Future Plans

I've received a number of questions about my graduate school plans. Many people have assumed that I would delay starting school under the current circumstances. This is not that case. I plan to begin school at the end of September just as I intended. I have discussed this with my oncologist. There is only a small amount of disease that we are fighting right now and Dr. W see no reason why we can't aim to be done with chemo prior to the start of classes. So I'm moving full speed ahead with my plans!

I have a couple of vacations planned before classes begin. At the end of the month, I will be in Las Vegas having a reunion with a bunch of my college friends. Then the first week in September, I'm going home to Omaha to visit my family which as of a few hours ago is one person larger! My niece, Isabelle Christine, was born at 12:37 pm today. Congratulations to my brother and his wife! I'll be in town to meet my new niece and to celebrate her sister's first birthday. I'm really looking forward to it.

Stupid Steroids... Again

During my first two chemotherapy sessions way back in December 2005 I was very sick. In order to help manage the side effects, my oncologist prescribed Decadron, a steroid, to be taken on my treatment days. You can read about the experience here. (Despite my proclamation at the end of the post, I did not go back on the Decadron.)

At the end of June, I began to take Prednisone in an attempt to treat my ITP. It didn't work. It did make me think that I was loosing my mind and I went weeks sleeping no more than 5-6 hours per night and more often than not less. I was taking Ativan and Ambien every night just to get myself to sleep. I was retaining so much water that we had to rig my bridesmaid dress because it wouldn't zip up. Don't even get me started on the mood swings and the manic episodes which led to an amazing number of baked goods at my grandparents' house.

9 days ago I took my last dose of Prednisone. Once it was confirmed that it wasn't making a difference, Dr. W told me to start decreasing my dose by 10mg every three days. Although it seemed to take forever, I actually went off the drug very quickly since many people have to wean themselves very slowly. I took it for just over five weeks. Between the side effects and the withdrawal effects, I don't think that I could handle taking it again. Stupid Steroids!!!