Live your life so that the fear of death can never enter your heart. When you arise in the morning, give thanks for the morning light. Give thanks for your life and strength. Give thanks for your food and for the joy of living. And if perchance you see no reason for giving thanks, rest assured the fault is in yourself.
The big dipper of life took a bit of a plunge after the chemo the day before yesterday. Started chemo around 3pm and finished around 5pm. By 6pm I was feeling pretty ordinary. Soon after the gastritis flared up with severe nausea and pain. Meantime bowel cramps had started with major evacuations. Had already taken Prilosec to reduce acid in stomach and when symptoms started took Zofran (anti nausea), antacid and Percocet (for pain). After about an hour got a little relief but was still in a lot of pain so took a second Percocet. Half an hour later I was pain free and feeling drunk (Percocet is an opioid). What a relief. Unable to eat but slept well.
Yesterday morning managed an apple for breakfast and then slept most of the morning. Had some soup during the afternoon but didn't feel well enough to get up out of bed. Managed a bit of pasta in the evening and went to sleep at about 8:30pm
Much improved this morning but still a bit nauseous, weak and tired. Managed a 15 minute walk, a short lie down to recover and then made some breakfast of granola, fruit and yoghurt. Then back to bed. Managed to get my supplements down (quite a few tablets :). Now building up to a swim in the pool. Feel like I need to make a big effort with the exercise regime. It all seems to be two steps forward and one step back, I just don't want to go two steps back.
Finished reading Lance Armstong's first book "It's not about the Bike" which was quite good. Also checked on a blog from a fellow patient and got an email from another fellow patient we met at the Gawler Foundation. Neither are travelling very well. They, and their carers, are showing great courage under very difficult circumstances. Makes me grateful that my journey is not as onerous. Also makes me think about the need not just for progress in cancer cures but in supportive measures (I'm talking medical here, not carer support) while patients are going through their treatment, it can be extremely harrowing.
One of the problems, I believe, is that there are huge profits being made on conventional chemotherapy drugs and the drugs that counter the side effects of the chemo drugs. There is very little incentive to reduce the side effects of the drugs directly as the sale of, for example, anti emetics (nausea) medication gives astronomical profits. There is very little incentive to find effective anti cancer drugs that have little or no side effects due to the greed of the big pharmaceutical companies. Unfortunately they have a lot of political lobby power.
My order of fluids, syringes and needles has arrived so I am set for the rest of our stay in the US.
I only have one more repeat of the chemo I had a couple of days ago, the other stuff I will be taking shouldn't cause as much of a problem.
Still have a lot of muscle wasting and still losing hair, not much left now, just some wispy bits. Oh well, monor really compared to what might have been.Hope to be up and about a bit more tomorrow.
Survive and thrive!
Linda
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