(5) It begins

Tuesday 12th of March - Chemo day

My partner and his mum took me in for chemo. I was pretty scared. We stopped in to the cancer society before the appointment to sort out car parking, and the wonderful lady helped me put the numbing cream on my port. Numbing cream is life.

I met with an oncologist first, and we had a brief talk about how everything was going. Then I was taken to be weighed (every time - I hate it!), and time for chemo.

For my first session I was given a private room with a bed, which was so great. The usual is in a seat in a row of lazy boy chairs. The nurses were all wonderful. They popped in the port needle and started me up on the hydration packs. Then we realised I had a temperature and had to stop everything and take lots of blood samples and weird nose samples. But luckily I was allowed to continue.

So they pumped me full of the 'good' poison and I sat and watched the chase on tv with my family. It felt really weird. And by the end of it I was ready to go home. The car ride home I felt mostly ok. It kind of feels like when you are getting tipsy and your eyes don't quite catch up with where your body is. At least that's how I feel it anyways. But I went home, was able to eat dinner, and headed off to bed.

The first 4 rounds of chemo are called A/C. I get this every 3 weeks It is a combination of two drugs: doxorubicin (also called Adriamycin) and cyclophosphamide. Doxorubicin is also nick-named the red devil.

Side effects of this chemo include:

Feeling sick, loss of appetite, red urine, mouth sores, hair falling out, high risk of infection, diarrhoea or constipation, tiredness and fatigue, changes to nails and skin, sore eyes, headaches, and the list goes on. If my temperature goes above 37.5 degrees, I have to go straight to hospital.

Thankfully modern medicine means I have 50,000 nausea drugs to help combat the sick.

The next day I felt pretty shite. It's like a hangover but not. Your body is exhausted for no reason, you can taste and smell the chemicals. It's in your wee (toilet lid has to stay closed after flushing cause poison), it's in your sweat. It is everywhere. But I was happy the first one was over. 24 hours after chemo, a nurse comes to the house to give me an injection. This is so important to help boost my white blood cell count. They go in my belly and sting like heck, but worth it to help fight infection. I was told I will probably feel some bone pain the next day.

Thursday was definitely the worst day of the chemo cycle. My legs ached, I didn't want to move, I didn't want to eat, and I didn't want to take any of my drugs. Just the idea of them made me want to throw up everywhere. So I sit at home and do nothing and feel a bit sad.

16th of March. Pony day and head shaving day. I was finally allowed out of house arrest and went to see my demon goat horse and amazing friend. She had volunteered to shave my head! I knew my hair could fall out pretty much at any time (though 14 days after chemo was most common), but I just wanted it gone. My friend helped me have an incredible ride on my horse, took me for a little hack up the road, and then bye bye hair! We shaved it to a number 4, as recommended for ease of the rest of it falling out naturally. It was the strangest feeling, but wasn't as awful as I thought it would be. I am so lucky to have a friend like her.

On Sunday I headed into hospital as my port scar had opened up, and I didn't want to risk an infection. 7-12 days after chemo is the most at risk time, so I was glad to get it sorted. After a wee wait, a doctor came and glued me up and sent me on my way.