Nausea

Oncology called today. My blood platelets are back to normal. I’m all clear to continue taking my chemo pills. This is the good news we were hoping for today.

Being eager to get back on track, I took my dose without giving a thought to the anti-nausea medicine. One of the doctors (a resident) had suggested that if I wanted I could try to take the chemo without the anti-nausea, because there is a chance that I might not need it. Well, I needed it. For an hour I tried all the tricks I could to fight it off. I finally just had to give in.

In a waiting room one day, another tumor patient explained chemo nausea like this: imagine the sickest you’ve ever been… multiplied by ten. It was pretty rough. But not as bad as throwing up from having drank too much booze in college. That is, I felt fine afterwards, and the room wasn’t spinning. So, lesson learned.

The squirrel

Tina loves squirrels. I like squirrels. But like most Atlantans that I know who feed birds, squirrels are regarded as a nuisance. I happened to take a look outside this afternoon and see the squirrel in the photo above. (Note, some mobile devices aren’t displaying the photos.) Looks like the poor guy has a big tumor on his shoulder. I don’t know what it meant, but it struck me as something I needed to take note of.