Yes baby, chemo sucks

I have now discovered that the second round of chemo is vastly different from the first round. I had some serious reactions after my toxic doses of chemotherapy yesterday, which included the red syringe of death and vincristine. I had full grade nausea, unable to be controlled even with two doses of my anti-nausea medication and its backup counterpart (zofran and compazine for the medically-minded). I was, however, managing to keep things relatively under control until around 8pm, when I started getting some tingles and pinpricks in my hands. Soon enough, the tiny needles radiated from my hands to my arms. From my feet to my legs. And then from my chest to my face. It's like when your leg falls asleep, and you're stuck at that point where your skin is crawling with pricks just waiting for the blood to rush back in and provide some relief. Except it never does.

I felt bad.

So naturally, I conduct a little research, and find that vincristine (a chemo drug as toxic as the red syringe of death, albeit less painful at the time of infusion), caused peripheral neuropathy. What? I know about peripheral neuropathy. I encountered cases as a medical malpractice defense attorney where plaintiffs suffered from peripheral neuropathy as an unintended but fully disclosed complication. It's when the nerves in your hands, arms, or legs go numb. It is usually temporary, but can sometimes be permanent, causing lasting damage to your nerves. I started to panic. For every prick in my hands, my feet, my arms, my legs, my face, I wondered -- could that be a place where I lost feeling?

I had excused myself to go to bed earlier in the evening, so I had been upstairs while Joe and my sister remained awake downstairs. I texted them, "My hands, arms and feet are numb. I have peripheral neuropathy."

I hear Catherine and Joe speaking in muffled voices. Slowly, I hear Joe's slow, deliberate steps trudging up the stairs, down the hall, and he finally enters our dark bedroom. "I have peripheral neuropathy," I say, trying to keep the panic from my voice. Knowing me as well as he does, he already knew from my text that I was panicking.

"Well," he says, in his calm, doctor voice which, by the way, always seems to rile me up. "What makes you say that? What are your symptoms?" he asks softly.

I try to keep the irritation out of my voice. "I have numbness from my hands radiating up my arms, my feet up my legs, and am starting to have numbness in my chest and face as well. I looked it up, and I have peripheral neuropathy," I said, crossly. I was nauseous, and feeling terrible inside and out. It almost seemed like I could feel the poison building up in my body. Why was he so exasperatingly calm?

He switched on the lamp. "Ok, your symptoms don't present as peripheral neuropathy. It sounds more like paresthesia, with the pinpricks, rather than loss of feeling in the fingers and feet. But, let's look it up," he says in that same calm voice.

I grab my phone and start looking up paresthesia myself. I quickly read through the search results. "It looks like paresthesia is a form of peripheral neuropathy," I say impatiently.

Joe is quietly and methodically reading through his own search results, and wisely ignores me.  I am a faster reader by far, but he is a more deliberate one. "Honey," he finally says, "you have paresthesia, and it most likely temporary. Do you want to call the nurse at the hospital and see what they can do?" he asks.

"Well, what can they do? Is there a medication they can give me?"

"You can take glutamine, 500 mg a day to help with the symptoms. You can pick some up at GNC tomorrow. But make sure you clear it with the doctor when you go in for chemo."

"It says it can be permanent," I whisper, scared. I'm suddenly glad that he is so calm and knowledgeable.

"Babe, it happens to abut 50% of chemo patients, and sometimes it is permanent. But that is really rare," he says, moving in to hold me.

"How do you know all of this?" I ask sadly. "You are kind of amazing."

"When the colorectal cancer patients go through chemo, a lot of them have paresthesia as well, and it usually does resolve. Just give it some time."

"Okay. I feel so badly. I am so nauseous, and I can't sleep because of the paresthesia," I murmur, miserable.  "Chemo sucks."

"Yes, baby. Chemo sucks." He continued to hold me as the pricks traveled up and down my body. We lay together, hoping the chemo causing all this pain will be the same chemo to cure my cancer.