Chemo Treatment #10: Choke & Puke

Hey all.  Seems like I’m slacking on my blogging duties as of late.  I find as time goes on, it becomes more and more difficult to carve out time to update you all on my progress.  Sorry about that.  Initially, it was a good escape for me to type out my thoughts every other Wednesday as I was pumped full of drugs and forced to sit idly by as the life saving process of Chemotherapy threw me into a 4-day hangover.  A penance, mind you, that is not served up voluntarily and is certainly not the result of drinking good Gin served on the rocks with a twist (my personal favorite way to be naughty).  Sadly enough, my Wednesday treatments have turned into more of a vomit fest followed by a drug induced nap/stupor.  It’s the strangest thing.  Of course I feel nauseous after my treatment, that’s typical, but now I have a significant physical response to the smells and tastes I associate with my treatments.  It’s all in my head, I suppose, and is just an outward expression of some sort of weakness within my cerebral cortex that I have to exorcise (yes I’m trying to use big words to impress you all), but I have an uncontrollable gag reflex when treatment begins that has resulted in some exciting moments in the Chemo ward.  Rest assured that the condition subsides after my treatment and leaves me ever so hungry for a Burrito Supreme after an hour or two.  It has however put me in a favorable position to request a private room (with a deluxe posturepedic bed) during my treatments.  The Chemo nurses (thanks Lana!!) are more than happy to oblige.  So, instead of typing in my blog during treatments….I nap.  For all you suckers that actually have to work on Wednesday afternoons, bite me.  

 

All in all, I still can’t complain about my condition.  Not much has really changed.  I’m still able to run and swim, although some days are more challenging than others to get motivated enough to hit the gym.  I started a spin class on Wednesday mornings, so it’ll be good to engage my bike muscles again.  I can’t wait to hit a Tri this summer.  Yep, I’m out of shape, and my lungs are half dead from these nasty drugs, but I’ve got to keep moving.  I went running with Kourtney the other day, and it was a bit embarrassing to be huffing and puffing after only 2 miles (2 really, really slow miles).  Of course he was there with an ever-supportive laugh and a comment about me being a big fatty.  Just remember Kourtney, the next time I take you climbing I’ll take off and leave you alone on the mountain.  I’ll tell everyone that I simply lost sight of your headlamp after a while.  My weight still hovers impressively above the “normal” category on our “WII fit” falling farther and farther into the realm of “obese”, my eyelashes are mostly gone, and I’ve lost a considerable amount of hair.  Seriously, I’d say that 75% of my hair follicles are non-functional.  For you hairy guys out there, you can appreciate that.  It’s really strange.  It’s as if every part of my body could be thrown directly into an Archeological dig site and mistaken as the fossilized remains of some incredibly tall Cro-Magnon man, whereas my body hair more resembles that of a 13 year-old boy.  Let that image burn into your brain.  

Mentally, I suppose I’m doing alright.  I’ve never been incredibly smart, and I’m realistic about my mental capacity.  However, until about 2 months ago, I’ve always felt that given any kind of standardized test I’d at least score somewhere in the middle of the pack.  Chemo has certainly taken my mediocre aptitude and left me barely capable of wearing a headset and asking if you might want whipped cream on your Mocha.  No offense to you Baristas out there, but seriously, if someone ordered a Venti Non-Fat Latte with extra foam and a shot of Vanilla from me right now you’d be just as likely to receive a Lime in your Coke-u-nut.  All these years of clean living just didn’t provide much of a buffer from the negative impacts of Chemo on my cognitive abilities (again, big word, just to impress you).  Seriously, I just said “no”, I didn’t inhale, and I even took Omega-3 Fatty Acids for a while, but nothing could safeguard me from Chemo.  I recently read in a book that we all have a certain capacity, a “gas tank” if you will, for mental concentration, and we can exhaust our reserves.  My reserves are gone, and I’m functioning on nothing but fumes and the lumpy gray remains of a brain that used to be whole.  But, lucky for me (and the girls) I’ve got a lovely wife that selflessly takes care of me as if I’m actually worth every bit of suffering that she’s going through right now.  For those of you who haven’t yet had life push you out (way out) of your comfort zone, you’d better pray, beg, curse, or otherwise offer a request up to whatever deity you may claim as God that a person enters your life that loves you unconditionally.  And, I’m not talking about your parents.  They don’t count.  As I’ve said before, parents are blind, powerless, and otherwise biased to accept even the worst in their children.  After all, if they admit that their kid is “defective”, that means that they’re admitting that they may have screwed up, right?  Oh, the vulnerability!  For real, the sooner we all admit that as parents we’re not near as smart as we think we are, the better off we’ll be.  13-year olds are exactly right when they think that their parents don’t know anything.  Contrary to popular belief, as our kids get older they don’t really start to think that we’re “smart”.  It’s simply that when kids get into their twenties they’ve just given up, surrendered their childish simplicity, and are more likely to agree with their parents.  I’m in my mid-thirties and all I want to do is learn how to think like a 13-year old and chase worthless and misunderstood dreams.  That’s another conversation….back to my point.  I’m blessed to have Kacy around to take care of me and the girls right now.  I hope to pay her back someday by giving her the husband that she deserves.  If any of you know where I might find him, let me know.  Maybe there’s an App for that.

To sum up, we’ve adjusted, and will continue to adjust, to what has become our life over the last 5 months.  The best part is that we’ve only got 1 month left.  We started planning out our summer vacation schedule last week, and it’ll be an action packed adventure.  Climbing, canoeing, camping, diving, paddle boarding, you name it…it’s on the agenda and on a shoestring budget.  Cancer, kids, mortgage….none can diminish our appetite for adventure.  We just have to be a little more deliberate about our planning process.  If you don’t plan it (and I’m talking months in advance) it simply won’t happen, and yet another summer will be spent drifting without a purpose until Fall is upon us, and life becomes too busy for fun.  Kacy told me to start responding to your blog comments….so I’ll give that a shot this time.  Oh I come kicking and screaming into the information age.  I hope you all are doing well, and take care of each other.

10th Chemo Treatment - March 28, 2012