- FOL– Folinic acid (leucovorin)
- F – Fluorouracil (5-FU)
- OX – Oxaliplatin (Eloxatin)
The fatigue is still significant. If I try to go without at least eight hours of sleep, there's no chance I'll make it through my day without being exhausted. If I do get eight of sleep, I still even then feel exhausted by the end of the day. In any given moment I may have lots of energy, feeling and appearing to be fine, but it feels like I still have a long way to go.
The neuropathy in my hands & feet is still quite significant. I feel very little in my finger tips and the skin feels very tight and tingles to the touch. The soles of my feet feel numb and tingle all the time. When I walk or stand, my feet feel like I standing on round rocks covered with cotton balls. To walk and stand, feels very strange.
Also, my alkaline phosphate count is still higher than normal. This would go up whenever I received Floxuridine (the liver pump chemo). However, I am not experiencing side-effects from the count being higher. I'm just being kind to my liver as it heals.
On a personal note, I no longer feel like the person I was two years ago. The person I see in the mirror looks strange at times. And when I'm in a lot of emotional pain, as I am from time to time, it truly feels like I am dreaming. I have to remind myself that people will not stop behaving in ways that occur to me as selfish or unkind, simply because of my circumstances. People's humanness continues. We are all still managing our lives, to the best of our ability, whether it actually works or not.
So, my life looks very little like it did two years ago. Completely rebuilding my life while also undergoing a huge surgery, then seven months of chemotherapy, has had a powerful impact on me. I am definitely far more passionate than I have ever been, yet I no longer have much tolerance for people's angry outbursts. And that has a lot to do with how I still feel quite "raw" from the last two years. My nerves still feel exposed. People yelling and/or being unkind when they are angry used to be something I tolerated. Something I considered acceptable if within reason. Not anymore. Of course I still get upset now and again. I don't raise my voice much. If necessary, I prefer to just end a dialogue at this point. Selfish...maybe. But with the possibility of limited physical existence, self-preservation, emotionally & physically, is a higher priority to me than it's ever been. I do my best to be good. Maybe not always nice, but good.
And now I'm a single father, two time cancer survivor, scraping along financially, with a high probability of recurrence. I actually feel quite 'single' after that mouthful. I once told a buddy, when I was in the thick of it all, I should start a dating site for people whose lives are train wrecks. But the criteria would have to be "as bad as Bert's life or worse." Can you imagine some of those profiles?!?!?! Ha-ha-ha! We laughed hard playing off of that one for a while. Fortunately some of the wreckage in my life has been tidied up a bit. At least the cancer appears to be gone. And in all honesty, my prayers are with anyone who is in a terrible situation. I laugh at my situation. No one elses.
Plus, I love plenty about my life. It's just some of the circumstances I prefer to do without. But don't we all.
On that note, people will sometimes try to play down the reality of my situation and say, "Anyone could get hit by a bus and die tomorrow." But a wonderful friend of mine with a hell of a cancer diagnosis responded to that by saying, "True we can all get hit by a bus tomorrow and die, but the buses in my neighborhood drive really fast and there's LOTS of 'em!" I thought that was an hysterical analogy. Great image, too!
On a good note, I love the kids more than ever, my music provides me endless joy, I'm learning many new things, and my friends are more dear to me than ever. A lot of other things are much different than they were a couple of years ago. And some things very much remain the same.
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