Today she is also getting a port placed. The port is like a permanent IV that is placed under her collar bone. The port is designed to deliver medications and Chemo through a large vein directly into your heart. This allows the medication to be diluted more quickly than if the medication was given in the veins in your arms or hands by IV. Also, by delivering the Chemo directly into your heart, the Chemo does not break down or deteriorate the veins in the arms or hands.
Beth has lost most of her hair from Chemo. Caroline and Lily helped shave Beth's head last week as Beth got tired of her hair falling out in chunks. In addition, our dog Poppy was like, "Look Beth, there is only room in this house for one of us to shed hair all over the place".
Lucky for Beth she has the most perfectly shaped head. We met Howie Mandel recently and he was in awe of her perfectly shaped head.
The Chemo wipes Beth out for about a week after her treatment. Some of her side effects from the Chemo are nausea, she feels foggy most of the day where she can't focus on things and can't think clearly, she is weak and has very little energy. Also, the Chemo makes her mouth very sore and wipes out her appetite. Other than that, Chemo is a blast.
Some good news from this visit. Each time she comes to Chicago, they do a full blood panel. One of the things they look for are her tumor markers. Tumor markers are substances that are produced by cancer. They measure her tumor markers each visit and they are hope to see a decrease in the tumor markers that would indicate that the cancer is responding to treatment. If they find the tumor markers increased it would indicate that the cancer is not responding to the Chemo treatments.
Beth had to go out to Chicago a day early for this trip, so she flew out Tuesday night and I drove out yesterday. Anytime she goes to Chicago I get very anxious knowing they are doing the tumor marker test. I nervously wait for Beth to text me with her results. I got this text from her yesterday. Such a relief.
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