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So what is this "chemo" you speak of?

As I sit here in my post chemo haze I decided to write to you all and let you know what it is all about.

I normally go into the doctors between 9 and 10. Upon arrival they take my weight and then I go to one of the chemo chairs. My office is smaller so there are about 15 or so lazy boy type chairs lined up in the back of the office. Each chair has a side table attached to the chair on both sides. They first access my port, which involves them using a long hooked needle (kind of like a paperclip) with a long tube on it; they insert the needle into my port and flush it with saline. (For those of you who don’t know what my "port" is...Back in Jan they surgically inserted a soft gel like piece of plastic on the left side of my body near my collarbone, it is connected to a main artery. It allows easy access to administer the chemotherapy.) They then take some blood through the same port and check my blood work. They have to make sure my blood counts are good enough for me to get my chemo dosage. One they get the all clear on my blood they hook the tube coming out of my port to the first medication bag. Right now I get three pre-medications for nausea and to help avoid any reactions to the chemo. After they run the pre-meds they hook up the actual chemo bag to my line. All of the bags are run through a machine that pumps the medicine into my body at a chosen ml per hour. Once I am done they remove the needle and cover the pin prick sized hole with a bandage.

The whole process takes about 3 hours and I tend to talk a little bit during it, joke around with my lovely nurses and read gossip magazines.

Not too terrible of an experience, I am very comfortable during the process and am pretty used to it as I have been doing this since January.

Right now, about 3 hours after chemo I am starting to feel kind of crappy. It is a sickness feeling that I have never felt prior to chemo. I get very sluggish, like my limbs are heavy and feel kind of inconsolable. The good news...this feeling will pass over the next 3-5 hours and then it's just another chemo day completed.

So that’s chemo, if you have any questions feel free to ask away.

Later - R

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