venom sac attached to a vein as its contents drain a trail of
burning destruction into their circulation. True, I don't feel exactly lovely,
and there is a bit of a balancing act to be done to keep the contents of my
stomach on the inside, but this is so much kinder.
The particular flavours of chemo I'm getting this time make
up a combination treatment under which two separate harsh chemicals gang up to
give whatever remains of the tumoury stuff a tanking, and stop it growing back.
I assume one of them holds its arms. Since my blood tests were all OK, I kicked
off on Tuesday as planned with an evening pile of capsules containing a drug
called Lomustine which is taken as a one-off at the start of the
cycle. That went without incident, and I got a perfectly good night's sleep, so
Wednesday took me into phase two, fun with Procarbazine. This one I need to take daily for ten days
and that, frankly, is a bugger, since it seems to be unable to play nicely with
any of my favourite foods, not to mention a few others I don't even normally
eat, just for good measure. So, no alcohol, particularly red wine, no cheese,
no patés, no meats prepared with cures, smoking or marinades, no yeast extracts
(which rules out a lot of gravies and sauces, apparently), no bananas or
avocados, and quite a few other things TBC apparently – the list seems to vary
from source to source.
I found one on Wednesday, I think, when reckoning that a wee
ham omelette would be a carefully light lunch, I found that the apparently
uncured and guaranteed allegen-free ham definitely had something else in it.
Cue 12 hours of stomach pain. I felt much better at 2am on Thursday when I was
eventually violently sick. At least that was some 18 hours after my last round
of chemo, so I didn't lose any of that, which is the main concern with all
this.
Thursday and today, however, went pretty well. Each day
began with a cheeky wee early-morning anti-emetic, a half-hour wait for that to
kick in, a handful of Procarbazine capsules, a wait for an hour or so to make
sure that had all settled, then my usual Losec and Keppra and dex regime. Then
a wee treat in the shape of some toast. It's been a gastronomic journey.
My stomach feels more than a little sensitive, but it's not
too bad. And I had a pretty good dinner tonight – woo for lamb chops! With luck things are normalising, as long as I'm careful. I hope so, I've got a
week of this still to go.
Still, it's only for ten days every six weeks and, as with
the Temozolomide, once I'm used to it I should be able to go to work through the
cycles.
What's more, tomorrow I get to try a different anti-emetic.
There is no end to this adventure.
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