A week in my life...

The week that was... 

Monday 13th - I had a PICC line dressing today and a blood test. Sam and I went to the shops after this, I ducked under the railing and when I went to stand up, my legs were too weak and I couldn't, so that mixed with the ground being wet, I slipped over and hurt my arm. 

Tuesday 14th - The oncology centre rang to ask if I had the Pegfilgrastim needle last week as my white blood count was now extremely high. I told her I had it last Tuesday (7th). She thought this was the case and said that it must have taken a while to kick in. She also told me that my haemoglobin was 84. She asked if I was having another blood test this week and I said I have another one on Thursday, she told me don't be surprised if I get called in for blood. My arm is still pretty sore.

Wednesday 15th - Nothing to report other then my arm still being pretty sore. I think I may have pinched a nerve when I fell on it. 

Thursday 16th - I had my blood test and the pain has gone from my arm... yay! I did our first online grocery shop through Woolworth's today, it gets delivered on Saturday, can't wait :). 4pm and the oncology centre rang to ask how I was feeling as my haemoglobin was now sitting at 81. She asked if I wanted to come in for blood tomorrow or wait until Monday. I told her I was feeling ok and that I had chemo monday/tuesday/wednesday next week, so we decided it was best I had blood tomorrow. She asked me to get a blood test in the morning to get a "group and hold" done to match my blood type. I said I couldn't as I didn't have any blood forms but I was coming in tomorrow at 1pm anyway. She asked me to get there at 12:30 to have blood taken and that they would squeeze me in for 1 bag of blood after my appointments. 

Friday 17th - I woke up early (6am for the ones playing at home) so Sam could drop me at his parents on the way to work. At 11:45am Sams Dad drove me to pick up his Mum and take us the hospital. We went up to the Oncology day centre to have my blood test done and then we went and had something to eat and drink. 1pm we went and met the psychologist Olivia and then had my meeting with my doctor. I had a few questions to ask him this time. I am half way through my treatment now, so next round which starts on Monday 20th i go onto the "Base dose". 

Drug	Base BEACOPP	Dose-Escalated BEACOPP	Method	Cycle Day
(B)leomycin	10 mg/m²	10 mg/m²	i.v. push	day 8
(E)toposide	100 mg/m²	200 mg/m²	i.v. infusion	day 1-3
(A)driamycin (doxorubicin)	25 mg/m²	35 mg/m²	i.v. push	day 1
(C)yclophosphamide	650 mg/m²	1250 mg/m²	i.v. infusion	day 1
(O)ncovin=Vincristine	1.4 mg/m² (max 2 mg)	1.4 mg/m² (max 2 mg)	i.v. infusion	day 8
(P)rocarbazine	100 mg/m²	100 mg/m²	orally	day 1-7
(P)rednisone	40 mg/m²	40 mg/m²	orally	day 1-14

He felt my neck and said that he can feel 2 nodes, possibly 3, but they are all 1cm or under which is normal size for nodes... yay! I will have scans at the end of it all to see how good it has worked and whether or not I will need radiation at the end. If all goes to plan my last day of chemotherapy will be July 29th! We then went up stairs to level 7 so I could get my bag of blood and so my doctor could check my blood results.
Before each bag of blood they check your obs... so heart rate, blood pressure and temperature. Heart rate was high (like normal), blood pressure was good and temperature was 37.5 (eeeek, the nurse told me it wasn't allowed to go any higher then this lol). She manually checked my heart rate and told me she thought it was irregular so wanted to do an ECG just to make sure. I had the ECG done (they can bring the machine to you) and my doctor looked at it and said it was fine (phew)! My doctor checked my blood test results and said that if I was due to have chemo today he wouldn't let me as my platelets are too low. He said to have a blood test first thing Monday morning to see whether they have come up enough to have chemo. Fingers crossed they are high enough otherwise it will delay my treatment and end date! Sam's mum went and got my scripts filled for me while she waited. It takes about 2 hours to have one bag of blood. At the end they check your obs again, heart rate had come down slightly, blood pressure fine and temperature still 37.5 so I was free to go home. We had pizza for tea at Sam's parents and then headed home. 

Saturday 18th - Nothing to really report for this day. We got our groceries delivered, soooo awesome! Will be doing it like this from now on!

Ouch and another phone call from the RAH

I woke up this morning with my back and top of my legs killing me... I guess this is a good thing because it means that my white blood cells are rebuilding themselves, but not good for the pain. It has got better through out the day though so that's good. I have also felt a little funny in the chest, but that seem's to be a regular thing at around this stage in my cycle. 

The Oncology Day Centre rang again today to tell me that my potassium levels are too low so I need to start taking my liquid potassium again. My level was 3 and it should be between 3.7 and 5.2. Not looking forward to taking this again as it taste's like cleaning product!! 

Hmm screw you white blood count!

I had day 8 on Monday 6th. All went well, blood counts came back good. I found out that the tingling in my fingers is actually from the Vincristine IV chemo I have on day 8 and not the tablets I am on. The nurse told me to mention it to my Dr and if things got bad with it they would look at altering the amount i got. Monday night I had really bad indigestion, took some mylanta and it seemed to settle after a while. Tuesday night I had it again, took some mylanta and went to bed. Wednesday night I took some mylanta after tea and before i got any symptoms, seemed to work!

