BEP Round 3 Day 4

6:35am O:5 P:4 N:6 T:4
Pretty bad start for the day, fingers hurt more than yesterday and using them is even worse.  Blowing my nose went from some light pink yesterday to full on  blood today.  I just tried not to blow my nose much.  Stomach is not happy but I expected that to happen by now, Thursday is the start of the down hill slip for many days.

9:35am O:4 P:4 N:5 T:6
Pre-meds down, taking a bit longer to kick in to push down the nausea... once they do I will try and eat something.  I have the old familiar feeling of "Starving, but can't stomach anything I want to eat".  However, we did an ice pack on my fingers and that really seemed to help they don't ache as much at rest and using them isn't as bad either.  Not sure how long it will last but its nice to have the relief while I have it.

12:00am O:2 P:2 N:3 T:7
Still very tired, benadryl is of course taking its toll. 2/3rds of the way through the Etoposide and overall I feel better.  Not great mind you but my fingers are better I guess from that cold compress I can pinch things between them and it only hurts it doesn't shoot fire through them and make me have to stop immediately so that's good.  We solved that Zofran issue with the insurance and they finally agreed to give me enough to last the rest of the week.  Blows me away that Insurance companies put up so much fight for things Drs prescribe for good reason!!  I ate a whole thing of zapped brown/wild rice.  Granted it had nothing on it, but just getting some calories into me made me feel better hopefully I can get something bigger in my stomach later today we have lots of iron rich things at the house I need to get in me to boost my Hemo/Red blood cells before Monday.

9:00pm O:5 P:1 N:4 T:7
So have been passing out off and off all day, just super drained the build up of 3 rounds of Chemo is really taking its toll on me that much is obvious.  I have been able to eat some here and there, not sure if I got 100% of the calories I should have today but my stomach is still not doing so hot.
I didn't get any work done, unfortunately aside from a few emails.  I can't really "think" clearly enough right now to focus on things.  My head hurts, and my body aches if I were to describe it I would say its a "Friday" feeling so that worries me about tomorrow.  After tomorrow I still have to live through the crappy fall out days of the weekend and next week as my body trys to come up and out of this onslaught of chemicals.  I haven't had any more blood from my nose tonight, and my fingers seem "better" I think the ice packing is helping at least for a temp solution.  Typing does inflame my fingers a bit though they are more sensitive and painful after typing for a few minutes like writing these blogs but its not too bad.

Sorry I didn't get a picture today but it wasn't a great day and I just forgot I will try and get a "Victory" one tomorrow over the last hell week (or at least my hope is that its the last hell week)

This is the comment I keep running over in my mind:
My AFP was 27, and my HCG was <1 which is amazing.  That shows the treatment is not only working but really whooping up on the cancer because that's lower than my projected half-life decay so it must really be doing great!  I am hoping that after this round all my numbers are down in the "normal" range and my PET/CT come out clear with either <1cm nodes or some dead scar tissue we can monitor.  Surveillance is the word I am looking for out of my Doctor and its the word I am hoping for as a result of all of this.  So I can focus on getting back to normal and not like I am right now.

Good night all, hopefully tomorrow holds no new surprises... and for work I am probably going to have to charge most of next week off to "Sick" time unfortunately but I will try my best to get up and running ASAP I put a lot of pride into my work (It is after all about returning mankind to Space flight!)  and it pains me to let things slip!

BEP Round 3 Day 3

Sorry I haven't posted yet, not feeling so hot today. Very tired and nausea has set in a day early. Also the pain in my fingers is worse and this morning blowing my nose had blood involved. I will update later with more details etc for now I need to relax and sleep
Here's a pic since I forgot yesterday :





6:30am O:2 P:2 N:4 T:4
Woke up this morning not feeling so hot overall, my fingers are hurting more than yesterday as well.  Seems like the nausea has set in a day early this round so that's not fun.  And of course I am tired because sleeping never fully recovers me once I get into this later stage portion of the hell week.


8:30am O:2 P:2 N:3 T:2
Here are the chemo center, fingers feel a bit better and just being up and about has taken down my tiredness a bit. I did have yet a new symptom this morning.  My Allegra hasn't been holding my allergies 100% at bay so I had some sniffle-y nose and coughing this morning, however when I blew my nose it had blood in it... and not just 1 time but like 6-8 times of blowing each time had blood in it something else to talk to the nurse about.  No headache though today so far which is good.


