Call Me Vampira

Sunday I get another transfusion, and I’m actually looking forward to it. I never realized receiving another person’s red blood cells would make me feel so good; I guess I’m a vampire convert. Today I was able to wander around in my yard and do some minor pruning on my potted herbs. I’ve been a bit sleepy, but I haven’t felt the extreme tiredness I was feeling after the last treatment; I wasn’t short of breath or in need of a bench the whole time, and I feel pretty good about that. So watch out all you O positive & O negative folks out there, I now know what I need when I’m feeling tired and run down .

I really had the best time pruning today. I simply love pruning my plants. I have a gorgeous pineapple sage plant that was all the more gorgeous after some taming. My basil plants also needed a bit of attention; they were starting to look very straggly, now their neat and tidy and ready to bear more delicious leaves. I also got a thai holy basil because I really love the flavor in my Vietnamese pho, but my husband had to pot it for me. I also stood outside while he planted a gorgeous dwarf magnolia for me, he wanted my help making sure he got the depth of the rootball right, and help making sure he had it positioned just right. The rootball I was helpful with, but he noticed when we were done that the tree was a bit lopsided; it looked straight to me… I blame chemo eyes .

I do think this round of chemo has caused me to lose my appetite a bit. I’m not nauseated, but my stomach jumps and heaves a lot even taking kytril and maxalon. It’s like some combination of a really intense hiccup and a burp, but the only sound is me gasping for air because it hurts and surprises me at the same time. At least it’s non-productive though, I don’t think I could take being sick at this point. Still I’m feeling better than the last time. I don’t get much of a break between treatments this time, so it’s nice not to be really unwell. I guess we’ll see how I’m feeling next week though… day 7, that’s the telling point.

I’ve been reading up on my stem cell harvest and I have to say it sounds intriguing, but pretty terrible. The blood thinner they’ll give me will apparently give me tingly, itchy lips… where do they come up with these side effects? I currently take a drug called neulasta the day after every round of chemo to help rebuild my immune system. For the stem cell harvest I’ll be taking neulasta’s predecessor, neupogen for somewhere between six and twelve days, and they’re promising me some pretty severe bone pain to go along with that. Bone pain, itchy, tingly lips, tingly tongue, mouth sores, mystery rash, chemo eyes, chemo brain, general stomach discombobulation… and that’s the cure . Funny I only had leg and back pain as a symptom of the cancer, but I guess it was leg and back pain, soon to be accompanied by death, so I’ll suck it up and deal with my side effects, all the while looking forward to August when I should be on the mend for real. I think August is going to become one of my favorite months.

The count down to a delicious night of sushi begins soon! Look out August here I come.