Cancer Blog #99
By Brian Zimmerman
Begun on July 31, 2021
Email: dyingman1@yahoo.com
My Dying Words
Entry #99– Medical Update
January 5, 2024
Medical Update:
[Psalm 40:1-3] 1 For the choir director. A Psalm of David. I waited patiently for the LORD; And He inclined to me and heard my cry. 2 He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm. 3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God; Many will see and fear And will trust in the LORD.
As that psalm indicates, it’s been an up and down week, so some bad times, but points at which I felt much better, at least briefly. I was feeling constantly under attack (as I’ve mentioned before, “attack” is my own invention, just the intensification of my chemo side effects or the appearance of new ones) on Monday and Tuesday: shortness of breath (SOB), nausea (which was a surprise as I usually lose the nausea fairly soon after my treatment), severe lethargy (which, for me, is falling asleep in my chair regularly), and just generally feeling bad (as I’ve joked before, it’s as if the chemo boot stomped on my amygdala in my brain, which is probably a ridiculous analogy as I only think it’s the amygdala that strongly influences our emotions). I was trying to give some sense of generally feeling rotten when there is no specific reason. After two days of that attack, I thought my body needed some help, so on Wednesday I took 15mg of prednisone (normally it’s 11mg). I hesitate bumping up the prednisone level as there are side effects and the problem of tapering from that move if done for a while, but my oncologist has given his okay with my tinkering with the prednisone levels as he trusts my judgment. I did find that the extra prednisone lifted the boot several times during the day on Wednesday (that would be the Lord bringing me out of the pit for a while). I also took 15mg of prednisone on Thursday, which gave me some more energy, letting me lift weights on Wednesday (wasn’t easy, but I’m not lifting much), and it enabled me to replace the basement doorknob (which I know is not much, but it was more than I could have done on Monday or Tuesday.) And, we lifted not only on Wednesday, but also on Monday and Friday, 3x for the week. The lifting is very important to me as I’m so inactive. The lifting helps me retain some muscle tone and strength. Friday I tapered the dose back to 13mg of prednisone, and will go to 12mg on Saturday and Sunday, and my normal 11mg on Monday.
And, there was something else of importance this week. I unexpectedly received a reply from my oncologist this week in response to my suggestion about the new chemo regime. To paraphrase, he said that there are no dose adjustments for Opdivo, but there are timing options, specifically one every four weeks. Trying that approach may involve a struggle with the insurance company to fund this regime, but he appears to be willing to push them to do that. The other question is whether I can endure even that reduction of the drug as we (the drug and I) didn’t get along so well last time I used it. I made it through 7 treatments at rate of one every 2 weeks. I have two more treatments on the current protocol (Ramucirumab and Irinotecan) (on January 16 and February 7) and then I have the status CT scan. That should give us an idea of how my cancer is handling the reduced time that’s in the current protocol (every three weeks as opposed to the every two weeks that I’ve been doing for years).
God has sustained me for over 2 ½ years and I never know from treatment to treatment or CT to CT how I’m doing. But, I have a God who can make the blind to see and lame to walk. Whether or how long He will continue to do so for me is something I can’t know for sure. So, I want to face this change as I have my entire treatment regime – trusting that He knows what is best for me. We have a great deal of love and care surrounding us, so much prayer it’s amazing, and we have taken a new vow to petition God for His help. Of course, as I’ve said so often, none of us in this age will live forever. Nevertheless, I ask for an extension of life because I believe He can extend my life. Nonetheless, not my will, but His be done.