#cancercomedy

I’m spending the last few weeks of summer at the lake (where my dad and Kim live) in their newly renovated guest house. This tiny middle of nowhere patch of the country, that we lovingly refer to as Pennsyltucky, has been my happy place since I was born and now that I have a little house of my own when I visit makes me feel like a god damn boonies queen! I spend my mornings with coffee on the deck, days working, sneaking out for paddle board trips around the lake, hang with my parents, cousin and friends at nights and on weekends. It’s calm and peaceful when you need to take a deep breath and fun and rowdy when don’t. Since I’m unfortunately tied to MSK every 2 weeks for years to come, it’s harder to visit for extended stays, but Dad and Kim have gotten pretty good at the 24 hour NYC trips (thank you!), so like normal, last week we hopped in the truck and drove back to NYC for my standard line-up of chemo appointments. 

It’s hard to explain the patient doctor relationship in the oncology world. They are life saving rock stars who are honestly intimidating but you still need to advocate for yourself and ask all of your questions, however annoying they may be. I’m constantly in-between feeling nervous and a little shy, not wanting to waste any of her time while also trying to be memorable and make her love me so she works extra hard at keeping me alive, haha. I decided that with 2 weeks left of summer and a scan in my pocket that I surmised as pretty good, I would ask for 1 more round of the 5FU. I would get whatever harsh shit they wanted me to next time but just let me have 1 more round of the gentle stuff and finish hot girl gentle chemo summer out strong. It hilarious how much asking this makes you feel like a child again. Fortunately my doc was more than on board (that’s definitely what she was going to do anyway). Never in my life did I think I would celebrate getting a specific type of chemo but celebrate I did. The team agreed that my scans were great and ordered a few more for next time. An MRI, which honestly I completely forget why I am getting this, (it happens sometimes, they say a lot in those appointments and some of it is left behind on the cutting room floor as they say) and a PET scan which will show cancer activity. Apparently even though some of my liver mets haven’t shrunk, there is a chance there is little to no cancer activity left. Also if my liver mets continue to shrink, another surgery might be around the corner to get them out. The mention of surgery gave me the visceral reaction of stepping backwards and saying “no” out loud but that’s just the trauma speaking! We’ll squash her down when the time comes and deal with it later! Or never! JK, I know surgery is an amazing next step but I can’t say I’m looking forward to it. 

We drove back to the lake in a Hurricane (hindsight is really 20/20 on that one) and I finished my chemo out there. Kim disconnected me on Friday morning, gave me my white blood cell booster injection and I was free for 10 days of no work (took some vacation) and no doctor appointments. Other than some serious post injection bone rattlin’, I’m a super happy camper. 

Sure enough, a few minutes into the oxali drip, I sat up in my chair with shooting pain up and down my back. I probably looked like I was having a seizure as my body convulsed every second to the pain and I couldn’t keep my head up. The nurses ran in, took out my oxali line, pushed anti-nausea meds and more Benadryl and called for an NP. I started dry heaving and went into rigors. I was shaking and dripping sweat and my throat felt fuzzy and foreign, like it wasn’t a part of my body. However, I could breath in and out of my nose and I knew that if I remained calm and focused on my breathing, the meds would kick in in a few minutes and things would be fine. They had an epipen and push of pain meds ready to rock but I asked them to wait because I felt so fucked up from the Benadryl, I couldn’t imagine putting more medicine in me. Sure enough, a few minutes later, sweet relief. I couldn’t really talk and had no motor functions at that point so the nurses let me sleep if off. They woke me up an hour later and I said I was ready to get the fuck home. They were so freaking sweet, even offered to run across the street to Starbucks so I didn’t fall asleep in the Uber home but I felt confident I could get home fine. I did, and spent the rest of the day in bed, loopy as all get out, trying to take in everything that had just happened to me.

As FOLFOX is still such a good chemo, they want to try again, but this time, give me the drip over 8+ hours so see if only little bits at a time will prevent another allergic reaction.