Skiing Soon!

This weekend is my friend Dave's stag and we've got chalets booked in Banff for a weekend of skiing and relaxing. I'm so excited to get back out on the slopes. I'm planning on trying to ski on all of my "good" weekends, so every other weekend. Hopefully 15 days this year!

I've got a bit of a sore throat right now. I went to the doctor this morning and he did a throat swab and prescribed me some penicillin. We don't know if it's strep throat or just chemo pains, but he said it's better to overmedicate in my case. It could be pretty bad if I get sick as I don't have the greatest immune system now.

Other than that I'm feeling good and excited for the weekend!

5/12

Number 5 is now past me. It was a pretty bad start, I normally don't have any trouble getting the IV in and this time took 5 tries between 3 nurses. I'm so tracked up I look like a junkie. I normally don't start feeling sick until later that night or the next morning and this time I felt sick from the second it started flowing too. Today has been par for the course though, not too bad. The weather is getting nice here so hopefully I'll get outside for a bit soon. I need to enjoy the last couple good days before winter sets in!

Pain Day

Days 5-8 of each cycle are days that I get my Neupogen injections. They stimulate your bone marrow to produce more white blood cells. This causes the bone marrow to expand and on day 9, today, it is at it's peak. It hurts the most in my hips because that is where you have the most bone marrow. I brought my bottle of Tylenol into work today and it's sitting beside me.

I guess it's kind of fitting that it's happening on Rememberance Day this time. I hope you all take the time to remember those who fought for us so long ago. We live in the best country in the world, and I'm sure without them it would be quite different today.

Good News Finally!

I just got back from my appointment at the hospital.

- My white blood cell counts are up to a decent level so I won't need to increase the number of Neupogen shots any more. They will remain at 4 per treatment (days 5, 6, 7, 8).

- My lung test shows that I have 130% of normal capacity, well above average, but I told him that I'm feeling quite a bit better without the Bleo in the last treatment. Even though I still have good lungs, I know that they were much better before chemo. He's decided to withold the Bleo for the rest so I think my lungs might be fine and scuba diving might happen again!

- My liver is clean! This means that it was a cancerous tumor and that the chemo has killed it all off. This is great news because it means the chemo is working and that I didn't have any other liver issues!

4th chemo is going to happen tomorrow and I'm happy now that I know that everything is going well. One third done after this one!