It's quite interesting how 2 hours can make such a significant change to your life.
First appointment this morning was with the endoscopy unit to have a little check-up for Jake. They were amazed that the district nurses hadn't been in contact (because if they had, they would have been my first port of call apparently), so looks like I'll have to make a gentle enquiry to them next week.
Anyway, they were very happy with Jake's progress after only a week and weren't bothered about the "seepage". As a result, the odds of me having a medical-intervention free weekend have just shortened considerably.
Next up, Catherine Barrow, Medical Oncologist. Having found my way to the relevant place, was amazed that my arrival was written down on a piece of paper and the receptionist scurried off to let them know I was here. Seems the entire hospital servers were down and there was a degree of mayhem everywhere as treatment regimes, etc couldn't be verified, printed, etc.
While I waited, I saw a fellow patient come in who had the nasal feeding tube fitted, It was taped to his nose, rested over one ear (where it was taped to his neck just in front of the ear) and hung over the other one with the feeding valve just hanging there. Jake certainly seems a whole lot better solution to me.
Now time for the main event of the day. I was shown into a consultation room, where I was joined by Catherine within a couple of minutes. We duly go over why I'm here, what I've been through so far and what is going to happen next. Catherine is happy with my general state of health, but hasn't seen the kidney test results. I explained that Magda seemed happy and that was sufficient for Catherine. My chemo routine will in fact be once every three weeks (Wendie was right), not weekly as indicated by Mr Hamilton and will utilise Cisplatin. The cisplatin will be administered by an IV they'll put in each time - thus eliminating a potential other procedure for fitting a hickman line, so another victory.
Treatment should be administered on Mondays and I'll receive up to 3 treatments in all, depending on if any need to be rescheduled. First one will be day 0, then 3 weeks after that and the final one 3 weeks after that - so just nicely fitting into a seven week radiotherapy schedule. Now for the fun bit. Seems the chemo will be an all day exercise on each occasion. They'll start with pumping fluids into me for a few hours, then administer the cisplatin, then pump more fluids in after. Obviously part of the desire to ensure the stuff gets diluted on its way out of my system. Apparently, this will have a side effect of making me want to go to the loo a bit more. Reckon? I'd expect, in fact hope, it would have that effect if they're continually adding fluids for such a period of time.
Speaking of side effects, there are some potential doozies. apart form the expected ones of vomiting and anuses and a stuffed immune system (38 degrees), seems I could get numbing, tingling or weakness in my arms or legs. Could also suffer a degree of hearing loss and if I don't tell them about it if I do experience it, the loss could become permanent. There is a big difference between selective deafness (we all suffer from that from time to time) and the real thing, so my full and open disclosure policy will come into play here as I don't want to suffer the real thing just because I didn't tell the medics.
Seems hair loss may not actually come into play, but remains as a potential side effect. Another potential side effect was however totally unexpected. Seems the treatment might cause my diabetes to flair up quite nastily, so I'll need to go and see Tatiana and discuss that.
We're agreed that the chemo will act as a scatter-gun and should pick up any errant lymph cells, but there is no guarantee. I do however get the feeling that the three weekly cycle will deliver a dose that is sufficient to knock the bastard off.
My chemo booking has now been forwarded to that team and all they need is confirmation from radiotherapy as to when they want to start. That means it is now most likely earliest start date will be the 14th of June. As I should only have the mask to deal with between now and then, that should really give me a good amount of time to get the body batteries recharged ready for the main event.
So, the two hours spent medically today have indeed had a significant effect on my life. I now know what the chemo is going to entail - one of the last pieces of the jigsaw - and there will be no medical procedures on me for the foreseeable future. In fact, the next couple of weeks should be pretty disruption free. To celebrate the boys and I are going out for a few drinks tonight and it will be my first "normal" weekend for quite some time.
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As you'll no doubt have guessed by the timing of this post, I didn't get around to finishing it last night before I went out.
Good night had by all and looking forward to doing some of that remaining unpacking today. HRV system was installed yesterday and that represented the last of the medical related changes to the house that I needed to make, so there is starting to be lots of closure on things that will leave me free to concentrate on dealing with the upcoming fight.
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