Tough going.

I've now been for two rounds of chemo treatment (intravenous) and am working my way through the 168 tablets to consume during this cycle.  I counted how many pills I take in a day, 17 in total.  Over the course of the treatment that adds up to 2,208 tablets all in.  Shake me and I'll rattle!  Anyway, how is it going? In a word, tough.  In terms of side effects I'm doing alright at the moment only having to deal with the common ones, nothing too horrendous. The scary bit was the drop in the levels of white blood cells and haemoglobin, both now rock bottom in just a week!

What does that mean in real terms? Apparently, I will have little immune defence and anaemia. The latter causing me to get out of breath easily and constantly feel tired. Walking up the stairs now tires me out. Stannah stairlift here we come! If we can't get one of those it'll have to be a Sarah stairlift :) The drugs themselves wipe me out for days, let alone the added effect of being anaemic. There are adjustments in plan for the dosages and also injections to help with the white blood cell level and a blood transfusion to bring the haemoglobin level back up.

The frustrating thing is there is nothing that I can do to change the situation, the drugs are working as they should, which involves stopping production of while and red blood cells.  I do know that this is the collateral damage caused in targeting cancer cells.   It does seem to have hit me early though.

So, that's me, the first couple of treatments have 'kicked my ass'.  I thought I'd fare better to be honest. I'm feeling wiped out but positive that I'm on the right track.  As I've said to many people, 'it's a grind' and that's just what it is.  On the plus side my beard and guitar playing are coming on!



P.S.
As I've previously said I'm not looking for sympathy. Yes, it's shit but it could be a lot worse. I'm telling it how it is.  One day and pill at a time, I'm getting there 😉