A week of pain.

I mentioned in my last post that I was injecting myself with GCSF growth factor to bring my white blood cell count up. The counts got back into the safe zone last Wednesday but it was decided to defer the chemo scheduled for that day until this week to give my blood a chance to fully recover.

The back, muscle and joint pain just got worse and worse however. By mid week I was in terrible pain. I think I spent the best part of three days just laying in bed groaning. None of my usual painkillers seemed to work well enough to even take the edge off the incredible ache from my lower back, hips, thighs and knees.

It's a lot better now and a couple of panadol easily deals to the back-ache that comes and goes.
However I have chemo on Wednesday and will start on the growth factor again soon after that as my white cell counts drop again as a result. I'm really not looking forward to another three days of what could be compared to torture on the rack.

Today was a milestone, for the first time ever my platelet count read absolute zero. Sometimes the nurses would say I was at zero but when the printout arrived it would be "1" or close to it.
Apparently most doctors have never seen a patient with a zero platelet count. You know me.. like to be different ;)

I bled all weekend from my nose. It started on Friday even though I received two units of platelets that day. I was thinking of going into the emergency department on Sunday but then the constant trickle stopped and the thought of going into ED for probably six or more hours for what takes an hour in the day ward put me off a little.

It turns out that I never actually stopped bleeding: my nasal cavity had just filled up with so much congealed blood that it acted as a plug. I waited until I had received my two units of platelets today before blowing my nose. I looked down at the tissue in total disbelief. "Did all that come from me?"
Gross!

Because of my inactivity over the last week or so due to pain and generally feeling really crappy, I've lost more weight. I'm now down to just 57kg's. That's really scary. It's six kg's lower than when I got out of hospital in June. I think one of the problems is that my muscles are atrophying as a result of  greatly reduced exercise. The doctor at the hospice had told me not to exercise as it would use up energy needlessly and leave me fatigued.
I think she thought I was closer to the grave than I do! The result is I'm now very week in my legs and need to get back on the treadmill for some gentle walking to get back some muscle strength and the weight that comes with it.

Well I'd better go... coughing fit.