Drugs

   
     I am up at 3 a.m all thanks to Dexamethasone. My dosage was 40 a week when I was 8 months pregnant because that is all I could take for myeloma. Now that I began chemo the dosage dropped down to 10 a week. That still wakes me up at 3 in the morning and if I lay in bed it takes hours before I can catch that sleep again. Most of the time I begin to think and once my mind begins to wonder, there is no way I am going to go back to sleep anytime soon. The best thing to do is be proactive, start my day a bit early and knock a few things out while I am already up. If I am lucky, I will be getting sleepy around 5 or 6 a.m , Maybe we will see.  That is one of the side effects of Dexamethasone a long with blur vision that comes and goes.

     I love the fact that when the doctor gives you a medicine to help one thing in particular there is a long list of side effects the out way the good of the medicine. For example lets do Velcade my injections for chemo. Don't freak out : p

•  Fatigue - 2 days out of the week for me.
• Peripheral neuropathy (numbness and tingling of the hands and feet) so far its a no and doctors are shocked which gets me a bid worry.
• Nausea vomiting - thank goodness not for me.
• Diarrhea - not for me.
• Poor appetite - some times.
• Constipation -  thank goodness not for me.
• Headache-  I was in the beginning but I realized that when eat before chemo headaches don't occur so no more headaches for me.
• Difficult sleeping ( Insomnia) - oh another medicine with insomnia , well we know how that is going. lol.
• Joint pains, Arthraiga,  myalgias - because myeloma doesn't bring enough joint pains already.
• Swelling of the face, hands, feet or legs(edema) - oh, ok I taught I was just getting chunky but ill take this excuse :)  My feet/ legs  do swell up when I sit for to long
• Low white blood cells count - I have been off by a bit or a point. 
• Shortness of breath - Only when I work out.
• Dizziness-  at times depending if I don't Eat,  Over work out or dehydration.
• Rash - Omg yes I did on my scalp which I will post later about.
• Dehydration-  I do coconut water and try to do a gallon of water a day.
• Upper respiratory tract infection - no thanks ill pass, if it was that easy right.
• Bone pain - Really... really. ugh...............bit on my back and rt shoulder
• Blur vision - To the extreme at times I can't  see a darn thing and it may be shaking sideways. 
• blood test abnormalities - I hope not.
• anxiety - most medicines have this side effect, no wonder people suffer so much from anxiety.
• Muscle cramps - that is trigger by dehydration side effect.
• itchy, heartburn, abdominal pain, low blood pressure, etc.

     Thats the basic on Velcade one of the 3 chemo drugs.  Velcade Targets and inhibits the Proteasome enzyme complex inside the cancer cells leading the cancer cell to apoptosis ( cell suicide). You can find more information on these chemo drugs on Mayoclinic.com

  What are your side effects if your going through chemo. If you have any questions please leave them down below in the comments. I would love to hear from you.  I hope  you guys stay tune for the next blog and don't forget to subscribe.

Thank you,
Yvette Norris