One down.... five to go

Yesterday I had my first chemo treatment. I wasn't sure what all to expect and overall it wasn't as bad as I had imagined. I did have one moment though when I first walked back to the infusion area and the nurse sat me down to check my vitals. I looked around and the tears just started. It was one of those moments where you realize why you're there. There's no fooling yourself that they're just running a test or giving you something just to be on the safe side and it's probably nothing. It's all real and way more serious than strep throat or an ear infection or anything else you've had. This is one of the biggies where you tell people and they look at you like they're afraid you might drop dead right in front of them. And they don't know what to say and you don't know what to say because you can barely get the words out yourself. But you feel fine, just like you felt before you ever knew anything was wrong even though you've probably had this for several years, all the while thinking you're perfectly healthy. And what else might be wrong with you, your husband or one of your kids that you just don't know about yet? So I cried.

Anyway, the nurse gave me a tissue and said they would put some Ativan (an anti-anxiety drug) in my IV first to help me. The funny thing is I have a prescription for that in my purse but I wasn't sure if it was okay for me to take one before going, so I didn't. Now I know.

After the Ativan they started my predrip with some nausea meds and a corticosteriod to head off a potential reaction to one of the chemo drugs, Taxotere. Then they started the Taxotere and I ended up having a reaction anyway towards the end. It was nothing major, my throat just got really itchy and I couldn't stop coughing. It's not uncommon for some people to have a reaction the first or second treatment, but after that your body adjusts so it probably won't happen again. They gave me some Benadryl, which made me very loopy, and the oncologist came over to check my breathing and heartbeat and it was all fine. He jokingly asked me why I decided to have a reaction and I mumbled something along the lines of not wanting to take the easy way out. Then I mostly slept through the other two drugs.

It all lasted about 3.5 hours and then Bob took me home where I pretty much slept off the Benedryl the rest of the afternoon and evening. Today my friend Amy, who lives down the street, came over and took Olivia and Jake for most of the day so I could rest (Thanks Amy!). Overall I'm doing pretty well. The nausea meds seem to be working so I haven't been sick. I just mainly feel a little blah and run-down.

On a side note, when they put my port in last week I joked to Bob that I felt like I now have one of those jacks that Neo had to plug him into the matrix. And one of my chemo drugs, the Adriamycin, is bright red. So now I guess I can say I took the red bag and we're seeing how deep rabbit hole goes!