My 11th treatment this week – a final bag of Melphalan with an electrolyte chaser. Tomorrow is a rest day, then I get my stem cells back on Monday. After that it will be a daily rebuilding process while avoiding infections and opportunistic germs.
The chemo effects will reach their nadir in 10-14 days. That’s also [...]
Posts Tagged as ‘Chemo’
June 13, 2009
Last Day of Chemo
June 8, 2009
Chez Chemo: Memo for the Week
Drinks & Appetizers:
Saline Solution (shaken, not stirred)
Scope Anti-nausea Patch
Dexamethasone
Main Courses:
Carmustine
Cytarabine (ARA,C)
Etoposide (VP-16)
Melphalan
Side (effect) Dishes:
Compazine – 40 mg daily
Kytril – 2 mg daily
Lansoprazole – 30 mg daily
Lorazepam – 4 mg daily
Temazepam – 30 mg daily
Dessert (next week):
Acyclovir – 1,600 mg daily
Diflucan – 800 mg daily
Levaquin – 500 mg daily
June 6, 2009
Knockout Round
My 10th round of chemo starts tomorrow and goes for six days. This regime is called “high dose” and is really the cure part of the whole rigmarole. Since the cancer didn’t respond to earlier chemo, the dosages of Etoposide and ARA-C are raised to the lethal level.
The stem cells are the “rescue” part of [...]
May 20, 2009
Apheresis for Dummies
What I had last weekend is known as mobilization chemotherapy, even though it de-mobilized me. It’s done to increase the number of stem cells in the peripheral blood. I return to Denver on Friday and as soon as my counts are up, I will begin stem cell collection, called apheresis.
Apheresis can take several days. I’ll [...]
May 17, 2009
Great To Be Alive!
it’s great to be alive on a sunny Sunday, especially after what happened to me on Friday and Saturday. The RMCC is a world-class facility with top notch professionals; and don’t even get me started on their kick-ass pharmaceuticals.
Despite these advantages, this “mobilization” chemo was my worst yet as far a side effects. At [...]
May 15, 2009
9th Round
I’m at the Rocky Mountain Cancer Center (RMCC) in downtown Denver for my 9th round of chemo starring Cytoxan (Cyclophosphamide) and Etoposide (VP-16). I’ve had them both before. The former is an alkylating agent derived from mustard gas and the latter is a topoisomerase inhibitor.
This is a three-day bout to mobilize my stem cells for [...]
April 27, 2009
You’re Taking What!
The newest addition to my list of drugs to swallow—number 23, but who’s counting—is Fluconazole (the generic of Diflucan), which many female readers will recognize as a leading treatment for yeast infections.
The packaging boasts, “Just one oral tablet provides a full course of therapy sufficient to cure most vaginal yeast infections.” Me? I’m on a [...]
April 20, 2009
Drugged Out
Home today and slooowly recovering. It’s a wonder I can sit up, much less stand. I don’t know how to describe what chemo feels like. Instead I’ll list its causes and let you imagine the effects.
Over the last eight months I have been repeatedly injected with, or ingested, a pharmacopeia from A to Z; either [...]
