So the first drug treatment went well. Better than expected. One of our friends, Myrna picked up me and Ryan before the appointment. She dropped me off at the cancer center and then took Ryan home with her. Dwight dropped the other kids off at another friend's house, Angel Ally.
In the treatment area, they have either 3 or 4 sections and each section has 4 recliner chairs. I picked the section that has a tv and a recliner that has the built in pillow. Thankfully, I took my own quilt. (I took the beautiful blue one that my friend made for me a while ago. It was comforting. I love that quilt!) I also took some water and graham crackers to snack on, my knitting bag, an Ensign magazine, and a Shape magazine.
The nurse, LaDonna came over to put in my IV. She asked which arm and I said I didn't care as long as I could still knit. She kind of laughed and said, "Oh you might knit in your dreams, but you won't be knitting today." Dang it. So, she placed the IV in the middle of my left forearm. I've never had an IV there before. In my hand, yes. In my wrist, yes. In my foot, yes. In my elbow, yes. In middle of my forearm, no. (Well, yes now.) She pushed a syringe full of steroids into me and then hung a bag of Benadryl. She told me to let her know when I was sleepy.
It didn't take too long to realize that the sleepiness had hit. When I told LaDonna, she reminded me of all the things I needed to tell her about if they happened and then she hung a bag of my drugs. She started it on a slow drip. A while later ... I don't know how much later ... I realized that the feeling I had above the roof of my mouth was what she had called itching. I wouldn't call it itching, but it seemed to be what she had described. Then I also realized that I was having a hard time swallowing and my throat seemed really big.
So they stopped the drugs and gave me more steroids and benadryl. The steroids and benadryl help to shut down the body's reaction to the drugs. It makes sense that my body doesn't like the drugs because they specifically go in and kill off my b cells.
Eventually, they came back over and started the drugs again on a slower drip. It took about 6 hours from start to finish. I went home feeling drowsy and drugged from the Benadryl, and my throat was really sore. Other than that, I really didn't feel anything else. On Thursday morning, I felt great. I did notice that my feet were swelling a bit on Thursday through Sunday, but they seemed to be fine today. I also had a horrible headache that started sometime Friday and didn't go away until early this morning. But, it's gone now too. Yeah!
Only 7 more to go.
I start radiation therapy tomorrow. The 1st of about 15-20 appointments. I looked at pictures last night of skin that has had radiation therapy. Doesn't look good. Should I do pictures? Before and after?
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