Skip to main content

A Short Post About Ear Hair and Neuropathy

"my hairy ear" by prazz is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
When you have Cancer, all your hair falls out except for ear hair. Ear hair feeds off the Cancer. It grows stronger, more resilient. Ear hair will survive a nuclear apocalypse. Like a cockroach. Ear hair is the cockroach of hair.

I also have a new symptom, Neuropathy. While that sounds like some sort of super-cool mind control ability, it’s really just tingly fingers, and I have it all the time. It’s what I imagine Peter Parker’s spidey-sense feels like, but instead of telling me when danger is imminent, it’s just fucking annoying. It also feels like my feet are falling asleep, which is helpful when the Prednisone keeps me awake - at least my feet are getting a good night’s sleep.

Neuropathy is a known side-effect of Vincristine, one of my Chemo drugs. Dr. Hu told me that it usually pops up around the fourth or fifth treatment. Being the over-achiever that I am, mine kicked in after the third. There’s really nothing that can be done about it, though Shawnna is urging me to try acupuncture. I think the theory is that once they stick needles all over your body, tingly fingers become a secondary concern. Dr. Hu assures me that if I start dropping things, or have trouble walking, we’ll reduce the Vincristine. So, there’s that. I’m just hoping that if I drop something, it lands on my feet and wakes them up.


Comments

  1. A quick note about hair? How is that possible? That adventure deserves a whole post to itself. Do you take requests?

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tell the Mouse to Bring Me Some Juice

So, the other day Shawnna and I were getting ready for bed, standing shoulder-to-shoulder in the bathroom, worshipping before the great American altar that is a porcelain double vanity, and performing our respective evening ablutions. We became synchronous, unconsciously so, but synchronous nonetheless. She had her handful of nighttime pills and was popping them one at a time. I was doubling and tripling mine in random combinations. I have more than she, so we were still keeping time… like a couple of pharmacological Art Blakeys. An epiphanic clarity came over me; a clarity so palpable that I had no choice but to give it voice, “This is a stupid fucking ritual.”  Tomorrow is gonna be a long week. At 8:20 I have a CT of my abdomen and pelvis with contrast . I think “with contrast” is when they shoot you full of radioactive fizzy water that makes it feel like you’re peeing in your pants when you’re really not. At 10:00, I have labs. Since I still have my central line port, this is re...

Sucking Bloody Pennies

Today marks one week since my first Chemo treatment. Today is also the first day I’ve gone back to bed after everyone else left the house. I woke up at the normal time, roused the kids, made coffee, had a bagel. After Shawnna, et al. left for school I fed the dogs, and sat sipping a second cup while continuing to navigate the flowing torrent of Sondheim remembrances . Then, in an instant, I just felt like crap – queasy and completely sapped of energy. So, I went back to bed. I have felt mildly queasy all week, but this was more pronounced. So much so, that I no longer wished to remain upright, and upright I did not remain. While we tend to think of side-effects as manifesting physically, there are some that take up psychological space, as well. I'm not talking about the mental and emotional toll Cancer can take on a person and his family, rather the physical symptoms that edge their way into the psyche thereby becoming meta physical. For me, such symptoms are the ones relating to f...

My Phreaking Phosphorous

It’s my own fault. I’d been getting cocky, telling anyone who asked how trouble-free my infusions had been, tempting both fate and the Gods of Chemo. My typical schedule on Chemo Day sends me to the Lab first where they draw blood and access my port. Then, I head upstairs to see Doctor Hu. She usually has the lab results before the end of our appointment. Lastly, it’s to one of two Infusion Centers where I make myself at home for the next 4 ½-hours. Yesterday, 10 nurses had called out sick, and the Lab was pretty backed up. (There are no phlebotomists at the Levine Cancer Institute. Only RN’s draw blood because of the number of patients with ports.) So, Doctor Hu could see some of the results, but not all before I headed to Infusion. We had already started my Chemo regimen when the Doctor called down to say that my phosphorus was low. Evidently, I had lost my glow. Now, because I am my father’s son, I immediately did some research to try and assess the culprit. I needed to know what vi...