Round 12 Day 21 - Results Day

I wanted to blog on Wednesday. And Thursday, and Friday. But this week has been a bit of a whirlwind. I have either lacked the time or energy or both!

I started this blog planning to update with all my adventures since Tues on this one post, but it's too much. I'll do them separately, and some of the smaller posts I'll just let you seek out yourself if you want, rather than spamming my facebook page with 3-4 posts at once.

So my CT Scan Results (and routine blood test results) was on Thursday this week.

The good news: Lymph nodes are all looking rather tumor free! Blood showing another decrease in tumor count too which is nice.

The not so good news: The tumors in my lungs have increased in size and number. They are my Oncologists biggest concern right now. There is also a very small spot on my liver and my sternum.

So time for a change in regime. I was booked for chemo on Friday anyway, but we changed it from the gentler Avastin/Capecitabine/every 3 weeks routine to a fortnightly dose of stronger stuff. Some new, some I've had before.

This treatment is called FOLFIRI (Modified). Catchy right? I'm sure people spend millions coming up with the drugs. I hope they didn't spend too much coming up with the name. 

I'm learning so much all the time. One of the main new things I'm on now is called Cetuximab. Which isn't actually chemo. Chemo is stuff that is cytotoxic- that means it kills cells. This stuff changes the way cells grow so for cancer cells its supposed to 'switch off' the bit of cancer cells that make them keep growing unchecked. Or something. I think. I googled it and it scared me!

I'm also going to be on the bottle again - going home with the stuff attached on Friday and having it removed on Sunday. 

On previous results days, Dave and I have avoided as much human contact as possible. I still can't properly explain the roller coaster that is results day, but one of the things that it is is exhausting. 

However this time, instead of having no other plans for the day, we had several social engagements we wanted to attend. And we did. And it was OK. It was great. But also hard. So I guess that averages out as OK. It's good to know we can do it when we really want to.

Before we started socialising we had a little time for a wander around the botanical gardens which were looking spectacular with Autumn colour, and we saw some Yellow Tails, which always brings me joy.