Life's Journey

It's been a nice break. I had three chemo free weeks and took the opportunity to take a fantastic trip to Hawaii. This last week I realized that I was really feeling like a person again. Feeling yucky had become my new normal but to actually be normal again was really nice. I had a few follow up appointments with my doctors during my break. The first was with Dr. Gordon - he is the experimental guru who was looking for clinical trials for me. He and I talked about my last scans in February. Because the scans looked so good he felt there wasn't a need for a clinical trial at this point and frankly I wouldn't be a good candidate for any of them. He made some suggestions about pulling back on my chemo treatment a little and would discuss with Dr Borst. He is staying on my team as a consultant for now and we can reconnect when the chemo stops working (which we know will eventually happen). I met with Dr. Borst when I got back from Hawaii. He agreed with Dr. Gordon and said the scans were such a good sign that we can try something new. So, we are starting something new this week. For the past 5 months I've been getting 3 week cycles of carboplatin and taxol. Starting this week I am getting 3 weeks cycles of just taxol - we are pulling out the carbo - and I'll get the 4th week off. We are going to do this for 4 months and then take a month off before having another scan. Our hope is that we can just keep things where they are.

Yesterday was the first treatment of this new protocol. It was tough to get up and go back to the drip drip drip of chemo. But, I put back on the boxing gloves and am ready to keep fighting. Honestly it was good to see the crew at the oncology office that holds my hand, gives me hugs, and genuinely takes such great care of me while I'm there. I've missed them over the past few weeks. And we are all hopeful in trying something new. As always we ran labs before starting chemo to see where my blood levels are… I guess a part of me thought with three weeks off I was going to get rockstar results. And while for me they were looking really good, these still weren't all in the normal ranges. Sigh. We are not scheduling neupogen (bone pain shots) for this week and keeping fingers crossed that by pulling out the carbo drug my levels will stay higher than before. Won't know until next week when we run labs again.

I did get a small reaction to yesterday's treatment. I started noticing that my arms were itchy. Then my legs started itching and before I knew it I was uncontrollably itchy all over. Itch itch scratch! Now I know what a dog with fleas feels like. Phew it was hard to handle. There were no hives or red skin and otherwise I was feeling ok. I couldn't take the itching anymore so I texted Super-Nurse Michele and she told me to take some Benedryl. After about an hour I started to get relief. I took a shower which also helped and went to bed. Today I'm feeling much better. Not sure what happened but hopefully it was a one time deal. Today is better than a usual post chemo day… hopefully the week stays pretty good. So, here's hoping that something new is a home run!

Hugs and Smiles,

Sarah