Post Chemo Cycle 6, Round 1 (side effects cont.)

Before jumping into this reading, please see short survey to the right of this posting and the blog introduction added on August 12 2007.

I was a bit pre-mature in my last posting about calling this chemo round side effects a success. I avoided the headache, but have had no more than a few hours of sleep due to general discomfort, neck and jaw pain from severe muscle tightness, and anxiety that the cancer has returned (due to throat soreness) during the past 2 nights. I have taken extra pain and anxiety medicines which have generally worked in the past but not this time. It is now 5:00 AM Sunday and I’m wide awake. I finally fell asleep at 2:00 AM, but woke up at 3:30 AM and then went back to sleep for about 30 minutes. It was pretty much the same way the night before. My mind is split between my friend who fought breast cancer for 8 years until succumbing to the disease earlier this year (wondering whether or not the long fight was worth it), thinking about trying to raise money for the Head and Neck Research lab at my hospital via a golf tournament (a huge undertaking when thinking about a big event), trying not to disrupt my family's life more than I already have (e.g., not waking up my spouse while I can’t sleep – she worries about me), worrying if I can take a short trip within chemo cycle #7 in early September for a relatives birthday/visit with a long term friend, and reading a non-fiction book about Theodore Roosevelt, “The River of Doubt.” I finished my last Michael Connolly book, “Trunk Music,” yesterday. The Connolly book was good with a few surprise twists toward the end.

This blog gives me some comfort in that it will help me remember via documentation how I felt at different points in time. I think it may also give those close to me some better insight into my moodiness and lack of wanting to communicate with them. If I can’t say something positive, I’d rather be mute on the subject. That's just my way of dealing with things. As a reminder, I'm not complaining about any of this (that's not my style), I'm just documenting how I feel. With that, I’m signing off and will probably read a bit more, so please take care.