Here's a good example. I am currently in week 2 of Cycle 16 of a Phase I Clinical Trial - full on guinea pig mode, in other words. So, I've just passed my one-year anniversary taking a drug that noone knows much about, including whether or not it can help my disease, or what its really doing to the rest of my body. This is my first Phase I clinical trial, and so far the results are better than anything we've tried in the previous 4 years. I have had a couple of god-awful surgeries that were also successful in that they have reduced my tumor load so that I have a better change of outwitting what's left, but that's another story. The point is that the guinea pig is doing pretty good right now, traveling out to Houston every 3 weeks, give or take, to see what's what.
The drug, called AZD6244, does appear to have stunned my cancer, making it difficult for it to further its attack on me. I call it the Shock and Awe drug. Not only is it shocking my cancer, it is shocking my tissues, who really haven't figured out a way to deal with it either. My tissues are apparently afraid to let go of something they feel may be saving their life. So they are retaining all of the fluid that the drugs are helping to generate - over the course of the year, this has amounted to approximately 40 pounds of fluid, which my tissues like, but none of the rest of me does - not my heart, my kidneys, my self-image, my joints, my poor clothes, my poor husband, noone wants that fluid around.
I will admit that my wonder dog doesn't mind it - she is still just as happy to see me when she gets up, and just as happy to race down the driveway to the mailbox - just as happy to be right next to wherever I am - its safe to say that she could give a rat's ass if I'm walking around with 40 pounds of extra fluid. She still sees me as me.
The rest of us, though, would like it to evaporate, to sweat itself out, and/or otherwise get discharged in the traditional way. There are days I feel like I could just stick a pin in my arm, and it would be like popping a water balloon. My tissues are so selfish with "their" precious, that they just hold onto it. They won't let it seep upward through my pores so my skin remains very dry and itchy, my nasal passages remain very dry and bloody, and my fingertips and heels are constantly cracked, making it hurt to do many of the things you do with your hands and your feet.
Water water everywhere and not a drop that's of any use whatsoever to me. Except of course if those fluids are in fact drowning the cancer, contributing to its confusion, its inability to fight back. I suppose then I become a little more inclined not to hate those 40 lbs, but when you've been an athlete your whole entire life, and it stands in the way of who you used to be, as a constant reminder than your life is changed forevermore, and you may never be able to complete a triathlon again - well, its just one more thing that's different about you. One more piece of you that made you who you were - a triathlete - that might not be coming back.
Cancer is really not for sissies.
The drug, called AZD6244, does appear to have stunned my cancer, making it difficult for it to further its attack on me. I call it the Shock and Awe drug. Not only is it shocking my cancer, it is shocking my tissues, who really haven't figured out a way to deal with it either. My tissues are apparently afraid to let go of something they feel may be saving their life. So they are retaining all of the fluid that the drugs are helping to generate - over the course of the year, this has amounted to approximately 40 pounds of fluid, which my tissues like, but none of the rest of me does - not my heart, my kidneys, my self-image, my joints, my poor clothes, my poor husband, noone wants that fluid around.
I will admit that my wonder dog doesn't mind it - she is still just as happy to see me when she gets up, and just as happy to race down the driveway to the mailbox - just as happy to be right next to wherever I am - its safe to say that she could give a rat's ass if I'm walking around with 40 pounds of extra fluid. She still sees me as me.
The rest of us, though, would like it to evaporate, to sweat itself out, and/or otherwise get discharged in the traditional way. There are days I feel like I could just stick a pin in my arm, and it would be like popping a water balloon. My tissues are so selfish with "their" precious, that they just hold onto it. They won't let it seep upward through my pores so my skin remains very dry and itchy, my nasal passages remain very dry and bloody, and my fingertips and heels are constantly cracked, making it hurt to do many of the things you do with your hands and your feet.
Water water everywhere and not a drop that's of any use whatsoever to me. Except of course if those fluids are in fact drowning the cancer, contributing to its confusion, its inability to fight back. I suppose then I become a little more inclined not to hate those 40 lbs, but when you've been an athlete your whole entire life, and it stands in the way of who you used to be, as a constant reminder than your life is changed forevermore, and you may never be able to complete a triathlon again - well, its just one more thing that's different about you. One more piece of you that made you who you were - a triathlete - that might not be coming back.
Cancer is really not for sissies.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment