Ding ding round two chemo

2nd May, 2012

Today, we both woke up fairly anxious as we both had a restless night’s sleep, due to today's events.

Chris’s anxiety started yesterday, just thinking about today’s treatment & understandably so. I wish there was an easier way to kill this F@#ker and heal Chris sooner, without having to undergo such a harsh treatment. Chemotherapy for Hogkins Lymphoma is a particularly aggressive type of chemo, yes in most cases, it works but it kills me to see her suffer.

This morning, whilst sitting in the chemo ward, there was a weird tick, tick, ticking noise. It reminded me of a bomb which was about to detonate, but it was just the electronic drip which doses out the amount of chemo treatment to the patients & it creates a symphony of ticking.

Today we had a male nurse. He seemed a little distracted & he stuffed up a bit when cleaning out her PICC line. Arrhh, we quietly scream to ourselves! But I must say all in all the nurses are truly amazing, they all have great humour & are fastidious about their jobs, which we love.

Once Chris’s PICC line was flushed and cleaned, they gave Chris her pre meds which are zofran, dexamethasone & an antihistamine.

The nurse then ordered Chris's chemotherapy treatment (A,B,V & D) to be prepared.

Chris took the A,B & V the usual way being injected/pushed in by the nurse, through her PICC line.

When it came time for the D, the nurse remembered what happened last time with the itching & her reaction, so he decided to let the drip run over an hour 1/2 period & this, along with her pre med (antihistamine) worked well, Chris had no adverse reaction. Yaye!

When Susie arrived she had a little present for Chris, (Susie you really are amazing) It was a book about Lance Armstrong's battle & recovery from cancer, some brilliant motivational reading.

Susie noticed the wig room at the end of the chemo ward & we decided that we would pull out every colour & length of wig they had and we were going to trial each of them on Chris.

So first we tried a long blonde number, Susie and I “Oooh’d & Ahh’d” & then we all broke out into hysterics. Yes now a long black one “Ooh not to bad”, next up, was a dark bob, followed by an Albert Einstein looking wig... bah haa we were all in stitches once again. Oh & FYI Chris won’t be donning any wigs at all it’ll be beanie’s & hats for her all the way!

Then Kylie from the clinical trial came up to say hello to see how Chris was going. We talked about how long the treatment will run for as we were all under the impression that her last treatment would be at the end of July & then Kylie just looked at us & said no she will be having chemo until the end of October!

"Oh what" we all just said in unison...none of us honestly recalled anyone ever saying that to us. So obviously this came as quite a shock,  but we just said "well what can we do", & we just decided to go back to the day by day outlook otherwise looking at the long term gets a bit overwhelming. So day by day it is.

When the day started, it was bad enough to know that today was day 2 of 8 Chemo treatment sessions but now to know that there are 13 Chemo sessions to undergo is truly devastating.

Once Chris got home she had something to eat & just crashed, her reaction compared to the first treatment was immediate and negative, it’s honestly heartbreaking to see the person you love so knocked for six.

Chemotherapy is toxic and kills your body’s good cells, as well as the cancerous cells. I just hope that rest and nutritious meals will allow minimal damage to Chris’s good cell’s and allow her body to recover quickly. Unfortunately this is the path we must take to heal.

It’s been 4 hours since we left the hospital and Chris seems to be suffering. She’s nauseous and nodding off. She has 0% energy, her words are slurring and it pains me so much... I feel helpless. But I know we have the strength to get through this.

And get through this we will!!!! 

Love you eternally my baby, you will beat this! Xx