NINTH ROUND OF CHEMO

Note:  Updating again….need to catch my blog up!

July 5, 2015:   A week and a half ago I had my 9th round of chemo.  My doctor said I should only have 2 more and then be finished.  So that will be a total of 11 rounds of chemo.  I’m sure I’ll make it the rest of the way.  One of my fears was that I wouldn’t be able to tolerate all of it, but I’ve done great so far.

The older side effects are lessening in severity, like the cold sensitivity.  It’s not as strong after chemo anymore, and it doesn’t last as long.  Last night I got the kids a frozen strawberry lemonade from McDonald’s and I had a few sips.  No problem with the cold and it felt so good to have something cold again.  It’s really hard to only drink warm water, especially in summer, and especially since I still have hot flashes many times a day.

One of the newer side effects is that my feet react to the chemo now each round.  It used to take about a week for it to kick in, but now it begins just a couple days after chemo.  The bottoms of my feet first start to hurt.  It really hurts to walk.  Then they turn red, red, red!  And then swell.  After a couple days of pain, the pain will taper off and the itching begins.  I’d rather have the pain.  The incessant itching drives me crazy.  It’s hard to fall asleep and it will wake me up in the middle of the night.  Then the peeling starts.

The skin will just start to fall off.  It looks like how peeling from a sunburn looks.  You can just rub and the skin comes off, especially when I’m drying off after my shower.  If my feet get really dry, like if I am barefoot in the house, then the edges of where the skin is peeling is very stiff and not easy to peel, so I continue to use an emery board, rubbing hard, to shave it off.  The skin then falls off easily and a lot.  It’s really gross but I have to do it.  And it feels good too.

I think it must be all the swelling that makes the itching so intense, or maybe it’s just the chemo.  After I get most of the peeling skin off and my skin is smooth, then I put lotion on and then my feet look pretty good.

And finally, the latest trick I’ve learned is to soak my feet in a bucket of cold water.  That was Abby’s idea.  Thanks Abs!  It feels absolutely amazing to do this.  After soaking for about an hour, the swelling, redness, pain, and itching are all gone for about a couple hours or so, especially if I am not on my feet too much.  Plus, it cools my entire body.  I even get goosebumps for a long time afterwards and it feels SO GOOD to be cold for a change.  These hot flashes make me feel sick.  They’re just unbearable.  I might just keep doing the cold water foot-soaks to keep my hot flashes at bay even after I’m done with chemo!  They should invent some kind of water shoe so I can always have my feet in cold water!

My fingers are peeling just as much as they did pre-surgery when I was on the Xeloda, but I protect them now.  Back before my surgery when I was moving out of my house and doing all that cleaning and spackling I wasn’t using any protection.  Now, even cleaning the bathroom I’ll wear those yellow rubber gloves.

Oh, I saw my ophthalmologist the other day and he said my eyes are really very dry from the chemo.  He said I could either use eye drops or he could put plugs in my tear ducts.  But then he said, “But I know you.  You probably won’t even let me get close enough to put plugs in your eyes.”  Yep.

Just like how my body cannot understand that you aren’t supposed to hold your breath while snorkeling, my body also doesn’t understand that my eyes need to be open for the eye doctor to examine them.  I can’t help it!  My eye doc has to use his fingers to hold my eyes open when he puts the thing up close and shines the light in.  You know when they say, “Put your chin here and press your forehead here, and just look straight ahead”, and then you’re looking into this really bright blue light?  That’s when I can hardly keep my eyes open and he uses his fingers to do it for me.  Even then it’s a struggle.  And I think I must look like a fool when he’s putting the eye drops in my eyes because I know I’m blinking like crazy.  Eventually the eye drops get in.  And it’s totally not a conscious thing.  I just can’t help what my eyes are doing.
Many years ago I had a horrible eye doctor.  He just wasn’t a nice person.  He actually yelled at me when I blinked each time he put the puff of air into my eye (which I’m so glad they don’t do anymore).  He told me, “I can’t examine your eyes if you keep blinking!”  I told him I couldn’t help it, and then I stood up and said I want a different doctor, and walked out.

At least my dentist has a sense of humor.  He laughs that he literally has to hold my tongue back from blocking him getting to where he’s trying to work.  I had no idea my tongue was doing that.  And I remember when I had to get a cortisone shot in a finger once.  The doctor kept telling me to hold still, and I said I was, and he said no I wasn’t, and I said I was trying my best, and then he said, “Well I can’t shoot a moving target!”  He was being serious!  Geez, how bad was I shaking that he couldn’t give me the shot??

Ok, that was a long digression.  I opted to do the eye drops myself rather than have him stick plugs in my eyes!  Amazingly I don’t have any problem doing it myself, and I think that’s because I know I’m in control of what’s happening.

I’ve noticed that my hair is thinning a little and it’s getting very dry and kind of seems to have more split ends.  So I started taking Biotin.  I’m sure my hair will improve once I’m finished with the chemo.

Oh, and I do still get physically exhausted pretty easily.  Last week Abby and I played some Frisbee and then badminton and I was really, really sore for a couple days.  We’ve also been out walking 2-3 miles at a time some days.  That’s really overdoing it for me but I know the exercise is good for me.  I thought my “chemo arm” was all healed up but I found out I can’t hold and throw a Frisbee like normal, and I used to be pretty good at Frisbee.

The arm that had the chemo infiltratation used to be so bad that I couldn’t even stretch out my arm having my palm facing up.  My hand could only turn sideways.  I can do it now, so at least it’s improving.  No biggie that I can’t throw a Frisbee anymore.  Life is good.