A New Normal

I know, I know, it's been a while. Consider it a good thing, generally speaking. For me, I have been trying like mad to get caught up at work so I have not had too much time to sit and type. For Nanc, she thinks she should be feeling better by now at 4 weeks since her last treatment.

So what about this "new normal" thing? I heard it said that living with cancer, no matter where you are with it in terms of your treatment, your recovery, your whatever, you have to get used to the devil sitting on your shoulder - you have to make friends with it...

I'll let that sink in for a minute - I had to think about it for a while when I first heard it.

Right now, Nancy's biggest battle is with the fatigue and the neuropathy. So what exactly is peripheral neuropathy?

"Peripheral neuropathy describes damage to the peripheral nervous system, the vast communications network that transmits information from the brain and spinal cord (the central nervous system) to every other part of the body. Peripheral nerves also send sensory information back to the brain and spinal cord, such as a message that the feet are cold or a finger is burned. Damage to the peripheral nervous system interferes with these vital connections. Like static on a telephone line, peripheral neuropathy distorts and sometimes interrupts messages between the brain and the rest of the body.

"Because every peripheral nerve has a highly specialized function in a specific part of the body, a wide array of symptoms can occur when nerves are damaged. Some people may experience temporary numbness, tingling, and pricking sensations (paresthesia), sensitivity to touch, or muscle weakness."

I think I've mentioned a couple of times before that Nanc has been experiencing this for quite some time. Sometimes she can't even pet the dogs because it feels so weird. The difference is that now it seems to have rocketed to some new dimension that makes it difficult to button shirts, put on a necklace or stand in one place without wobbling. Try walking without any feeling in your toes sometime...

That pretty much describes it. They can't predict when chemo therapy induced neuropathy will reverse itself. the time it takes varies widely from one person to another. So we've been in touch with the pain team in terms of the medication for it and we just doubled her dosage and will see how that goes for now.

And colder weather has a way of magnifying it quite a bit. Sunday was a chilly day by LA standards - maybe 60 - and she was in quite a bit of pain versus a day like today at 85 or so.

And the fatigue. I am almost jealous how she can sleep 12 hours at a clip. I haven't done that since staying up for 2 days straight many, many years ago. But each day lately, it seems to get just a tad better.

So anyway, we had an appointment at Cedars today for her first port flush. You need to access and flush the port so so it doesn't get clogged up. Kind of like an oil change which needs to get done once a month. We stopped by the infusion center and said hi to a few of the nurses. They all commented on how good she looked. So, no matter how she feels, the experts say she is looking very good....

I happen to agree with them.

xoxo