Hello!
This is an update blog for my cancer treatment in the past one month. As you can imagine, I haven’t been doing physically as well as I was in the early part of my treatment. Otherwise, I would have blogged way more often! In this blog I will go through the progress I have made addressing the disease, the different side-effects I have encountered (and which have debilitated me), and my condition today.
I got diagnosed on 14 April, and it has been nearly 2 and a 1/2 months into my treatment. In the first month of chemotherapy, I had a decent amount of energy and all of my previous entries are from that time. The second month was a difficult and dark period. I have managed to go past that period and recover some of my earlier energy in the last couple of weeks. Strangely enough, that difficult second month brought news of the complete remission of my cancer in the body and bone marrow. The cancer can no longer be detected in the brain, central nervous system and bloodstream. In the bone marrow, it has shrunk such that it cannot be detected by flow cytometry and doctors need more advanced instruments (genetic sequencing) to be able to find and measure the cancer. Many patients, perhaps even the majority, that reach such a point are gifted with more than a decade of productive life thereafter. Assuming I am part of this lucky cohort, I will be able to make something positive from this experience. Life often poetically delivers the good and the bad news juxtaposed with each other. While me and my family were receiving this good news pertaining to my cancer, we were grappling with a few major effects of chemotherapy.
First and foremost, I faced an episode of Delirium between 26 and 28 May. It is hard to express what I went through during the delirium. My mind was seeing and believing things un-anchored to reality. I had to be rushed to hospital, lost 4 kg of weight during the episode, and was also unable to walk those couple of days. I bounced back from this episode due to efforts of doctors, immediate family, and my friend Dr. Pranav. This episode was likely triggered due to a mix of sleep deprivation, anxiety about the development of side-effects from chemotherapy and the effects of the chemotherapy itself.
One early and long-lasting (few months) side-effect of chemotherapy I encounter is peripheral neuropathy. I feel that my hands and feet have become less sensitive. It often feels that the blood flow to these organs is lower than usual (whereas in reality everything is fine). Peripheral neuropathy stems from the damage some chemotherapy agents, like Vincristine, do to the motor neurons in the body. Exercising affected organs helps alleviate some of the symptoms, and my exercise regime does improve my symptoms in the feet. I haven’t yet found a good regimen to improve the neuropathy in my hands.
Muscle wasting and strength loss has been a constant companion. From the start of chemotherapy, I lost 12 kg at peak, and am currently 5 kg lighter. I regained most of the weight loss, and some of the strength loss, thanks to the nutrition and strength building efforts from my close family. Chemotherapy sessions have, multiple times, left me bedridden. During these more acute days of chemo, I sleep 15 hours a day and am able to keep up with only the bare minimum. There are also issues such as haemorrhoids, internal bleeding, headaches, loss of appetite and general malaise. Finally, one of the recent rounds of chemo may have mildly damaged my kidney function, and I will need special care to recover normal functioning in the next one month.
Through all the above, I have kept a positive attitude. I am learning to address these challenges. Over time (several months or a year), my body will be back to an energetic state. Already, I walk 2 km everyday, do sukshma yoga and breathing exercises. I am also able to participate in social life around me, and have started keeping up with friends again. I feel confident, and am truly grateful that I am in complete remission.
