White Noise...

Sometimes a bit of white noise in the background is more comforting than silence. I haven't written in a week, through a week that had promised all sorts of challenge. I'm sure that some of you who check in regularly may be concerned. Don't be. All things are moving forward nicely... little to no problems. The major challenge is that a change to the anti-nausea drugs is making me very lethargic... down right sleepy, really. I am not sick. I am not spewing everywhere and everything as I did last time. We even seemed to have gotten the hiccups under control fairly early on, with the odd, gut-wrenching spasm at the esophagus/diaphragm barrier. Makes me wonder if I'm heading for a hiatus hernia...

So, I'm here, I'm good, and I'm tired.

I'll try to write detail tomorrow as the last of the anti-nausea drugs work their way through my system.

Hiccups are bad. Hate 'em.

The continuing fallout from chemo therapy seems to be centering around the hiccups that keep coming back and back and back. This morning, after radiation (by the way, they cut the eyes out of the Iron Maiden for me!) we waited to see Dr. Koski and her intern to see what can/should be done about the hiccups. They have become absolutely disruptive to everything... my sleeping, my eating, my drinking. (Hell, the whole chemo thing is devastating my drinking, not just the hiccups. I can't keep up with my scotch consumption... just kidding!) What happens is that I get sudden bout of gut shaking hiccups that goes on for three or four minutes. Then, after walking about, drinking cool water, and anything else I can think of, they'll subside. If I have taken meds lately, or had anything to eat, then it becomes a waiting game; will my system sudden toss it all?

New drugs are on the way... a little anti-psychotic called 'chlorpromazine-oral'. If they were to ever offer it to you, make sure you read the fine print. Its got some potentially nasty side effects that I personally don't want... and one that I might similar to Viagra. The warnings say 'in the unlikely event that you have a painful, prolonged erection (lasting more than 4 hours), stop using this drug'. Okay... four hours would be good, right? Not so sure about the 'painful' part though.

I'm also doing a bit of research on the nerve that may be causing all of this... I'm not sure that I got it right the last time...

What a disaster! By 7 PM last night I had vomited up absolutely everything in my system and was beginning to work on all of the accumulated fluids in my system... talk about a 'cleanse'! My urinary output was virtually Nil. I had also been hiccuping almost non-stop since noon. The 'almost non-stop' was for about half an hour after vomiting, then the damned hiccups would start again. My guts were sore, I hadn't been able to keep anything down, I was becoming dehydrated. So, after a number of consultations with the Cross (including a mid afternoon call with Nicola, the day's phone triage nurse, that did get a subtle change in the anti-nausea medications) we headed off to Sturgeon Hospital.

At midnight we finally made it home, after being given 3 litres of fluid to stave off dehydration and the potential kidney damage that cisplatin can cause. They also gave me a med to stop the hiccups, which it eventually did, and a big dose of the anti-nausea meds that I hadn't been able to keep down long enough for them to work.

I got home and slept for about 10 hours. I've had my morning pills, with an Ensure (meal replacement), and am sorta waiting for any reaction. Lunch is something that I very looking forward to, not because I'm hungry, but as a way post that says I'm starting to get the cisplatin under control.