A few weeks from hell but with a Happy Christmas ending!

As you all know I’m a pretty positive person but the last 4 weeks have been horrendous. Staying on treatment and not missing one is such a psychological roller coaster. Unfortunately I turned up for my day 8 second chemo, bloods were good but I had a temperature. I say a temperature, just 0.3 over! Temperatures on chemo are a no no so within 10 minutes I’m sat on a ward with IV antibiotics pumping into me. So after taking bloods etc they couldn’t find an infection and I was so frustrated but they still wouldn’t give it to me.

The next two weeks we’re a bit of a haze. I struggled with the effects of day 1 chemo, I was down in the dumps, I had gastritis, thrush, loads of tablets to take and I didn’t feel like I was getting anywhere. In the middle of it all I ended up for an evening in A&E after my vision started blurring and I was struggling to keep on my feet. After another drip of antibiotics and fluids they established I was dehydrated so easily remedied.

In amongst all this the port I had had fitted that was meant to make everything easier was not healing and I was in and out for gluing, steri strips, stitches etc. Finally the day they went to take it out it had healed!

So needlessly to say I became a bit despondent about everything. 

Chemo 3 day 1 knocked me so hard. I have never felt that bad after chemo. The thought of getting out of bed to go to the toilet was horrendous and it lasted about a week. I’d lost my Uncle Vince and was so upset as I couldn’t make his funeral. He was my inspiration for buying a property in Italy and like a second dad to me so it hurt that I couldn’t say a proper goodbye. Psychologically I’m not sure how I made it through that week but I did.

Next hurdle would I get my day 8 chemo. Bloods were fine and I was naughty and made sure my temperature was ok by taking a paracetamol (naughty but I had checked it and it was ok before I left the house). So I got my chemo which was a boost and then the day just got even better!

I had an appointment with my consultants second in command after chemo. I moaned about the horrendous weeks I’d had and we made a plan, changing medication etc. We’re chatting away and there’s a scan on the screen behind him. I didn’t want to look, thought it was my brain and could just see too many dots. The MRI brain scan was due the next day so I knew it wasn’t anything significant. But it was!

I’d had a pet ct scan of the rest of my body (neck down) about 10 days before and the results were in. The lump in my lung had decreased and the cancer was significantly less active. This was significant as I hadn’t had radiotherapy on my lung so this was the chemo working and because I have the same cancer in my head it must be doing the same up there too. HAPPY CHRISTMAS ME ❤️❤️❤️❤️

This buys me some more time, it’s not a cure but I’ll take it and then we’ve still got that next drug with the curative element so it’s all going to be good, I just know it.

Happy Christmas, love you all xx