Start of Round 3

OK lets get right to it, I have several updates for you.
First I lost my little assistant Dr. that was doing the fellowship at MUSC. Dr. Sharai has completed his two year program in this study and is moving on to another assignment. He is still at MUSC and still in the Cancer center, but not working with my case anymore. However he said he would be around and checking in on me periodically, and if I needed anything I could contact him. So it is just me and Dr. O’Brien for now. I do not know if he will be getting another understudy or not, at some point I am sure he will, but there is no telling when.

I went in Friday the 20th for my checkup and we decided to continue the Chemo treatments on schedule for probably 2 more months before doing a scan. At $750 after insurance, my cost, we do not want to hear that the results are unclear or unable to tell if there is a difference in the scans. The farther apart they are timed, the better the chance of getting readable, comparable results in the scan, whether good or bad, but at least it is not just a waste of money. So today (Monday the 30th of July) is my first treatment in round 3 of Chemo. One more to go after this.
During the visit I talked to him about my severely swollen feet. I look like Violet Bouregaurd from the shins down, this is the girl in Willy Wonka that turned into a blueberry. Except I am not blue. It is crazy, I can press down in the middle of my foot and leave an inch deep crater. Then it fills back in. It is like working with a balloon filled with play dough.

Anyway, he said that one of my blood levels, Albumin or something like that, is low and will make me experience the symptoms of diabetes.

Great!! I don’t have enough going on. So my body is laying the symptoms of diabetes on me for now. How fun. Do you think we can pile on some Crabs and Shingles too? I am just a little too comfortable, lets see if we can’t get some Scarlet Fever symptoms and maybe a slight touch of the Plague. I hear Scurvy is very popular this time of year.

I am getting a new shot today along with the 5 bags of whatever the hell they are pumping into me during these chemo treatments. It is a red cell booster shot. It works like the Nuelesta white cell booster they give me on Sunday mornings at the crack of dawn after a week of treatment, but this one is for red blood cells instead of white. This is the first time we are doing this. I did not think the red count was a problem, but it must have been a concern too.

This week I am having people from my office go with me for the treatments. Cindy starts her new position at work and is completely booked until Thursday. She will come Thursday and Friday with me and then spend the first part of next week being my nurse all day during the recovery session. So thanks to her new supervisor for giving her 2 half days and 2 full days off during her first 5 days in the department. She is really looking forward to moving to this new department after 10 years. She again has opportunity to learn new stuff and further her career. In her old job, she had risen about as far as possible, so this is a new ladder to climb.
I will be dead to the world next week so I will try to get another update out late this week to let you know how its going.

Thanks to all of you helping with the Google boycott. If they have a service you like and don’t know of an alternative let me know. I will direct you to someone who has the same or superior service they offer for free so you do not have to use them.

Closing thought: Money cannot buy class.

Love to all (except the bastards at Novartis and Google).
Greg