Day 13: floodgates open

Monday

WCC: 0.2

Hb: 80

Neut: 0.0

Platelets: 14

Weight: 73.3kg!

Woke with a smile this morning. I had been to Africa overnight and on safari and although had woken at 5.00am, it was with a great feeling. I lay there and thought of all the wonderful things we have done in the last few years and how wonderful the memories are to have - and they are going to help me get through this.

Then reality begins...9kg gain in weight. I have scenes flashing through my mind that there is going to be an 'exorcist style' incident in this room if I can't get rid of some of this fluid. I feel I am about to pop and if I sneeze too hard there could be a flood.

I've never been happy with my long skinny feet, but at the moment, I would be delighted to see them again!

Day started with bloods taken, handful of pills etc as per normal. Got a shower in and then the last bag of chemo started.

Dr's all crowded into the room to go through everything and I was pushing a bit with the fluid overload and my desire to get some relief. They say be careful what you wish for...

So it was agreed to give me a much higher dose to help extract fluids. The first hour after taking it, I had to laugh - every 10 minutes off the bathroom I went... This involves getting up, stop coughing, removing oxygen, unplugging 2 x IV pumps, wrapping cords up, pushing IV pole with 2 pumps around the bed and into the bathroom. Return, plug everything back in, back into bed, oxygen back on and relax for another 7.5min before starting again.

By about the 2.5 hour mark of this routine, with the chemo pumping into me the whole time and the more I move, the more nauseous I feel - my sense of humour had gone and I was in a bad mood. I was exhausted, desperate for sleep, but couldn't because I had to keep getting up. I wondered about the practicality of Dr decision to give me the dose whilst the chemo was going in without really thinking about what that actually meant for me. Maybe a slight relief today and tomorrow, with no chemo a larger dose would have been a bit more practical!

Finally by about 2.30 I could close my eyes and fell fast asleep.

I was in the most bizarre dream (that would be a whole other blog to try and describe that) but basically I was at the point of the dream that I was wandering around, lost, with blurry sight, unable to talk properly and panic was setting in when someone grabbed me from behind. I woke with such a startle and gasp I tested not only my heart strength by that of my haematologist - I think I scared him half to death too! Lucky I didn't try and whack him. I had discussed so many things to ask him the night before but for the 15 min he was there I was still trying to wake up and calm down that I asked nothing at all! I fell fast asleep again and didn't wake up until 5.00pm until Anth arrived for evening visit.

So - end weight for tonight was 69.9kg - so lost about 3.4kg today - and that was with me actually eating today!

CT scan booked for tomorrow to find out about this cough and need for oxygen. Hoping for an uneventful night - still extremely tired and my left eye is feeling a bit sore - so eye drops and sleep for me!