12:30pm O:2 P:1 N:3 T:6
I was knocked out by the Benadryl this morning, I couldn't fight it so I slept for at least 1.5 hours in the chair.  They re-ran my blood counts mostly just to check my platelets to make sure they weren't crashing (that can cause the blood coming out of my nose).  They were "normal" for me, in the 80s range which is low but that's what I have hung around at during chemo.  My WBC is still ok, but my red and hemoglobin is pretty low.  Dr. says not to worry too much about it since we have no baseline for comparison we have never drawn my blood MID hell week so there is no telling what the numbers mean.  Jenn and I are going to focus on some high iron/high vitamin C things (C helps you absorb iron) over the next few days until monday as much as I can since my stomach isnt' going to let me eat much.  If I drop below 8 on my hemo they will have to give me a transfusion which I really would rather NOT do.  All-in-all a fun day chemo wise, lots of things to keep us on our toes.  We are going to do some shopping and, while my blood counts are good WBC wise we are gonna grab a yummy burger from Ruggles Green which has great organic meats etc.  I will update later, but i think I am going to have to charge this day off to "sick time" cause I can't see me getting anything done.  I really really need to do something for a guy at work though before monday so I am going to try my best to do that at some point!!!


4:10pm O:1 P:3 N:2 T:2
Feeling much better overall, the food helped and I am gonna try and get lots of iron/vitiamin C over the next few days.  We picked up some supplies to that end, and we will be trying to boost my blood counts so I don't have to do a transfusion Monday.  The tiredness and nausea are mild but enough to make me not be of much use moving around doing things.  The pain is pretty bad in my fingers when I use them, though typing so far seems to be ok as long as I take light strokes and only type for 15-20 minutes at a time.  Afterwards they are a bit sore but otherwise not bad.  I am hoping the pain doesn't get much worse, doing simple daily tasks sucks with them like this.  Last round when my pinkies went numb from the Plat that went away by the end of the 2nd week so I am hoping this does the same thing!

BEP Round 3 Day 2

10:25am O:0 P:0 N:1 T:1
Today started off much better. I got 9.5 hours of sleep which helped a lot. Got some crappy traffic this morning but we still made it on time. Pre-meds done, and about to finish off the Platinum. So far doing ok side effect wise, I am starting to get some bad headaches over the last couple of weeks though nurse said to try aleve which I will, Norco always works but its such overkill Med wise. The "fun" of this round wont really start until Thursday if it keeps the same pattern as the last two.

3:05pm O:1 P:1 N:2 T:4
I am back home now, the drive makes it much more of a full day of chemo crud that it used to be.  I am drained, little bit a nausea but not bad and a slight headache.  I have been getting these headaches ranging from a 1->6 on the pain scale still not 100% sure what's going on with that could have been the nuepogen but I stopped taking that many days ago, nurse says it could be the zofran but I just started taking that yesterday who knows. Anyway back home, trying to get a little work done then relax a bit.  I would rather NOT take a nap because I want a full good nights sleep tonight. Sorry I didn't get a "chair pic" for you guys today it was a busy day and I was doing work/telecons from my chair and honestly it didn't even occur to me until after we left.  I will try and get them for the rest of the week though.

9:05pm O:1 P:1 N:0 T:2
I am not very tired, I fought the need for the afternoon nap so I could get a good nights sleep, however I am going to try and go to bed in the next 30 minutes or so.  I did have a couple more symptoms I wanted to let people know about.  Before I do that, I wanted to say my headache has been gone since about 5pm and hasn't come back so that's great.  However, I have some darkening of my joins in my hands on the top of them.  I tried to take a picture but it didn't come out very well.  The "worst" one feels kinda like a callous and its dark grey, I showed them to the nurse and she recommended some hand creme so that's what i am trying tonight.  The other symptom which just showed up tonight is on the tips of probably half my fingers.  I feel like they have a little any bite or a splinter is stuck in there.  If you rub them you can't feel anything but if you hit them just right it hurts, very odd since I thought a symptom of the Platinum was deadening of the fingers! HAHAHAHA.  I will mention it to the nurse tomorrow and see what she says.  Good night everyone, all-in-all not a bad day.. but the bad ones are coming =(

BEP Round 3 Day 1

9:00am O:0 P:0 N:0 T:3
So having to wake up at 5:45am to drive up here for chemo isn't all that fun, hence the tiredness rating.  However, its only for a week right.  I was a bit nervous and apprehensive about starting this week because I know full well what I am in for pain/discomfort wise and its not something I am looking forward to HA.

