Meeting the Red Devil

It’s 11:00am Monday morning, and as I lie here typing in my comfy recliner in the infusion room at Texas Oncology, the “red devil” is flowing into my veins. It’s actually a chemo drug called Adriamycin. Indeed, it’s bright red, and I was told that my pee would be too. I guess I’ll find out soon enough why they call it the devil.

I arrived here at 8:30am to get my blood drawn. They will do this before each treatment to make sure my white and red blood cell counts are in the normal range. Afterwards I met briefly with my oncologist to go over the treatment plan and any questions I had.

Next, it was on to the chemotherapy infusion room. While I waited for the Lidocaine cream to numb my bulging alien (the port catheter), a very nice nurse named Berta went over the possible side effects of the treatments. Among these are severe diarrhea, constipation, painful mouth sores, fingernails that won’t grow, nausea and vomiting, fatigue, nervous system changes, anemia, and bleeding. And of course, the inevitable loss of my nice thick hair! But wait, there’s more! There are also the side effects associated with a shot I’ll be getting tomorrow to help regenerate my white blood cells. The most common complaint is bone and joint pain that can range from mild to “holy s**t this hurts!!”

After hearing about all that scary stuff, the chemo was slowly pushed into my line. At that moment the tears welled up. It really hit me: Wow, I have CANCER, and a long journey ahead of me. I just pray that I don’t get all of those terrible side effects. My track record hasn’t been great; I seem to always get the side effects…. On the bright side, all of the chemo kids have been nice enough and the teachers (nurses) have been friendly (if you’re confused read the previous entry).

Yay, the nurse just came by to tell me “only 20 minutes to go.”