new day, new drug

Well, I made it thru day one, and of course, the tingly fingers are back. I should learn to make friends with them, right?

Got another dose of sobering news today. The chemo drugs are not discriminating in their hunting down and killing of cells, so they not only kill cancer cells, but the hematocrit in your blood, your red cells and the ever important, disease fighting, white blood cells.

Once you get 'plugged in' at chemo, they first suck your blood out of the port and test your cell counts before they treat you. At a certain low cell count, they'll give you a 'chemo holiday', which is a week off, to allow you to regenerate more cells. Or, they'll lower your doseage. Neither are good options: both diminish your effectiveness of treatment.

Well, my white blood count is already low (not good for flu season). Just barely but low. So, rather than do either of the afformentioned options, they give you another drug. Oh, yes! , another drug. This one is a shot called Neulasta. I get it 24 hours after treatment and it supposedly stimulates your bone marrow- where your white (and all) blood cells are created, and hopefully more good cells get made. This all sounds well and good, but this shot does have a few side effects (of course) and is spendy (1000$ or more per shot...thanks, Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield). The main side effect is bone pain (heh, heh. he said 'bone'). I'm not thrilled about 'bone pain' (heh, heh heh heh), but guess I should be semi-happy to be getting another 'scrip for pain pills.

oh, well, another day, another drug.