Monday, May 17, 2021

May Health Update

It's been about a month since I last posted and my situation has improved substantially. I hesitate to say I'm completely back in action, but I'm in good spirits. It feels strange when people tell me they're surprised by how cheerful I am as I talk about the remainder of my treatment, because to me it's not really that I'm laughing in the face of danger so much as I've resigned myself to what needs to be done and I'm no longer dwelling on it.

I'm still on my feeding tube, and taking in an additional 350 calories a day that way to keep my weight up, but that's much better than it was. I was stuck at taking 700 liquid for a month and for a while I was really frustrated that I couldn't wean myself off a little more, but this past week I finally started gaining weight, so I lowered my intake.

Unfortunately my chemo treatment is probably starting again this week (pending my blood test results), so depending on how I feel, I might need to temporarily bolster my feedings. Chemo makes me nauseous, but on the bright side, the feeding tube goes straight into my gut so in a worst case scenario I don't need to worry about swallowing food.

The current plan is for eight weeks of chemo followed by six weeks of a hybrid chemo/radiation treatment to hopefully kill off any cancer cells that might not have been cut out during surgery. So I'm still going to be in treatment for another three and a half months. I'm not sure yet whether I'll get a break between chemo and chemo/rad. It's so far out I haven't asked.

Aside from that, my neuropathy issues following the surgery are improving. My oncologist said the nerves affected as the same as for carpal tunnel syndrome, so I started wearing a wrist brace to help it heal. I still can't feel temperature out of the first three fingers of my left hand, but the pain spikes are less now and in general my hand feels better when I wake up. Typing is still uncomfortable, but it's a not outright painful to use my left hand anymore.

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