Chemo the day before

Most folks hear the word chemo and think it is something that you go in for and that's that.  It doesn't work quite like that.  Some folks take chemo by pill at home on a certain schedule.  Others go to an infusion room at a hospital or clinic.  They receive their treatment by IV.  This is how I get my chemo.  But it isn't just a day.  There is prep work.  For instance.  I have to take 5 steroids in the evening before.  This equals about 20 mg.  They make my heart beat fast, and often give me a headache.  Fun times!  No, really it is just an inconvenient necessity.  

So, today is Thursday.  The day before chemo.  I am anticipating having to take those steroids all day long.  Not with excitement mind you.  No, with dread.  But I will do it, because I have to. Tomorrow I will wake, eat something bland so I don't get sick later.  Then I will head off to the center.  Once there, they will draw my blood.  After they determine that my counts are within a range that is safe to have chemo, I will head back to the infusion room.  Lately I have been popping a couple Tylenol at this point to prevent getting a headache. If I get a headache during chemo I usually barf.  Then the chemo nurse hooks me up to premeds, which are more steroids and an anti-nausea medicine.  That takes about a half an hour.  Then one big gun chemo drug after another.  I take two drugs, Taxol and Avastin.  All of these thing happen between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m.  When I finish my wonderful husband takes me home, gives me something for nausea.  Then I pretty much lay around for the rest of the day feeling out of it and tired. 

That is what it is like the day before and the day of.  Just in case you are curious about what having mets breast cancer is like.