Potions and Pills
I had hoped to do some writing while I waited for the call from Dr. Gregg. However, I found that typing for more than a few minutes made my chest ache. I was also barred from driving, since turning a steering wheel required the use of muscles attached to things that weren’t as solid as they used to be.
And I “creaked” when I moved in certain ways. The wires holding the two halves of my breastbone together could not, of course, prevent some movement. It was an effect that, thankfully, gradually went away as my bones knit back together, but while it lasted it was definitely unnerving.
It wasn’t long before Meaghan and I were sitting with Dr. Gregg. He laid out the details of how the chemotherapy regimen would be work. The treatment employed a series of four drugs – adriamycin, cisplatin, vincristine, and cyclophosphamide (called the ADOC protocol). It was a combination that had been found to be most effective in thymoma treatment. I would receive six rounds. Mondays I would get the first two, Tuesdays I had “off”, Wednesday for the third, and Thursday the last. Two weeks between rounds. Which meant that the whole plan would last eighteen weeks.
Dr. Gregg went over expected side effects again. There were three significant issues - nausea, the hallmark of every cancer-related doctor show I’d ever watched; hair loss, the “badge” of people in my new members-only club; and a compromised immune system (please don’t let sick people cough on you, Mr. Keating, it could kill you). Other minor issues included potential hearing loss and temporary (hopefully) peripheral nerve damage.
Because I lived a two hour drive from the hospital, I decided to stay at the Quinte Thousand Islands Lodge, a hostel for people like myself who were undergoing cancer treatment. It was just a few minutes walk from the hospital.
I have to confess that chemotherapy was the part of this whole experience that I dreaded the most. (Well, with the possible exception of the whole maybe dying thing). I don’t like feeling sick. I don’t like throwing up. That teen drinking commercial that shows a girl passed out beside a toilet with something icky in it makes my stomach churn.
Nevertheless, I showed up as ordered on the following Monday morning, had some blood work done to ensure I was fit enough to have poison coursing through my veins, and had an IV connection slid into my arm. Oh. Did I happen to mention that I have small veins and hate needles? It took a couple of practice runs before the nurse was satisfied she’d hit a good spot.
For the next six hours I sat in a recliner with a blanket over me while several bags of innocuous-looking fluid slowly emptied into my arm. I did not, to my great relief and surprise, get sick. Due largely, I’m sure, to the handful of anti-nausea pills I’d been given before treatment started.
Meaghan and I had decided that for the first round I’d go home for my “day off.” I think we both just wanted to have each other around. I know I did. So off we went back to Marmora. We had to stop a couple of times. I took more pills.
Over the course of the eighteen weeks I met a lot of very brave people, both those in my “club”, and their families who were there to support them. Chemo involves a lot of sitting around; waiting for blood work, waiting for the drugs to be prepared, waiting for them to infuse. It all takes time. There’s time to talk. We didn’t talk a lot. Feeling ill will do that to you. We did, however, exchange anecdotes, quips, or just a smile.
The camaraderie between the patients, the nurses, and the volunteers was amazingly relaxed. It belied the deadly earnestness of the battle that was being waged invisibly in our veins.
Three weeks in, when hair started to appear in my comb in greater than usual amounts, Meaghan wielded the clippers and razor. For the next three months, shaving involved all of my head. Everyone who saw me told me how I was one of the few people who could “pull off” the bald look. They were lying. I appreciated it.
I want to emphasize that I was extremely fortunate. My reaction to the ADOC drugs was mild. Once I learned to gauge my food intake (I learned to absolutely love the blandness of Shredded Wheat. And I’ve lost count of the number of watermelons Alan cut up for me), I did pretty well. Walking was an adventure sometimes, focusing on a computer screen for more than a few minutes an impossibility without dizziness.
Considering what some of my peers were experiencing, I was blessed and I knew it.
And then it was over.
I had a few weeks to regain my strength before Meaghan and I were to head out to Alberta and BC to see her brothers, then back to Ontario and radiation.
Time to see Dr. Falkson again.
