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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

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