A Joyful Farewell...

Warning: Keepin' it real folks, showing you a very unflattering close up of my "I've had too many drinks at the bar" eyes that resulted today from an acute reaction to one of my chemo drugs. 

“It looks like you just drank 4 shots of tequila in a bar”, said my oncologist. This was said after I had an acute allergic reaction to one of my two poisons-I mean chemotherapy drugs this morning while I was at the clinic. So basically what happened is after having only 20 cc’s of a chemotherapy called “Oxaliplatin,” I started to feel my mouth and tongue getting numb and my hands getting numb as well. Although I’ve had a reaction in the past with feeling my tongue get numb, nothing has been as quick and severe and accompanied by other symptoms like they were today. 

It's hard to tell but I was really RED. My cells were revolting today and officially called it quits with one of my chemo meds.

In addition to the numbness, I started to flush really badly, I looked like a lobster that had sat too long in the sun and I also became very warm. My hands became bright red, and my chest started to feel constricted. I’ve never in my life experienced an allergic reaction like this. Now I know why some of these drugs are exclusively given in an open room clinical setting with many nurses and medical personnel readily available should someone have this kind of reaction. 

As soon as I felt something was off, my first thought was, “did the manufacturer of this medication change?” (During cycle 3 they did change the manufacturer and I had a numb tongue for 4 weeks because of it…whole different story.) I looked up from my computer, called the nurse over and told her something was wrong. Immediately she stopped the IV (you can see me hooked up to the IV in the picture) and flushed the line with saline solution. Then they gave me benadryl and a fast acting steroid to counteract the reaction. Another nurse brought over an oxygen tank and quickly put the nasal cannula on. 

Shortly, my oncologist came in and checked out what was going on. The first thing she said with a laugh was that I looked like I had downed some hard liquor, {which is laughable given that I think I’ve had maybe one tiny sip of the stuff my whole life, and I've never had a drink in a bar; I'm so deprived, I say sarcastically}, because my eyes were completely blood shot too. The part where I call it a blessing is when my doctor said, “You’re done with oxyliplatin”. Halleluiah! I was so thrilled to hear those words! 

I’m down to only 1 chemo drug now and after this weekend, I’ll only have 3 more cycles to go. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and it feels good to only have to have one kind of chemo in my body. Thank you oxyliplatin for doing what you did for 8 cycles (16 weeks), you did a good job killing all of the cancer cells floating around in my body. I joyfully bid you farewell FOREVER.

God is Good ALL the time!

Debbie