Yesterday wasn't a good day, but this morning Lisa feels better ( "so far," as she cautiously adds) so I'm able to go in to the office until we go for more chemo early this afternoon. She was quite apprehensive about doing the chemo today if she was already feeling nauseous or crampy, but right now that's not a problem. We don't know if she's felt poorly the last few days because of the chemo, a combination of other meds, something she ate, or a 'bug' she might have been exposed to. Not knowing only adds to her stress.
Update 10pm: Apparently it's the chemo. When we left the cancer center around 4pm after the chemo, Lisa was ok, as she had been all morning. Several hours later, nausea and cramping started, and have gotten progressively worse through the evening to the point where it's very rough and unpleasant for her. It's unfortunately become more typical of what you hear about as reactions to chemo, which she didn't have in the first series. It's difficult to have to watch her go through it. We're grateful there's only one more treatment in the current chemo series.
Side note: We had the house retested for radon as a concern for possible cause of the lung cancer, and the results came in. It had tested as acceptable when we had it done a decade or more ago, though I don't remember what the number was, and the current test shows it's still "ok" and typical for this area of the country, at 2.0 pCi/L (pico Curies per Liter). This compares to a national average of 1.3, and an EPA threshold of "take action" of 4.0 or above. With a lifetime exposure to radon at 2.0 pCi/L, the risk of lung cancer from radon for a non-smoker is about the same as the risk for an average person dying from poison (3/10 of one percent, or about 3 per 1000) according to statistics from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (I was surprised to find out that poisoning is the second highest cause of accidental death in the U.S., following motor vehicle accidents).
Michael
