Taxol

Yesterday, I had my first Taxol session. I wasn't sure what to expect going in, but the entire experience was different.

With the AC treatments, I was given an injection of anti-nausea medication and a steroid called decadron prior to receiving my chemo treatments. An hour before I got any of it, I also took another anti-nausea med called Emend.

With Taxol, I get to skip the anti-nausea meds as nausea is not a major side effect. Woo hoo! This is good because the anti-nausea meds, mixed with the chemo treatment, made me pretty non-functional for three days starting with chemo. They also included other non-pleasant side-effects, such as constipation.

Taxol, however, comes with its own set of side effects. One thing that they have to watch pretty carefully in patients is allergic reactions. In order to minimize them and, perhaps, head them off at the pass, they injected me with three drugs prior to receiving the Taxol:

• Decadron (only at a higher dose than I was receiving with AC)
• Benadryl
• Zantac

This little cocktail has to percolate in your system for about an hour before they give you the Taxol. The decadron gives you tons of energy... which is immediately counteracted by the Benadryl. The Benadryl hit me so hard that I have no idea what the affect the Zantac was.

I've had a lot of experience with Benadryl. I have allergies and Benadryl is my emergency drug of choice. However, I tend to only use it when all else has failed because it knocks me out. Seriously. The injection of Benadryl was no different, except that it hit me 10 times faster. One minute, I was feeling all energetic from the decadron, the next minute I had to lay down.

Most of the hour that I had to wait before beginning my Taxol treatment, I was napping. It wasn't that true nap you get at home on your couch.... it was hospital napping. The last time I spent enough time in a hospital to actually try to sleep, I was 14. The interesting thing is that you forget how noisy they are. Hospitals are not restful places. In my nap state yesterday, I was also constantly awake as I listened to the conversations of the nurses outside my door. In fact, the only way I actually knew that I napped was by how incredibly fast the hour passed while I was waiting for Taxol.

In order to watch for any allergic reaction, they started off my administering the Taxol at a slower pace for the first half hour than they normally do. For the first 15 minutes, my nurse sat in the room with me monitoring me for any signs that I might have an allergic reaction. Nothing unusual happened. After that, she left the room and I resumed my in and out napping. Fifteen minutes later, she came back and upped the dose rate to its normal speed... which is still pretty slow. It would take another hour to complete the dosage.

Half an hour later, I started experiencing intestinal cramps over each of my hips. I had just seen my nurse walk over to help another patient, so I waited a couple of minutes to see if she would walk back by. Nichole was with me yesterday, so after about 5 minutes, I sent her out in search of my nurse. Almost as soon as Nichole walked out the door, I started salivating... seriously salivating. It was the kind of salivating your mouth does right before you're going to throw up. I started panicking because I thought I was about to throw up, and yet, I had absolutely no feeling nauseousness. I called for Nichole, who was followed in by a nurse. The nurse went and grabbed a bucket for me and then turned off the Taxol until she talked to my nurse.

As soon as she turned off the Taxol, the salivating went away. It was so strange to have that happen without feeling nauseated. My mouth thought I was going to get sick, but my body wasn't convulsing in anyway. It was very strange, and I was very happy that it passed without incident. I was still feeling the cramps when the nurse came back in and turned on the Taxol again. She said that what I was experiencing wasn't a known side effect to the Taxol. The rest of the session passed without incident. And, though I still experienced the intestinal cramps throughout the remainder of the Taxol, they disappeared shortly after my nurse switched me over to saline to flush out my system.

When I got home, I was still feeling pretty groggy from the Benadryl. Nichole and Ben were joining me for dinner yesterday evening. Nichole made dinner, which also provided me with leftovers for the weekend. She made a delicious pasta primavera with my favorite veggies: asparagus, broccoli, and zucchini. In fact, it's making me hungry just recalling it. But, back to my story.

While I laid on my couch half-napping and we waited for Ben to arrive, Nichole cleaned my kitchen and threw away all the expired food from my fridge. Thanks, Nichole!! I don't know if I properly showed her my appreciation when she did it because I was having slight control issues, but I really appreciated her doing that for me. So, thanks again, Nichole.

By the time Ben got there, I finally started coming out of my Benadryl stupor. So, for those of you who accompany me to future chemo sessions, I'm not going to be my usual talkative, chatty self. It's most likely that I'm going to be half passed out... so be sure to bring along a book or magazine, or some other form of self entertainment.