Chemo start date

Having had the chemo portacath op last week, I am now all ready to roll!

I met up with the chemo team on Friday who talked me through the regime I will be on. It is called Folfori + cetuximab and will be very similar to the Folfox I had 7 years ago in that each cycle will be administered every fortnight. With Folfori the side effects are apparently more gastrointestinal, fatigue and alopecia, whereas with folfox it has more neurotoxicity (I remember this with the pins and needles in my hand and feet by the end).

Ordinarily it will be that they give me the chemo infusion over the course of one day, and then I go away with a portable pump for another two days while it continues to go in. They then take the pump off and leave me alone for 12 days before repeating it all again.

However for this first cycle, just so that they can monitor me more closely and see the extent of the side effects they will do it more slowly over two days (28th and 29th April). As before they talked through the list of potential side effects…. good news is that it won’t necessarily be that I experience all of them. The impression I get is that the more common / likely are hair-loss (Ollie already had that covered and will be ‘waiting in the wings’ to shave it off as soon as it starts to go🤣….I’m told this tends to happen after the second cycle), mouth ulcers, stomach cramps, diarrhoea, skin rash, nausea.

I’m just keen to get started now so that I can have a sense of how my body will cope. Hopefully by trying to keep the running up this will help to mitigate some of the effects. Fatigue is one they mentioned and as I recall last time that wasn’t too bad (something I put down to keeping active throughout).

We have a family weekend in the diary for the May bank holiday which Catherine, the boys and I are really looking forward to. Something to focus on to get through chemo cycle number 1👍

Now let’s get it going, I am feeling totally ready for it now 😃

7 Replies to “Chemo start date”

  1. Good luck Tom, hope all goes well. I admire your strength and positivity. Enjoy your family weekend, Bon courage xx

  2. As always your positivity and words speak volumes. Best of luck with the chemo and pay us a visit when you can

  3. Not long now ’til the next phase of your journey! Good luck and fingers crossed that any side effects aren’t too much of a problem! We’re both thinking of you and the family, as always!

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