Lovin' my STD

I know, who would have thought I'd be enjoying my STD so much!  I mean, Short Term Disability has really helped me out!  What?!?  What were y'all thinking I meant?  Anyway, I'm thankful to have short term disability because it's making for a nice transition into my "Disability Retirement."  I've been bombarded with paperwork and unfortunately it takes awhile applying for this and that (something you can't do until you officially stop working).  So with my chemo treatments, Drs appointments and dealing with all of this... I feel like I'm still working.   And by the way, I'm not quite sure I like the way Disability Retirement sounds. From here on out we'll just call it Retirement.  Disability Retirement makes it sound like I have a terminal, incurable disease... Oh... Wait...   (Cue the chirping crickets!  Seriously, these crickets need to be on standby at all times!).

So a quick recap on what's been going on with my treatment... My tumor marker has been steadily declining which is great news.  A couple of weeks ago it took a turn and started to go up, but thankfully that didn't last long and it's heading back down in the right direction.  When I started this cocktail my CA27-29 tumor marker was at 462 and as of this week it's down to 96.8. Woohoo!  We're back in the double digits.  Dr. Hellerstedt is trying to get a PET scheduled in the next couple of weeks so we'll have something to compare to the last PET scan I had. I'll keep you posted when I find out more.

Until then, my lab work has been pretty low (WBC, RBC, etc).  I was able to get one of my drugs on Monday, but because my WBC was so low, I was given a WBC booster shot on Mon and Tues and I was back in the infusion room Wed to get the remaining three drugs.  We're also monitoring my hemoglobin which has been low.  There's a chance I'll need a blood transfusion, but I'm waiting till Dr H says I absolutely need it.

Since my schedule has been flipped around and upside down this week, I'm grateful I don't have the stress and pressure of trying to make it into work.   So yes, you could say that I'm loving my STD... Paving the road to a stress free, relaxing Retirement!

(Thanks Baby B for inspiring me to make this blog entry)