I have some amazing, awesome, super great (probably enough adjectives) news.  They pulled my tumor markers last Thursday and it takes a few days to get the results.  So I got them today and my HCG <1 which was expected since it was 9 three weeks ago and it decays very quickly.  The thing I was worried about was my AFP.  It started out of 2716 before my surgery (Which is quite high) and it was still 855 before I started chemo.  After the first round it only dropped down about half over the 3 week round.  That worried me because it could mean I still had quite a bit of active cells producing AFP, it could also mean they just gave off LOTS when they died which happens as well. That brings us to today, using my sheet I showed you guys last time to do the half life calculation it should have been at ~84.  I was hoping for at least 150, but really wanting it to be around 84 because that means NOTHING is actively producing markers and its decaying like it should.  Well I got the numbers back and its 27!!!!!!!  Its hard to express how happy that made me, that means in about ~11 days from that date my AFP will be in the NORMAL RANGE!   I wasn't feeling so hot this morning, tired, worried about how this week would go etc but that news made me very very happy.  Here is a pic of a print out of my numbers AND a picture of my reaction when I got them!

I will update later, we are doing the premeds.. then I have all Three today B, E, and P so it will be a long day of chemo fun but its working and that's the important thing!

2:15pm O:0 P:0 N:0 T:2
I didn't do any updates during the treatments because I was asleep HA.  I tried to do some work but the combination of me being tired to start with, then getting chemo, AND getting some benadryl for my reaction to the Etoposide meant I lasted about an hour or so then passed out for the rest of it.  It all went well though and I am back at home.  The trip is about an hour there in traffic in the morning and ~35 minutes back in the afternoon so that's not bad for a few more days.  I am still under the wonderful spell of the pre-meds they usually start giving out around 4-5 and are gone by 7pm.  But since its the first day I am hoping for a decent night.

9:15pm O:0 P:0 N:0 T:5
All-in-all it was a good day, I did some work (almost of full day) and I did some things around the house.  However, I am getting very tired now.  Since I have to wake up so early tomorrow, and every day this week I am going to call it an early night.  I did have an odd reaction though, after a hot shower it went away but my face broke out and my complexion got all crazy look here is a picture I am very confused:

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH just kidding of course I found that when I was unpacking thought it would be a funny picture :-P (I even have my glasses on) CYA tomorrow!

BEP Round 2 Day 18

Small update, I have a Dr's appointment today to redo my blood work and see where I am count wise.  I will update it later to let everyone know.  As for how I am feeling, these neupogen shots are really taking their toll on me this time.  I have had pretty bad headaches, hot/cold flashes, and overall body ache/flu like run down feeling from them.  Sorry for it being a short post but I feel cruddy.  I will update later.


4:30pm
UPDATE: So just got back from my Dr appointment.  Good news, my blood counts are all back up!  In fact my white blood cell count is about 5x the normal range HAHAHAH super immune system :-P.  I talked to my doctor about the headaches and body "flu-like" feeling etc and he said its because my white blood cell count is so high due to the nuepogen that my body is reacting like a have an infection.  The counts will balance back out to normal in a day or so and I will feel better.  I think I am going to pop in at work tomorrow just to say hi to everyone, and maybe sync up my computer with the server while I have this cell count!

Aside from that the Dr App went well, starting Round 3 next week and we are hoping that will be the end of it. We have PET/CT scheduled for after the round and we are going to check my nodes and check for active cells (ie PET) because EC has a tendency to leave scar tissue when it dies off which can cause fault positives if you are just going to be size and not activity.  There are more things we can do treatment wise, if we need to after that but I am not going to think about that yet.

BEP Round 2 Day 15

2:30pm O:0 P:0 N:0 T:0

So last day of Round 2!  Just bleo today, and blood work to make sure my white blood cells are cooperating.  I feel great honestly, if it wasn't' for the fact that i was sitting in a chemo chair having deadly chemicals pumped into my body right now I would say I am "normal" :-P

I organized the garage/house a bit yesterday while i was feeling good.  I know that next week is gonna hit me like a ton a bricks so I want to get as much done this week and weekend as I can.  I worked for several hours last night and many more today.  My goal, since its as new pay cycle, is to work 50+ hours this week while I am feeling good and that way I don't' have many hours left to try and cover next week as I descend into chemo HELL!.

