Reality Check!

I don't know where to start tonight.

There is so much info. Today we met with Dr. L and discussed my treatment. I learned today that two treatments equals one cycle. I will be getting 6 cycles. (12 treatments) over 6 months starting in January after my kidney is removed.

The chemo I will be getting involves 4 drugs. ABVD

A: Adriamycin
B: Bleomycin
V: Vinblastine
D: Dacarbazine

Short term side effects are seemingly basic: Nausea, Hair loss, Fatigue, Changes in taste, Mouth sores, Drop in white blood cells (my risk of infection is huge), Fevers/Chills, Itching...

Long term side effects however involve possible Heart muscle damage (irreversible enlargement) and possible Heart failure, Lung Damage (Pulmonary Toxicity)-Bleomycin is responsible for this and Dr L said she can remove Bleomycin from my treatment if necessary. (They'll be watching for this) and unfortunately Leukemia is also a possibility.

All of this is immediately followed by Radiation five days a week for 4 weeks straight on the back end of my treatment to deal with the mass of nodes in my chest.

So the first 7 months of 2007 are generally going to SUCK! How many months is a year? ...oh yeah, uh 12...do they realize that's more than HALF!? And the first 18 months after kicking Hodgkins is critical because if it returns it usually does so in the first year and a half. So how relaxed am I gonna be until 2009?

And not to mention 5 years of PET/CT scans to boot. (Possibly more than twice a year).

We met a few nurses in the cancer center down stairs from Dr L's office and discussed the drugs I would be getting and a nurse suggested I consider having a "Portacath" installed (more or less...) basically having an IV port surgically placed into my chest above my heart to among other things improve the nurses ability to "hook" me up each visit and to minimize damage to my veins every two weeks. (They weren't pleased with my veins either...) the idea was kicked around of having the port done while I am still under during my kidney surgery on Jan 2. (not to mention Dr L wants to ask Dr G to do my Bone Marrow test while I'm under as well.) I'm gonna be hurtin' when I wake up that afternoon. No kidney, 3 small incisions, a larger one for the kidney to exit thru, possibly a Bone Marrow test and biopsy from my hip and...a portacath for easy access to Chemo.

That's if they can line all this up for Jan 2. If not...Bone Marrow happens in Dr L's office and the Port is done out patient with sedation at a local surgery center over the next couple of weeks.

Better that it's all done at one shot I guess eh?
I'm exhausted already.

Walking into the cancer center was surreal. It was the always popular sterile nurses station combined with a poor attempt at being accomodating. Basically there were recliners next to IV poles, which doesn't really give me the impression of the old family den. There were patients getting chemo when we walked in and a few nurses remembered Dawn when she came there with her Mom. It was weird.

I felt so out of place (age wise) as most of the nurses were my age and the few patients I saw were much, much older.

(what am i doing here?) I felt like an intruder. I stood out like a sore thumb. A nurse handed me a piece of carrot cake with cream cheese icing which Dawn and I shared while a nurse went over ABVD with us.

I can't completely explain it.

For as much of this sometimes felt unreal, even when it was going on: neck biopsy and 2 needle aspirations, kidney surgery being scheduled, PET and CAT scans, the very words: LYMPHOMA and KIDNEY CANCER hanging in the air like huge dark clouds. Walking into the cancer center today was a reality check. That really made my head spin.

All the talk, speculation, various testing, examinations, bloodwork, etc were real to me, but that room is my full circle. I have spent the last 45 days in and out of hospitals and Dr's offices to narrow down why I need to get there and in less that 30 days it will be my office for 2 hours a day, twice a week for 6 months.

It sharpened my perspective on just how life threatening these two cancers are (can be) and this is how we get rid of them. Kidney removal surgery and IV lines attached to my body via a "port" to allow the poison into my body, which I need to kill the cancer I have, so I can continue to live.

My short visit to the cancer center felt like an out of body experience. I wasn't really there was I? I'm not really going back am I?


Sooner than I realize.