Jan. 5: Too much of the ca-word

Today was very cancer-y. Everywhere I turned, there were reminders of it.

• First, I had an appointment to see my rheumatologist. He’s the one who finally paid attention to my back pain and ordered the MRI, which led to the CT and biopsy and ultimate lymphoma diagnosis—in other words, he’s the good guy in this story. The appointment this morning was a follow-up we scheduled before all that happened; I think we had originally planned on discussing the progress on my physical therapy referral. Anyway, this morning was a good time for me to thank him profusely for being a good doctor to me. He’s a very kind man.
  
  I mentioned to Dr. Awesome that I’ve had this cough for two weeks now, which only seems to be getting worse, and he said he wanted to test me for pneumonia. PNEUMONIA! Later, after he diagnosed with me an upper respiratory infection and sent me on my way, I started freaking out a little that he had mentioned pneumonia. It seems like cancer patients always die of some kind of secondary infection—like pneumonia!—and I expected my first risky illness NOT to happen in my first five weeks as a cancer patient. Argh.
  
  I’m on antibiotics now, on the road to being much less annoying to those around me.
  
  Also, did you know that Vicodin is a cough suppressant? Is Vicodin a wonder drug, or what? It is all things to all people. Especially people who are addicted to it.
• Conversations at work revolved around health, which has become fairly normal conversation. The people I work with most closely have been very supportive to me—always, but especially now that I’m going through cancer treatment. They are lovely, and I feel blessed to know them.
• Throughout the day I received emails containing comments left on yesterday’s blog post. I can’t thank you all enough for your kind words. You are all so thoughtful and know exactly what I need to hear.
• I ordered two books about cancer-related things that were delivered today (What to Eat During Cancer Treatment and The Chemotherapy Survival Guide). The second one has some good info on what blood counts mean, what kinds of side effects the doctor needs to hear about, dealing with side effects, and all that.
• I just started reading another cancer-y book, Cancer on Five Dollars a Day (chemo not included): How Humor Got Me Through the Toughest Journey of My Life, by comedian Robert Schimmel. Not surprisingly, it’s hilarious so far. It feels really, really good to laugh at cancer.
• My head is stubbly.