File under good news:
- The wound vac came off Monday morning. I'm glad I volunteered to keep it on for that extra couple of weeks. It's now done as much as it could do. There's still an open area that totals maybe two square inches (some of that is long and skinny along the incision line) where there is no skin yet. So it's behaving like an oozy skinned knee and I still have to keep gauze on it when I wear clothes or they stick in it which is pretty gross. I saw the surgeon this morning and she went over the oozy bits with silver nitrate to try to get them to dry up quicker. I've been instructed to be topless as much as possible to encourage it to dry out as well. I'm really glad the weather is warm enough to support that behavior around the house.
- For the first time since last September I've felt like I had extra energy over the last few days. For months now I've been exhausted all the time, barely able to do the bare minimum of things I need to. Whether it's been chemo, taking opiates for pain, recovering from surgery, being colossally depressed, or some combination of all of them, I haven't moved unless I absolutely had to. This week I've been antsy and started walking for exercise again. I saw the oncologist yesterday and the surgeon this morning and they both cleared me to go back to the gym and start weight training and pilates again. It's going to be a long road back to where I was when I had to quit last May, between the steroids, the sitting, the poison, and the surgery I am most certainly weaker than I was when I started three years ago. But I'm excited to be starting again. I'm going back to the gym to reinstate my membership tomorrow and I've got an appointment with the trainer I'd been working with for the last couple of years on Tuesday. My expectation is that I'll need to take a week off from working out after the next three rounds of chemo, but the two weeks following I should be able to be consistent about exercise.
File under not-terrible but not-great news:
The neurontin experiment isn't going well. One of the possible side effects is weight gain. I started at 300 mg and that helped with sleep a bit but not enough, so we upped it to 600, and then upped it again to 900 about 10 days ago. The idea being it would help me get to sleep/stay asleep and I could wean myself off of the Ativan I'd been using. I had noticed that at 600 I was waking up hungrier than usual, but I would eat my usual breakfast and be OK until lunch time. At 900, I wake up absolutely ravenous. So hungry I could easily it double or triple what I usually do for breakfast and be hungry again an hour later. I suspected I was gaining (we don't have a scale at home) and being that hungry is kind of miserable too, and it wasn't really improving my sleep more than the 600 dose was. So a couple nights ago I dialed it back to 600 again. The effect on my appetite was immediate. This morning at the surgeon's office we confirmed that I've gained 10 pounds in the last two weeks.
While I'm OK with weighing what I weigh, taking a medication that could make me gain like that for not a lot of benefit just isn't worth it. The benefits I am getting are 1) no night sweats, 2) once I get to sleep I usually sleep better, and 3) some reduction in the neuropathy in my feet. I'm hoping that some time at the gym and keeping that dose at 600 will keep my weight in check. If it doesn't I'll have to stop taking it.
Also not-great, the last couple of nights have been awful. I was used to the higher dose and it's going to take a while to get used to the taper, apparently. I'm now on my third (and last) cup of coffee for the day and trying to honor my commitment to myself not to nap today. It's 2:52. I might make it.
- The wound vac came off Monday morning. I'm glad I volunteered to keep it on for that extra couple of weeks. It's now done as much as it could do. There's still an open area that totals maybe two square inches (some of that is long and skinny along the incision line) where there is no skin yet. So it's behaving like an oozy skinned knee and I still have to keep gauze on it when I wear clothes or they stick in it which is pretty gross. I saw the surgeon this morning and she went over the oozy bits with silver nitrate to try to get them to dry up quicker. I've been instructed to be topless as much as possible to encourage it to dry out as well. I'm really glad the weather is warm enough to support that behavior around the house.
- For the first time since last September I've felt like I had extra energy over the last few days. For months now I've been exhausted all the time, barely able to do the bare minimum of things I need to. Whether it's been chemo, taking opiates for pain, recovering from surgery, being colossally depressed, or some combination of all of them, I haven't moved unless I absolutely had to. This week I've been antsy and started walking for exercise again. I saw the oncologist yesterday and the surgeon this morning and they both cleared me to go back to the gym and start weight training and pilates again. It's going to be a long road back to where I was when I had to quit last May, between the steroids, the sitting, the poison, and the surgery I am most certainly weaker than I was when I started three years ago. But I'm excited to be starting again. I'm going back to the gym to reinstate my membership tomorrow and I've got an appointment with the trainer I'd been working with for the last couple of years on Tuesday. My expectation is that I'll need to take a week off from working out after the next three rounds of chemo, but the two weeks following I should be able to be consistent about exercise.
File under not-terrible but not-great news:
The neurontin experiment isn't going well. One of the possible side effects is weight gain. I started at 300 mg and that helped with sleep a bit but not enough, so we upped it to 600, and then upped it again to 900 about 10 days ago. The idea being it would help me get to sleep/stay asleep and I could wean myself off of the Ativan I'd been using. I had noticed that at 600 I was waking up hungrier than usual, but I would eat my usual breakfast and be OK until lunch time. At 900, I wake up absolutely ravenous. So hungry I could easily it double or triple what I usually do for breakfast and be hungry again an hour later. I suspected I was gaining (we don't have a scale at home) and being that hungry is kind of miserable too, and it wasn't really improving my sleep more than the 600 dose was. So a couple nights ago I dialed it back to 600 again. The effect on my appetite was immediate. This morning at the surgeon's office we confirmed that I've gained 10 pounds in the last two weeks.
While I'm OK with weighing what I weigh, taking a medication that could make me gain like that for not a lot of benefit just isn't worth it. The benefits I am getting are 1) no night sweats, 2) once I get to sleep I usually sleep better, and 3) some reduction in the neuropathy in my feet. I'm hoping that some time at the gym and keeping that dose at 600 will keep my weight in check. If it doesn't I'll have to stop taking it.
Also not-great, the last couple of nights have been awful. I was used to the higher dose and it's going to take a while to get used to the taper, apparently. I'm now on my third (and last) cup of coffee for the day and trying to honor my commitment to myself not to nap today. It's 2:52. I might make it.
No comments:
Post a Comment