It Was a Frustrating Friday

Friday morning I get up grab my breakfast, the pills I need to take with breakfast, and four bottles of water I have to chug before we hit Newmarket.  I managed to drink 2 bottles before we left the house. It's an hour and fifteen minute drive from our house to the Stronach Regional Cancer Centre. So off we go and I take 2 more bottles of water with me to drink on the drive.

I'm mentally ready to start this new chemo adventure that awaits me until my oncologist nurse walks in the room and tells me that we're putting a hold on your chemo right now and the doctor will explain everything to you when he talks to you.

Me to the nurse: Why? I took all the required pills, and drank all the water before breakfast, and now you're delaying the treatment?

Nurse to me: The reason is that you have a needle biopsy ultra sound booked for next Thursday. This needs to be done before chemo is started. The doctor had hoped to have it booked before you were scheduled to start chemo and was unable to do this. So we'll start your chemo next Friday following the biopsy.

My mother in law had flown up from Florida to be with me and my husband and son had dropped us off at the hospital and continued on to work. They were scheduled to pick us up at around four. I understand that the first treatment of the round of 3 in the month is the longest one.

My oncologist comes in and basically tells us the same thing that the nurse did. The results of the biopsy will take a few weeks to come back. This biopsy is to determine if I am eligible to take pills for chemo rather than have chemo by i.v.   He then explains that the course of treatment is to do three to four rounds of chemo and at that point we'll either switch over to the pills or continue on with more chemo by i.v. There is also the possibility of taking a break from chemo all together depending on how my tumors responded to the chemo.

So that was that.

My mother in law and I had about 4 or 5 hours to kill before my husband was scheduled to pick us up. We did what women to best to kill time .... we went shopping. That was the plan anyways except the pills I had taken earlier in the day hit and I was exhausted. One of the side effects of  all 3 of these pills are that they cause drowsiness. We shopped a little and sat a lot. It was a long day.

My big question is why didn't the oncologist or his nurse call me on Thursday and tell me not to start the pills on Friday morning as there was going to be a delay. Too busy I imagine.

Here's to one more week of freedom ...