Chemo Done & Out of the hospital

Quick 'catch up' since I was in the hospital --

The chemo therapy did take all 96 hours. It ended on Friday night about ten-thirty. I was pretty run down by then. Actually from the beginning of the week to the end, I was getting more and more slow and had less and less energy. Between the effects of the drugs and the boredom of not beinng able to do too much besides lay around in bed -- I was getting pretty slow and my energy level was falling down to a pretty low level.

The food was always good at this hospital. They put a menu next to the bed and I could order three times a day. Whatever I ordered came within forty-five minutes. Just like delivery pizza. That was on the menu too -- Pizza! (pepperoni, sausage or plain cheese). The selection was really wide and everything was tasty. I got into kind of a rut ordering lots of vegetables every day. The gave great big portions of spinach, carrots and green beans. So I went for those nearly every lunch and supper.

Besides watching TV, reading, telephone calls and meals -- there was not much to do. I was allowed to take my intravenous 'tree' power cord out of the outlet, let it run on batteries (the same way I get to go to the bathroom) and go for a walk around the building. But I was not allowed to leave the floor. So all I could do was walk around the building past the rooms of all the other patients. It was a big square and it seemed like every room was full. So the nursing team was really busy. They had to check on me at least three times a day. They took my temperature, blood pressure, heart rate and pulse rate. I was not allowed to pee in the toilet since they had to be sure I was processing enough fluids. The chemo will damage kidneys if left in the body for very long. So I had to pee into a container and they had to write down the amount before dumping it out. That is nasty!

As far as I can tell from the blood tests my white and red blood cell counts never fell to the low levels they expected. Who knows why? Here is an explanation of the process that I was able to get from a very experienced nurse coordinator who has supported, according to her own account, over a hundred transplant patients:

• First of all, the CDEP therapy works in the body to interfere with cells as they divide -- during the cell creation process. Secondly, it does not kill existing adult cells. Blood cells have a normal lifespan from seven to ten days in length (Mark: well, that is not what other documents say, but let's just roll on for now) and those two processes together cause a gap to appear in the patient's immune defenses. As the adult cells die, the number in the body if mapped on a grid would glide downward to zero. The cell creation process, on the same grid would start at zero and climb upwards. In most patients, the upward climbing line is gradual. Depending on how steep the down line is and the starting point of the upward line, there may be a period of time when the line stays at zero. At least, the patient has a period of time during which their immune system is at a low level and recovering at a moderate pace. That is not true for all patients, but it is normal.

Apparently what happened to me was that I never fell to a very low level, or if I did it was for a very short period of time. So my grid would have lines going down to zero, but my line going up was climbing so quickly that it crossed the other line at a very high level. I am not sure that is a clear way of explaining it, but somehow I got an expanation that satisfied me. More than anything, I feel like the chemo therapy was probably effective --even though it did not make my immune system as weak as my oncologist had predicted.

On Saturday morning, I did get released. I was given another dose of anti-nausea medicine intraveneously -- thank goodness! It is such a nasty side-effect of those drugs that they made me feel like I was going to toss my cookies every once in a while. But all I had to do was push that little red button, ask for anti-nausea medicine and Poof! in came the RN with a teensy-teensy clear plastic bag of whatever-t-was. In just a few minutes the feeling was gone. Great Stuff! I also got a prescription for the same thing in tablet form that we filled before we went home. Luckily we did, because I needed it Saturday night at home.

Saturday and Sunday were pretty much a waste. I was stuck in bed most of the time: no energy, a bit nauseous, really low energy -- just taking it slow.

By Monday I was doing better. By Wednesday, I was out and about doing regular things.

Next Blog -- Blood Stem Cell Collection: I set a new land speed record!