The last few days my dad’s been correcting me when I say cancer he says “it’s not cancer, it’s a tumor” and then I’ll reply “yah a malignant tumor which is cancerous”. I feel like he’s in denial to the point where he’s calling Derek: HE-WHO-SHALL-NOT-BE-NAMED.
Yesterday was a really bad day for me, I’m sorry to those that felt like I was pushing you away maliciously. With so much bad news lately, I kind of broke and couldn’t handle the very unexpected news that I had zero sperm count in the lab tests. Joanna tried to cheer me up and said that if we don’t have kids, we could definitely do more traveling. I told her that we could go to China and just steal a baby because there’s like over a billion people there so missing one person isn’t going to be a big deal.
Last night, around 4am I woke up with terrible night sweats to the point where I had to change the sheets and all my clothes. I also had a very sharp pain in my right side when I would move. Today was my scheduled appointment with Dr. Costello at the Mayo clinic so I figured I’d ask him then.
Got in the car around 12:30 with my parents to drive an hour and a half down to Rochester. Around 2pm, I started feeling achy, feverish, and just overall yucky. Thankfully my appointment was at 3pm and I could get those symptoms addressed.
I feel like I must be a really special case to be admitted into the world famous Mayo Clinic, especially under such short notice from scheduling the appointment last Friday. The lobby and everything else was just so fancy.
While in the check in area, I started feeling really cold and overall achy-ness. They brought me in and checked my temp which showed a fever of 100.4. We met with Dr. Westin who works under Dr. Costello. His recommendation would be to go with the original BEP mixture of chemo drugs because at my age, there shouldn’t be too serious of a risk for lung toxicity. With my current symptoms, he said I needed to be admitted into the hospital immediately as I could be showing signs of a blood clot in my lungs or an infection like pneumonia.
I brought up the sperm bank lab results to Dr. Westin. He said that there is no time and they need to act quickly as this tumor is growing very aggressively. On the bright side, 2/3 of men are able to gain reproductive health a year after chemo. On the not bright side, my reproductive health is non existent and we haven’t started treatment yet. He suggested that we schedule a consult with a urologist in the morning who would perform a testicular biopsy to fish for any sperm in my junk. To be more specific, THEY’RE GOING TO STICK A GIANT NEEDLE IN MY NUTS.
At this point in time, I was doubled over in pain because of my ribs and generally not feeling well. Dr. Costello came in to review Dr. Westin’s recommendations and said that he would like me to start chemo tomorrow morning if my blood cultures do not show signs of infection.
I have confidence in these doctors because they said a patient with my same type of cancer just wrapped up chemo about a month ago. Considering this is such a rare type of tumor, I felt better that they have the exposure and experience here to treat me.
I needed to ask for a wheelchair to get to the hospital wing of Mayo. I was just so weak and tired that I was sure I would pass out on the way there.
I was admitted right away but my mom had the nurse change the original room number from 414 to 412 because of Chinese superstition.
The nurse practitioner explained the next few days to me. She said that tonight I’ll be under observation and I’ll begin a 5 day sprint of chemo treatment starting tomorrow afternoon. I asked her if I’d start feeling myself by January. She said “oh honey I’m sorry but you won’t start feeling yourself until 12 months from now.” She did however compliment me on my hair and said it looks really good.
You know how before I talked about the fact that I hate needles and getting blood tests and stuff? Well they ordered ALL the tests and needed 60ml of blood from each arm. That’s 4 syringes of blood in the photo below. I had an IV placed because Mayo is conservative and feels that ports aren’t worth the risk.
Later I found out that because I’m under such intense observation, they need to get new blood samples every 4-6 hours. The 2nd collection, the tech pulled the vial too quickly and spilled my own blood on the bed.
They had me do another CT scan so they can compare and see how big the tumor’s grown since the last time I got a scan. They’ll also be able to tell if I cracked a rib from coughing so much. My right side is visibly bruised so they know at least that much. I also had a lung capacity test done. Normally, guys my age are at 4 liters of air. 2 weeks ago, I tested at 2.8 liters. Today I was at 1.9 liters. This just means that Derek’s been growing into a strong boy and pushing my other organs around. The nurse also said that it’s likely the tumor’s pushing my stomach too which is why lately I’ve been getting full faster (I don’t recommend this weight loss plan).
My fever peaked at 102.9f which is really high. It was a really good move on them to admit me and I feel really blessed that the timing all fit together perfectly. I do feel bad that I’m an hour and a half away from home though. As of right now I’m not taking any visitors while I’m here for the week because I don’t know what my chemo regimen and rules for contact are.
After the CT scan, they recommended that I drink as much water as possible to flush out the dye they used for the scan. I have to call the nurse every time I have to pee because I’m a “fall risk”. They are making me go in this big measuring cup that hangs on the inside of the toilet so they can measure my input and output, it’s super weird just because I have to announce to people that I have to pee every 45 min, they come, take a sample, and dump the rest.
Every few hours the nurse will ask me cognitive questions like “What city are you in? What month is it? Who’s the current president?” With the president one I just answered “ughhhhh” and she took that as an acceptable answer.
My dad’s biopsy will be at 9am tomorrow morning and he said he’ll stay here the rest of the week with me while I start treatment. I really hope his tumors are benign and not malignant because our whole family can handle only so much.
Joanna’s clinic was very generous and understanding to cancel all her appointments tomorrow, no question asked so that she can accompany me for my first day of chemo.
It’s 2am now and I’m feeling loads better than I did just a few hours ago. They gave me tramadol pain killer for the IV and bruised rib. I wasn’t going to do a blog post but I knew that this turn of events would be a shock to people and tomorrow will be another very busy day with lots of new information to share.
Derek sounds like a big asshole.
Ps. The Aspen family is rooting for you (and like always, Dr. Tran as well 🙂 ).
Uh yah he’s the biggest asshole I know right now. Thanks Chelsea!
Hi! I’m a new grad nurse and your blog has been really enlightening, getting to look at things from a patient’s perspective. You might try asking your future nurses to request and order for EMLA cream. It’s a cream that can be applied to an IV site 30 mins before sticking that numbs the area. I don’t think many people know about it and it requires a docs order so nurses don’t often think of it or go to the trouble of requesting it. It’s used more often in pediatrics but is supposedly really effective! Sending prayers your way!
Thank you for the fantastic tip! No matter how many times I get poked, I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it.
I’m having a picc line installed on Monday so hopefully they’ll be using EMLA cream or local anaesthesia. I have an appointment with my doc today, so I’ll ask.