I will update later with what my blood work says and if I have to do more yummy nuepogen shots, ttyl.

3:15pm O:0 P:0 N:0 T:0

Ok I am just blown away.  I got back my blood work, and .... Its amazing I am walking around.  Nearly every count is at its lowest its EVER been some by a factor of 10!, even my Red Blood cells and Hemoglobin are crashing and that has never happened. Those are low enough to where if they drop much more I am going to need a blood transfusion!!  I am not really sure what to say, most of them are in "Critical" range and the rest are either "Alert" or "Low".  I just don't' understand how my blood counts can be such trash, and I feel fine... best I have in weeks.

So I am on quarantine AGAIN, my doctor made me put on my mask IMMEDIATELY and I can't take it off until I get home.  We are still going to do my chemo today and finish off this round... and we are gonna do LOTS more nuepogen shots (nearly out of pain meds gonna need more of those) and I see my oncologist on Thursday so we are going to reassess then and see how much my body has recovered.

4:00pm O:0 P:0 N:0 T:0
Well i got my two shots for home then next two days, and gave my self one just a second ago; so we shall see if they can bring be back up out of the abyss by Thursday when I see my Dr.  Here is your chair pick of the day, nearly done for the day:

VICTORIOUS over Round 2 of BEP!  Even though my blood cell counts are in the trashcan right now we will get them back up.  The important thing is that I am DONE with Round 2!

BEP Round 2 Day 14

I wanted to let you all know "moving day" went well.  We got everything in 1 trip thanks to a 24' Uhal, two trucks and a trailer HA.  I did a little bit here and there but since my energy lasts for about 5 minutes at a time before I am wiped out for an hour or so, we had lots of help.  Jenn's parents and her sister's husband came to help.  I can't thank them enough there is no way we could have moved without them and I am going to have to think of some way of properly thanking them.  Jenn's sister's husband especially since he took on the tasks that happen on every move where it takes 150% of someone's energy to do X (move some crazy piece of furniture or lug something up stairs etc) and he put his all and then some into helping.  All-in-all the move went well, we have everything here at the house... now is the fun task of getting it all unpacked and actually usable. We had many instances of that wonderful "Crud we need thing Y, what box is it in? HAHAH"

As for chemo related issues, I did have a few instances of my bone pain coming back and I had a take a Norco about mid day since the Ibuprofen wasn't keeping it at bay.  Luckily I haven't had the fever issue this time I had last time on it, but I think its because I have kept up pretty well with the med doses to keep that issue "hidden". I am getting some rashes back again on my arms and legs (it happen last round too), the Dr said it was from the steroids they give me in the pre-meds but it really seems to have kicked up a bit since I started back on the nuepogen so it might be related to that.  Its not bad though and only mildy itches so its alright.

I do have more news on the insurance front, my first set of Nuepogen shots were basically ordered by my Dr from my insurance (they have to be specially approved) and then they just GAVE me ones they already had while they waited to get mine approved.  So my insurance had to call me today and get me to give them "verbal acceptance of the charges" because they were so much.  Luckily they were covered 80/20 so I only had to pay 20% of it but that was still ~$975!  And that's just for the shots they gave me this time, and I am going to need more so for those of you counting that's about $850 a shot.  I need ~3 more next week and probably another half a dozen for each round so yeah  I am going to have no problem maxing out my "out of pocket" medical for the year very very soon.

As for the rest of my symptoms I have been doing really well, I would say i am back to "normal" now from hell week.  That normal is in quotes because its really a new normal for chemo where I am still tired and I don't have any engery reserves but all-in-all I feel good.  I have been eating pretty well and my stomach is doing fine with it, my taste buds are still nearly dead so really only STRONG flavors get through but even regular stuff doesn't turn my stomach it just doesn't taste like much of anything.

Well  I have 1 more Bleo shot Monday and then Round 2 is officially DONE!  I am not looking forward to the hell week of Round 3 but, we will cross that in a weeks time I am going to try and enjoy this week's NOT feeling like horrible crap :-P  For those of you counting Round 3 might be my last one, we are going to do CT/PET/Blood work and see how well my tumors in my lymph nodes responded to the chemo... fingers crossed its all I need but we can do 1 more round (for a total of 4) to give it a bit more kick then there is the RPLND surgery but I really really don't' want to do that.  Anyway, not going to think about all those what-ifs yet we will cross those bridges when we get there!!