Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

Note:In the rush to set up this Blog I had inadvertently "restricted" comments to the Blog. The oversight have now been rectified...apologies that some had to resort to sending e-mails instead.

Syukur Alhamdullillah to the mighty God that I had survived my first day of chemo. On the way to the medical center I received a text message with an inspiring short poem from a friend who had gone through similar :

I lost a breast, but I live
Chemo makes me sick @times, but I live
RT blistered my skin, but I live
Cry if you must,
But cry for the Joy of another day.

Thanks, NJ. That really helped me to put in perspective what I was about to do. I was really "hiba" the night before and again after morning prayers. I was unable to receive phone calls as I choked on my words. I calmed down on the way to the medical center after reading your short but meaningful words of encouragement.

Everything ran like clockwork upon arrival. This was a plus point as waiting can make a patient (especially one like me) all anxious and antsy. I registered upon arrival at 9am, saw the Oncologist at 9.30 for last minute clarifications and questions and was in the Chemo Day Care Room by 10.

SNA, a good friend , and my brother accompanied me to the room. Thoughts of being sentenced to a gas chamber crossed my mind but the welcoming smiles of the onco nurses blotted out my untimely creative imagination. I selected a couch that faced the waiting guest sitting area so that I can see and run hand signals if necesary to SNA and my brother. I made myself comfortable, bearing in mind I will be seated for a couple of hours. Soon as I got comfortable, I got the urge to wee! Bummer! The Washrooms in the old wing of this medical center are not as conveniently located like in the new wing. I had a long way to walk and reminded myself to provide feedback that a nice little washroom within the Chemo Day Care area wouldn't be a bad idea. Especially when one has an attachments on one's wrist.

At 10, the nurse began by looking for a "nice" vein to insert the needle . She selected one. Looking back, that was the worst part of the whole procedure, that gentle but firm prick which I dread everytime I had to get a blood test done. She began by administering some anti-nausea and anti-vomitting medication, at the same time running a saline drip into me. I felt a prickly sensation in all my extremities that was not unlike the feel of static electricity, but it passed after a few seconds.

I rested for half an-hour later. When I saw the nurse donning a disposable protective coverall, gloves, a face mask and visor it reminded me of some sci-fi movie and again had a chill in my tummy remembering what was going to be pumped into me. I remembered a certain world leader who was desperate to locate WMDs in Iraq. Well, if he is still looking, he will not be disappointed if he were to send his missives into my blood stream now. The nurse had protective gloves on and came to my couch with a surgical steel tray . It contained syringes containing the WMDs that will be zapping any cancer cells in my body, and along with it some collateral damage among my good cells as well.

Well, win some, lose some I thought. I prayed hard that with proper management of diet, rest and heaps of positive attitude, the bad cells will be exterminated and that many good cells will be spared. I also prayed hard that those involved in cancer research will soon come up with better and friendlier chemo drugs that may even be sought after the way everyone is seeking for Botox shots now. Well, who knows.

At 11, the nurse sat beside me and arranged the syringes in the order that she would inject them into my vein. The first to be fed to me was the rather attractive looking red coloured Epirubicin. My face was scrunched up in anticipation of perhaps a chili-hot flow into my vein, but thankfully it was nothing. The other 2 drugs Fluororacil and Endoxan(Cytoxan) were as uneventful. I now felt rather embarassed at being so flustered before going into the Chemo Room. I was given to suck a cupful of ice cubes to relief any hot or burning sensation in my mouth.

We were done by 11.30 or so and I had half an hour of rest. I nibbled on some cream crackers and realised that the first outcome was that my fears of the procedure had all but dissolved. I will need to manage what happens next when the drugs take their hold once they start coursing through my body. I also decided that I need not admit myself this time and would prefer to go home and be among familiar surroundings.

That was what I did. We had lunch on the way back at Ms Read BV1 . I chose a healthful one, mixed grilled vegetable on a bed of pesto on a multigrain slice. I felt fine and could have continued shopping for more stuff to support me during the upcoming period of depressed appetite. But we bumped into my Surgeon who reminded me I should be at home resting.

She was of course right! Luckily I was at home when the nausea began to hit me. I tried to contain the feeling by reclining on the sofa, feeling seasick like hell, and any small movement felt like I was being rocked about in a ship in the middle of a storm. For 3 hours I remained on the sofa, visualising myself floating leisurely in the middle of a pool at night, with the stars twinkling above me.

Maybe the stars were twinkling too brightly! The urge to retch was so strong that it was a miracle I found my way to the washroom just in time for a Halley's comet type of expulsion all the way from the pit of my stomach straight into the toilet bowl. Luckily, it was a good aim. I emptied all of my lovely lunch and more. Sweat was pouring from every pore in my body but I felt surprisingly so much better than I did a couple of hours ago. It was exactly 8pm when I emerged from the washroom.

Well, I have to learn the trick to hold on to my carefully selected meals. How else will I nourish my body otherwise. My friend PSJMS suggested that I lean my body at just the right angle on the sofa so that any flatulence and trapped gas would be released and that would stop me from being sick. She practiced this and it worked for her and she was able to retain her food intake quite well by fighting the nausea. I must try that the next time I get another hit of nausea.

Dinner was nutritious but prescriptive-steamed senangin with broccoli and choy sam ala RJ. It was kind of her to come by to prepare dinner as I could not even get up let alone go to the kitchen. In a twisted kind of way I felt vindicated for my earlier fears and the negative images of "suffering" experienced by cancer patients. So the worrying was not wasted!

Just to be sure I replaced all the nutrients expelled earlier, "starters" for dinner was no escargot in butter sauce but a glass of ENSURE, a complete food drink except for fibre. A dinner of brown rice, steamed fish and vegetable provided the fibre and I chewed each mouthful very slowly to help speed up digestion.

My sister and her daughter arrived from London about 10pm to stay for a week. She came loaded with more books and magazines, nutritious snacks and supplements. I liked the tub of Lavender hand cream that I applied to my hands and forearms. The cream exuded a comforting and lingering lavender scent that helped to lull me to sleep. I slept peacefully and woke up after the sun!

I managed to contain my dinner and hopefully my body was able to benefit from it. Recognising that I have all these weapons of mass destruction in my body (FEC/CEF), I must continue to ensure that while they do their job on any remaining cancer cells, my good cells must be continuously nourished.

Eating, which has always been a pleasure is now a duty. And it will not be a simple act of stuffing things in your mouth. It has to be practiced religiously when every morsel that goes in needs to be respected for the goodness it will bring. As they say, most major 21st century diseases are not caused by under-eating but rather due to indiscriminate over-eating or eating enough but of the wrong kind.

But does eating the wrong kind of food cause cancer? The books imply it is so. However, I know of people who eat everything under the sun, smoke like a chimney, drink like a horse and yet remain stick-thin and cancer-free? And what about the spouse of the promoter of Macrobiotic Diets? She was a practitioneer of the healthy Macrobiotic Diet but succumbed to cancer recently.

One of these days I will need to examine where I went wrong.