Thought I better drop by and let you know I'm still alive and kicking! The demands of my job have risen of late and have kept me very, very busy...so I do apologize but there are some interesting things to report.
I continue to tolerate my meds reasonably well...I continue to remain in complete remission...I will get another course of Zometa next week along with my Velcade and then it's off to Arkansas the second week in April to get poked, prodded, analyzed, scanned and written up. We're looking for those little teensy pits in my spine to go away, at which point I believe I will be in MRI complete remission.
As I write this, I note my friend BB (not the doctor, but the patient) was very, very close to this...with only about three small lesions that were remaining and were resolving...when he lost remission. He is now continuing the struggle, having ruled out Carfilzomib because of his liver's inability to tolerate it, and now trying Pomalidomide. His spirits remain high and he inspires me...but his is also a cautionary tale indeed. Not everybody maintains remission. Even in the low-risk cohort, which he shared with me, people do lose remission during those critical three years. Until I'm past that four year point, really, where the curve does appear to flatten, I will have a bit of a sword of Damocles over my head.
As far as other news to report, we have figured out what was wrong with my shoulder! Regular readers (if any of you remain, given how long this update has taken) will recall that I felt a pain in my shoulder about six months ago, and was originally concerned it was tumors reactivating. I got an MRI and ruled that out, tried some massages that didn't help, got a massage from a person that was a physical therapist who suggested it might be a rotator muscle. Went to an orthopedist who gave me a shot of cortisone in the shoulder where this rotator muscle emerges from behind the shoulder blade. Boy did THAT suck. It did nothing whatsoever at the time (beyond the needle pain which was moderate, not horrible) but that night it was like I had awakened a sleeping devil and he was really irritated that I'd interrupted his sleep.
The orthopedist said I needed to go to a physical therapist, and I fortunately found one who really understands shoulders. He immediately knew what muscles were the problem (the superspinatus and something else underneath the shoulder blade). I've been a few times and it is helping, but the kicker is...in conversation he mentioned this is common for someone on steroids.
Dex is the culprit, ladies and gentlemen. It has destroyed the muscle tissue on BOTH sides of my shoulders, so I can expect to have to rehab the left one soon enough. The pain on the right is bad enough where I still use Vicodin a few nights a week to ensure a good night's sleep -- and in fact the mildly constipating effect of the narcotics help counterract some of the other meds so I'm afraid I'm becoming accustomed to having one of these pills each night, between the gastroenteritis caused by the Velcade and the shoulder pain and the GI issues, they are kind of a godsend. Plus they make a guy sleepy.
When this is all over, I will eventually cut out the Ativan and the Vicodin...I'm staying away from Ambien because they left me a zombie in the morning but 1mg a night of the Ativan is enough to make me drowsy. It's working, I ain't gonna change it. Hopefully I won't end up on a future poster for Reefer Madness: 2012.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
