It’s been 3 weeks since my last treatment. Recovery has been quite the ride, although the road is starting to smooth out now.
DRUGS — At this point I’m down to just the 50 mcg patch, and am about to halve the dosage. It’s been at least 5 days since I’ve taken any of the “breakthrough” medication, which means the pain is under control. The swelling in my throat is down enough for me to eat just about any food, although just about everything tastes awful. Sneezing and yawning are the real kick in the neck, though, so being tired at crazy-cat-lady house is my current nightmare.
FOOD — while I can eat just about anything right now, the only things that are palatable are those that are sweet and/or fatty, and both is preferable. Pancakes and eggs in the morning are my go-to, and cashew-milk ice cream for dinner. It sounds like heaven, but trust me, it’s gotten old. Everything else tastes like chewing on galvanized steel.
On a brighter note, one of my favorite chefs, J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, has just released his newest cookbook, called The Wok, and Erin has been working her chow fun game. It’s just fatty and oily enough for me to enjoy, and the kids absolutely love it. And I’ve just gotten us a new Chinese vegetable cleaver, which is bad-ass. When I can taste food again, I will be in heaven.
BILLS – we are sorting through bills with Orlando Health, getting them to the right insurers for the months we were actually insured. It turns out for the month we were un-covered by insurance, the treatments, before any discounts, would add up to well over 100k. I’d have to do 100 more fundraisers to even being to deal with that! We are working with them to get financial assistance to make the January bills reasonable. The state of healthcare costs in my country is ridiculous, but I’m not going to go down that road right now.
OUTLOOK – I don’t know if any of the treatments did anything. Right now, I feel like I did before I knew I had cancer. There is a small, barely noticeable lump in my throat, that hurts when I sneeze or yawn. It is probably just be leftover inflammation from 35 sessions of radiation. My first follow-up CT scan is in 3 weeks. But the CT scan I had before my biopsy did not indicate anything abnormal, so I’m not pinning any hopes on this CT scan.
I will have a PET scan sometime in May, but it hasn’t been scheduled yet. After that there will be scopes and other inspections. I try not to think about it, but I’m going to go with my doctors’ optimism for now.