I had a blood test this morning (the nurse comes to me), its great because I get to stay in my PJ's :) At 4pm the Oncology Day Centre rang and left a message on my phone saying my white blood count is sitting at 0.20 so I am highly susceptible to infection! Normal count should be between 4.0-10.0! So i am not even registering 1! I had plans to spend the weekend away in Mannum this weekend and now I can't go because I can't risk getting an infection!

Red blood count is 91 so no blood for me this week!! :) 

I am sick of everything being put on hold! Why can't it be easy? I guess cancer isn't easy, but some days I feel I have the rough end of the stick and am dealing with a lot more then other people with it. I know it could be worse and there are other patients far worse of then me, but still! 

Adelaide Relay For Life 2013

Saturday 4th May 2013

I had the privilege of being involved in my first ever Relay For Life, and what an experience it was. 

A group of ladies who I have mentioned in this blog before all banded together to pull it off! Over the last few months we have all been fundraising and trying to get as many donations for our two RFL teams "Quinzi's Sisters from other Misters" and "Fish kisses for Finn" to raise money for the Cancer Council SA! We raised a massive combined total of $9034.19!!! 

In April we held a fundraising movie night where $5 from each ticket sold went to our fundraising tally. I also got in contact with lots of companies asking for donations towards a raffle that would be held on the night. The support from the companies that donated goods was just amazing! We sold our raffle tickets for $2 each or $5 for 3. The whole night was a great success and we raised over $700 on this night alone.

The Adelaide Relay For Life alone raised $178,000! 

The relay started at 2pm Saturday and went right through until 9am Sunday! I stayed from 1pm - 11:30pm on the saturday and then went home to my nice warm bed because it was too risky for me to be out in the cold. 

It was an amazing experience and I can't wait to do it again next year! 

Kelly, Finn, Anais and Myself 

Me, Shelley, Kirsty and Keryn

Selling scones and soup to raise more money

Off on our "survivors/carers" lap

Our two teams :)

Some lovely ladies and myself :)

Round 4.. half way!!

Monday 29th April 2013 - BEACOPP Round 4... Half way through!

Sam took me to this appointment, we arrived at 9:30am and went off to the waiting bay, it got to around 10am and the nurse that would be looking after me that day came and told me that they were still waiting on my chemo to be made up by the pharmacy as my script had been taken down late and hopefully it wouldn't be too much of a wait. He asked how i was feeling and I said that I was already feeing sick at the thought of having the chemo as it had previously made me sick. 

Alan a man that works with Dr Osborn came up and seen me and told me that he was going to go and make my appointment to have my gated blood pool scan on my heart. He went off and came back and said it was going to be on Thursday 2nd May 2013 at 9:40am. I asked him if Dr Osborn still wanted me to get an ECG done today because i couldn't remember if he had changed his mind on Friday when i saw him, he went and called him and came back and said that it was fine to not have one as Dr Osborn had looked over the results of my last one and my heart was beating in rhythm just fast.

At 11:30am my chemo finally arrived. I got taken into the smallest chemo bays. They gave me half a lorazapam to help with my anxiety and calm me down. The nurse said to make sure I had my blood test on Thursday as my haemoglobin at my last blood test on Friday was 85. I had my 3 bags of chemo and went home. No vomiting once again!! 

Day 2 - Tuesday 30th April 2013 - Arrived at the hospital 9am for chemotherapy, all good. Sam took half the day off work to take me.

Day 3 - Wednesday 1st May 2013 - Arrived at the hospital 9am for chemotherapy, all good. Sam took half the day off work to take me.

Thursday 2nd May - Sam's mum took me for my gated blood pool scan at 9:40am. I got in straight away and the took me out the back and injected me with a tracer, told me to sit in the waiting room for 20 minutes and they would come back and get me, take some blood, add radiation to it and then make we wait another 20 minutes and then inject my blood back into me. I then had to lay in the scanner for 10 minutes while they took a video of how much blood my heart was pumping. Then i was free to go. We went and had lunch and then to the IMVS clinic to get a blood test. We then went and done some shopping at Kmart, which totally exhausted me! Penny dropped me home and i had a nap. 4pm my phone rang and it was the oncology day centre at the RAH telling me I needed to come in tomorrow (Friday) for a blood transfusion as my haemoglobin was now sitting at 81. I asked her how many bags i would need and she said probably 2 but would speak to the doctors. I had to be there at 9am! Having blood is one of the things i hate the most, I think its the thought of someone else's blood going in to you that I don't like. I guess i better get used to them, they seem to be a regular occurrence these days!

Friday 3rd May 9am. Mum came down and took me to my appointment. We arrived and they told me i would be having 2 bags. Each bag costs $330 and takes 1.5 hours to put through. Including these 2 bags, i have now had 7 blood transfusions!! We left there about 1:30pm. 

So everyday this week i have had to be at the RAH at around 9am, i am so not used to these early mornings!!