Big respect to all the Mummy's out there

Hi peeps,
Why the blog title you are asking??
Well we had quite an exciting day on Friday - NOT!! The day was going well, I'd cleared a number of chores and chose to take Hayley out for lunch before finally dropping the insurance paperwork for our December holiday off at the post office. Then I walked home.....and I started to get discomfort in my lower back - around the kidneys. Oh well not an issue, however as I got closer to home, the pain levels increased and of course every ache and pain is referenced to the Lymphoma and Chemo.

Well to cut to the chase, I got Hayley to take me to the emergency department - her stress levels were high, it was pouring with rain, heavy traffic and a Dad sitting in the passenger seat in significant amounts of pain and making sure poor old Hayley knew that!!! As it panned out the ED quickly gave me some morphine, did all their tests (would you believe, BP, temp & pulse were normal!) and sent me for yet another CT scan. Well by the end of the CT I'm afraid my language was extremely poor, pain was rated 11/10 and PLEASE CAN I HAVE MORE MORPHINE!!

So what was happening to poor old Hairy - it appears that I had a kidney stone - is that it you ask? Well with the amount of pain, and discomfort that came on on Friday, my respect for all those Mummy's has increased big time.   I only had to cope with pain for a few hours and they do say a kidney stone is as bad as delivering babies!!! I was lucky that the meds I was given plus a bit of luck passing the stone meant that this episode was pretty short lived, thankfully.   The hospital kept me in over night for observation and it appears that the kidney stone is probably related to my body trying to dispose of the Chemo & Lymphoma - so I am potentially at higher risk of these types of issues.

So apologies to the family for giving them quite a fright - it was nice that Hayley stood and held my hand, however I think it was her that needed the hand holding.   I recommend that whoever you are that you avoid kidney stones - pain like you would not believe!!!

I'm due to start chemo 4 on Tuesday, which will be a B type chemo, and you may recall I had big reactions when I had the first B chemo with the rash, issues with body temperature control and so on.  So it will be interesting to see how I react during this session.  We will have to wait and see.

Prior to the kidney stone episode, during the week Tony sent me for another bone marrow biopsy.  We had discussed the case for potentially taking bone marrow earlier rather than later for use in a stem cell transplant.  The situation is similar in both cases of early or late harvesting, early harvesting requires the bone marrow to obviously be 'clean', late harvesting may be more difficult to achieve due to the impact of all the chemo sessions.  Anyway the biopsy will give Tony a heads up as to where we stand at the moment.  My head is saying that we may be a bit early yet.

I'll let you know how I get on with Chemo 4 this coming week.  Behave all of you!!

Alan

Chemo schedule 3 - day 7

no updates since the third - sort of oops but also topics are a bit of a repeat. Currently midday at home on day 8 of third Chemo. cycle.

I saw the Doctor last Tuesday, before we started the chemo, it was a day of frustration and concerns.  Frustration because I  had to hang around the hospital for no real reason, concern because Tony was himself concerned about the node in my groin that was surgically biopsied. He thought it may have grown!  So he sent me for a CT scan & I was admitted late Tuesday to be ready to start chemo 3 / see him on the Wednesday.  Well thankfully CT results were good, nodes are shrinking, however that one node is taking longer - probably due to the invasive surgery. So, positive news there!

I've now completed the in-house schedule 3 chemo. and am currently sitting at home in a rather damp Brisbane, whilst my blood counts once again drop.  I've taken a little longer to recover from the hospital time on this occasion, it's primarily nausea / loss of appetite plus tiredness.  The nausea is managed via drugs, however you really do not feel ready for a good home cooked meal!  Tiredness again relates to the drugs and disturbances received whilst in hospital, Monday I was unable to concentrate but was not tired enough to sleep.

I'll be back to see the doctor on Thursday (day 9) so may get admitted dependant on my blood counts / neutropenia - infection once again is the biggest risk and Tony's potential requirement to give me further platelet or blood products.  Day oncology next Saturday - a short 30 minute IV, again depends if I am admitted prior to this due to the blood counts. After that is is recovering til 31st /1st when round 4 starts.  (Eeeek)

So that is round 3 update.   Interestingly my relatively rare illness is so rare that there was a guy about 10m away from me in the hospital, with the same illness, and running a month behind me!! Interestingly a different doctor with potentially differing treatments - more questions for Tony my Oncologist!!!!

Hayley got to fly down to Sydney to meet with Lesley, Barry, Hebe and special guest - Barry's credit card for a few days (shopping) - nice for friends to catch up and spend some time together especially before the girls start their Uni. careers.  Afterwards she met up with her cousins and had a nice day or so, before returning to Brissie to "partee"!!

Kathryn flew out for Pittsburgh last Sunday, that month flew by very quickly!  She is  now safely at Uni. with her team mates after quite a long haul flight. Unfortunately I wasn't able to see her off at the airport, I don't think nausea and farewells go together.  As it happened Liz said that the Airport was freezing and it was a good move to stay at home, so tearful hugs in the garage was the best farewell we could gather. 

Some thoughts / quotes I read recently -
“You can not control what is dealt to you; you can only control how you deal with it”.

What lesson did I get from today? In the words of Woody Allen:
“If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.”

The start of a new year

Well they finally let me out, not however in time for my birthday, I was let out on Monday since my blood count had recovered somewhat in the time from New Year to the 2nd.
We celebrated Kathryn's 21st birthday and my own birthday in the hospital ward, Cheesecake & Tiramisu being the order of the day for each occasion respectively.  We arranged for KT to have a special treat of Skydiving over Redcliffe - working on the principle that the bungy didn't break on her 18th, so no bungy this time.

Anyway she landed safely a few days after her birthday, due to weather constraints.  New Years for me was low key - watched a film & Stephen Fry on TV then off to sleep - I couldn't even see the city fireworks from where the ward was.  At that stage I was still not allowed out of my room without either Baxter or a mask due to the neutropenia.  I received both blood and platelet transfusions to help my recovery. 

(from facebook - A rare wilderness sighting, Dad just warm enough in long trousers, sweat shirt and Mountain fleece, Hayley baking in shorts and T shirt. What is this Chemo doing to me???!!)

The first platelet transfusion set the rash off, with lots of temperature and itching, plus the reaction set my pulse racing to 130+bpm, not pleasant I can tell you!  Future transfusions were preceded by meds to stop such reactions.  By Monday of this week my blood count had recovered, aided by the transfusions plus the demon rash had finally faded leaving just bruises that are due to the low platelet count.  So they let me out to the care of my family,  I still have to be cautious of infection plus any illness and avoiding highly populated areas, however home is home.  I'm back into hospital next week, 11th, Cycle 2 schedule A.  So no peace for the wicked,  here's hoping everyone had a great New Year and looking forward to a fantastic 2012.

ps.  I heard from our new friends in Pennsylvania that they had a great time in the lead up to Christmas, with little Zachary celebrating his birthday on the nearby ski slopes.  So that's good news that our booking did not go to waste.