Side Effects

I am sure by now most of you have seen enough movies, read enough books, to have some sort of understanding about the side effects of chemo. I know I sure did educate myself as much as I could before I started chemo to have a good understanding of what to expect and I can tell you this: put away your movies, put away your books, close “Google”, you can’t understand it, unless you have done it, there is no way to understand it. Having been thru just one round of chemo, having experienced the side effects of that one round, I can tell you that I can’t explain it. I can’t explain it in a way that you could understand.

It just sucked. I could say to you “well, on day one (two, three, four) I felt…” but really, that doesn’t do it justice either. Remember I said the effects are cumulative? Well, if that is true, then it really sucks. So I am not going to bore you with the details…

I will say tho that I am lucky. Lucky to have a husband who will make me milk shakes and massage my legs any time I ask him too. (used to drive me nuts that he worked from home. I will never complain about that again). I am lucky to have parents who are willing to take Michelle to their house until I “get thru the worst of it” (I am ready for her to come home today). Lucky to have friends who send short, loving emails/texts with no expectation that I will actually respond. Lucky to have sisters in pink who can say “yes, that’s normal”.

These last few days have not been handled with much dignity or grace. Or sarcasm. They have just been handled. And now they are part of the past. I don’t feel great today, but I am better and so tomorrow and the day after that and the day after that, well, they have to be better too.

So I have to change my way of thinking right now. Yes, chemo is going to bring me down, way down. It brought me to a place I didn’t like, a place of such discomfort and wild emotions I thought for sure it would kill me. But it didn’t. And it won’t. And now I can expect that too. And know that it is temporary. And know that, come Sat. mornings after chemo, I should be feeling better.

And I need to always keep in my mind the one good side effect of chemo:

Chemo is going to save my life.

And when I look at it like that…then I know I can get thru it.