A sleepy sweaty week

With the increased pain medication that I am on (not altogether working at times, like deep into the night) I am sleeping more during the day. I have always been one to feel the heat, and our humid conditions of late make for uncomfortable daytime sleeping. Generally I need a chance of whatever I have been sleeping on (including pillows) when I wake up. I also carry a small towel around with me to wipe myself down if I am up and about.
My blood work is still a little unstable in places, so another bloodiest next week then another visit to the specialist on Wednesday.
My daughter has settled in very well at her new school, and is enjoying it. There was some speculation amongst her and her friends a to weather their teacher was pregnant but no one wanted to ask the the teacher (for obvious reason). Their suspicions have now been confirmed though so she will be getting another teacher for much of the year, something that is quite a big event in an 11 year olds life.
My son is balancing a heavy school workload with a very heavy twice-daily rowing workload. There are not too many of us out there that could handle the types of loads these rowing boys are under. I have found myself helping him with Physics homework in the evening. Normally this would be stuff I would eat up but in my drugged state I have found it bit of a challenge at times. We get there in the end though.

The Battles Continue

I am still in a good head space since receiving the scan results. As someone wrote to me said, these small steps add up to make a big footprint. With my increased pain meds I am often sleepy and, whilst I am not getting really good sleeps at night, I do seem to be getting some nice morning sleeps, albeit rather sweaty ones. I find the current weather far too hot for me and I seem to be continually sweating. This is particularly so (and bad) when I lay down. My body has not yet adjusted to the increased dose of meds and I am often rather cloudy headed. In writing this blog I have noticed it and I am having to recorrect and modify a lot of what I have been typing. I am sure that I will adjust though, just like I have in the past.
There does not seem to be too much more to add. My back pain is not as bad as it was but I am getting some rather nasty pain in my rib area (everything is connected it seems to the back) and I have not yet gotten this under control. Other than that things are pretty settled (and some things are even improving, as the scan results showed).
I did receive some wonderful emails in the last week or so - thanks for those.

Scan Results Are In

The oncologist rang me yesterday afternoon to discuss the report on my scan results. If I recall correctly I had had a scan taken about 4 months ago which showed the disease had progressed significantly from a scan I had taken in July (6 weeks before I had started taking any medication). The latest scan results, when compared to the scan taken 4 months ago show that a number of things have improved. There are no new tumors anywhere I believe, and the tumours in my liver have remained unchanged. My spleen is almost back down to it's normal size and, if I recall correctly, the adrenal tumours have all but gone. There in no evidence of bone metastases (which means all the aches and pains I have been having in my back and shoulders are just a result of me staying horizontal for so long). To quote the oncologist, this is very good news. I had been finding it increasingly difficult not to think the worst in the last few weeks, what with the lack of energy and pain. The scan results have changed that and I have given me a well needed boost. I know there are lots of big hurdles yet to overcome (liver tumours need to start to shrink, the blood work needs to start improving) but at least some things are moving in the right direction, albeit rather slowly.

Another Weaker Week

The pain has continued, draining me of my energy. However, I am now on a stronger regime of pain medications and that seems to be doing the trick. Evidently my dosages are still quite low so that is good to know. With the reduction in pain I seem to have a bit more energy, but there are times when I just feel continuously drowsy - one of the side effects of the medication. This can make eg reading the newspaper hard as my eyelids seem to get heavy every paragraph or so.
No news on the scan results yet so we will just have to wait on those. My other blood work is mostly doing ok, although there are a couple of indicators that are a bit out of kilter with where they had been so these are going to be watched more carefully and regularly for the next little while.
Other than that things just move slowly along. I did get a couple of emails from friends telling me about there Xmas holidays or just what was going on in their lives. I found these very nice to read - thank you.

A Painful Week

The CT scan on Friday went smoothly. I managed to walk to everywhere I needed to get to but I did use the wheelchair for a seat at lunchtime and got wheeled a small distance in it (mostly by my daughter who thought it was good fun to push). It did take a little while to get the scan completed as they slipped in another patient ahead of me when I was all prepped to go. I don't ever recall getting so many different slice sequences taken or me having to raise my arms above my head before, but that is what happened. I expect to hear something about the results next week when I see the specialist.
Whilst I am no longer getting fevers I have been in quite a bit of pain, mostly in the evenings and morning. My shoulders, ribs and back have begun to really complain when I lie down a lot. I have had difficulty getting to sleep with the pain and wake up in the middle of the night feeling like I have sprained shoulder joints. It takes quite a while to settle down, even with extra pain medication. Not sure what can be done about this at all, but it is becoming a real problem when I can't even get rest when lying down. The scan should reveal if tumors are involved or not. Me, I think it is just because there is not enough of me and I sleep on my sides by preference. Time will tell but I hope this is a passing phase and somehow I figure out how to work around it.