Three months ago I was in really rough shape. When I had my appointment at the Mayo Clinic for the first time, I was running a fever, needed a wheelchair, was coughing like crazy, and had a hard time breathing.
After 4 rounds of intense chemo therapy I look to be in pretty good shape besides being bald.
I definitely have to give a lot of credit to my dad who’s been to literally every doctor and chemo appointment. As well as staying in the hotel with me for a total of 3 weeks when I had my full week sessions in Rochester.
You should see the folder that my dad keeps of all my medical records as well as the notebook he writes in during each of my doctors appointments. I had him take a Myers Briggs test and he fit the exact same personality category (ESTJ) as my manager who does the same thing with his dad’s medical stuff. I’m pretty organized but I’m not detailed oriented to that level. So he’s definitely stayed on top of things not to mention all the research at the beginning, all for my benefit.
Overall my last chemo session was as expected. During my shot of bleomycin the nurse found out that it was my last day, she went and got me a pin as a present.
Because I didn’t have any additional chemo sessions left, they scheduled me to have my PICC line removed. I asked the nurse if he was going to yank it out like starting a lawnmower. He said “Well I’m not going to YANK it.”
He removed my bandages around the tubing, told me to take a deep breath, and bear down like I’m about to make a bowel movement. Then he just pulled it out of my arm. I didn’t feel anything as it came out which was a relief.
While he stood there holding it like a freshly caught fish, it was weird seeing how long the line was that’s been living in my body for the last 2 months.
Yesterday at lunch, my mom asked me now that God has given me a second chance, what am I going to do differently?
I didn’t really have to think about it but my answer is nothing. I wouldn’t do anything differently because after seeing all the love and support from everyone around me in the last few months, it just tells me that I did things “right” the first time and that I made a positive impact in my community and in my time of need, those people wanted to show me that they care through words of support, prayers, gifts, and cards.
Secondly, because of my faith, I feel confident on where I’d be going if I didn’t make it since there was a very real chance of me dying when I was first admitted to Mayo. I mentioned I had just purchased a life insurance policy in April which meant my family would be taken care of financially, but more importantly, I had soul insurance on myself 😀
So this experience has just encouraged my faith in people and God and to do what I can to help the people around me.
To celebrate me being done with chemo, I bought myself a cake from a bakery that I like: Chocolate cake filled with raspberry mousse & fresh chopped raspberries. I’m sure a huge pile of sugar is helpful to my recovery somehow, but does anyone really need an excuse to buy a cake for themselves?
I have a check up exam on 9/28 where I’ll have a CT scan done, blood work for my tumor markers, and a surgical consult. I would assume that the surgery will be sometime in early October to remove the remaining tumor and dead tissue. The question I have is: how invasive the surgery will be and how long is recovery time?
Until then, I don’t really have anything going on for 2 weeks :/
My hands stared swelling up and my left armpit felt sore because of the PICC line removal last night after chemo.
The last three months have definitely not been easy. I’ve felt a whole spectrum of emotions and time has just crawled by. I think one of the hardest parts of this experience is the sense of loss that you go through. The loss of independence, loss of control over your schedule, the forced changes your body goes through, and the loss of just general life progression since everything you planned to do has to be on pause.
I really just want to do stuff to feel normal with the few weeks I have prior to the surgery. I’m not looking forward to post operation time when I won’t even be able to get out of bed for who knows how long.
The whole cancer ordeal isn’t over and it won’t be for a long time even after surgery. I read that you’re not considered a cancer survivor for at least 5 years after diagnosis. My doctor said that after surgery, they expect me back every 2-3 months for a year to do tests and then every 6 months after that to make sure that nothing’s come back. I feel like the anxiety of any cough or weird body ache would immediately result to thinking about cancer recurrence.
Here’s a relevant XKCD comic
