Thursday, July 16, 2009

A Quick Update From Tina

Hi All! Thanks so much for the thoughts and prayers!
I'm doing much better today, and will hopefully come home tomorrow.
I've had such severe cramping that the doc (the oncologist) thought maybe I had a serious infection in the bowels, or maybe even a perferated bowel. There is some bacteria in both the colon and bladder, so I am on 2 different antibiotics, but they haven't found the more serious infection they were looking for. I had x-rays done on Tues., and they showed some distention, but nothing more serious. They are also giving me an iv anti-diarrheal med.--and even that has taken a few days to finally slow things down. We were all beginning to wonder if anything was ever going to work! I'm getting Percoset every 4 hours for the pain, and now I've also been taking anti-nausea meds--thanks to all the other meds, I think! The antibiotics are ones that can cause an upset tummy.
So, finally, with all these drugs, things are finally starting to feel better--no more urgent runs to the bathroom!!
I got to eat regular meals at lunch and supper; my first 4 meals here were all the same, except the broth--red jello, orange sherbet, cranberry juice and apple juice. You'd think they could at least vary it a little!
Monday I will start radiation again, and the pump with 5FU. I thought they were going to take me off of it (5FU)completely, but they will just modify it somehow so I don't get as much. I'll find out more about that tomorrow. My radiation was supposed to be done on July 30th, but now it will be extended for 4 days, to make up for the ones I missed this week.
My oncologist mentioned again that I seem to be very sensitive to these chemo drugs. I just hope that means its working well and the cancer cells don't have a chance of surviving!
I'm going to go walk around a bit with Rich now--take care!!
Love, Tina

3 comments:

  1. So glad to hear from you. Stay strong....

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  2. Very happy things are getting better for you!

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  3. I'd ask what he meant by "sensitive" to the chemo drugs. He may have meant they give you the more serious side effects however, I'm hoping he meant that the scans show your tumor is responding effectively to the chemo!

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