Day 5, Cornflakes, chemo and rain.

I like breakfast time it's the highlight of my day.
Generally I'll head downstairs to the restaurant at around 8am, this morning I left it a little later arriving at 9am.
As she does every morning Frederica greeted me with her mile wide smile and a cheerful "good morning". Frederica is in her 40's, is tall, has reddish brown hair and wears glasses. She wears what looks like a traditional Bavarian waitress costume, a black pinafore, red apron and a white blouse with short puffy sleeves.

I always choose the same things for breakfast, it's safest. Cornflakes, toast and green tea. This morning as I enter the dining room, seated in their usual place are two men, both are in their late 20's and appear to be either Russian or from one of the Slavic countries.
I greet them as I do every day, with a cheery "Good Morning" only one of them ever replies. The elder of the two. He has lost his hair through treatment and appears unwell. The other man ignores me completely.

My table is some distance from them which is good because it means I have an excuse not to attempt conversation. As I take my place two women in their 60's enter and also take their seats at their respective tables (all the tables have name tags). I say good morning to both. The more outgoing of the two, an American, asks where I am from and I reply New Zealand. Eleanor introduces herself and says she's been there, loves the place. We talk non-stop for the next thirty minutes or so about treatments and how we each came to be here.

The other woman "Eva" is Swedish and more reserved, she nods and smiles and add's information to the conversation as Eleanor asks it of her. We talked about the poor internet service and I tell them that I manage to get online about half the time. Both are immediately envious as neither can connect. Eleanor asked if I could visit her room and take a look at her computer. I told her that the problem is downstairs with the server and that I don't think the guy that they have "fixing" it has a clue.

I finish my breakfast, bid the ladies good morning and return to my room, meeting Dr Kopic on the stairs. He follows me to my room and we both seat ourselves at my writing desk as we do every morning where we discuss the days treatment plan. Today is a rest day, it's raining anyway so I have an excuse to stay in and read my book. Dr Kopic tells me that he has decided to start chemotherapy tomorrow once my monocytes have recovered enough to reduce the chances of infection.

I asked him how he came to decide on what drugs to use when the results aren't in from Greece yet? He said that he has been in discussion with the German Hodgkins study group (the recognised world leaders in Hodgkins research) and that they have suggested the drugs dexanethasone, Alexan (Cytarabine) and Cisplatin.

Cisplatin and Cytarabine cause damage to a cell's DNA ultimately resulting in it's death (cell necrosis) Healthy cells can repair their DNA, cancer cells cannot and therefore die. Possible side effects include kidney damage, hearing loss and more worryingly bone marrow suppression. The other drug Dexanethansone is a power anti-inflammatory, 6 times more potent than prednisone.

I'm expecting to be quite ill from these drugs, I guess the posts might be a bit shorter after tomorrow. We shall see :)

After Dr Kopic left I started researching the drugs, how they work and what to expect. It's not fun reading, but then again this has got to be better than high dose chemo.

There's a knock at the door and Eleanor pops her head inside and exclaims in her American accent "Ooh I just love your room!" and proceeds to inspect every nook and cranny, saying that hers is nowhere near as nice. She see's that I'm online and again voices her annoyance that she cannot connect. She leaves just as fast as she appeared.

There's another knock at the door..Christine the office manager pops in to say that Eleanor had "volunteered" me to take a look at the clinics computer network and see if I can't fix it. I told her that I'd have no problem if I could read German to understand the info on the screens, but I'd take a look later anyway.. Perhaps it's a simple fix. Later when I went downstairs she said that the technicians were coming and not to worry. They have been out 4 times this week already.

It's still raining outside, so I have nothing planned for the rest of the day other than to consume two ham and tomato sandwiches for lunch made for me by Stephanie in the kitchen, have three IV infusions of what ever they have chosen to give me today, and to read my book. (in actuality I slept most of the afternoon)

Expect an abridged blow by blow guide to how my body reacts to the administering of highly cytotoxic chemicals tomorrow.

..Ron