Day 29 was a mixture of pleasure and pain, but overall I'm happy how it turned out. The past week side effects have been mostly absent again. Some sniffles and sneezing, but it always goes away in an hour or so.
Nothing else.

And that's the pleasure part. Doc N is both pleased and surprised by my progress so far with Gemcitabine. He asked me three times about stomach pain, as though he couldn't believe I hadn't had any. The bad news was I was stuck in a wheelchair made for a pre-schooler when what I need is one with a wide load sign.. A couple hours in that and my normal jovial demeanor was heading for the exit fast. Also stumbled several times transferring from and to the wheelchair, but luckily had managed to position my fanny at least part way above the seat when the knees gave out.

The good news?  A misinterpretation on my part of Doc N's initial description of the chemo drugs and their side effects. If all goes well with the next three weeks, I will start 5-FU or whatever along with daily radiation. The first good news is that those drips are weekly, not daily. The second is that between the two chemicals, 5-FU is not the one with more pronounced side effects. It turns out the Gemcitabine has more pronounced side effects. So this is likely close to as bad as it gets for me. Unless of course those baddies go viral and we have to get radical.  Should get first clue about that in three weeks, as they want to do a scan to check for new malignancies before doing the radiation. Fingers and eyes crossed about that.

Time to drag my achin self to bed. Best to you all. And best wishes for a peaceful pain free holiday.

Oh. It appears that one of the local VA Social Workers has pulled a rabbit out of the hat and convinced the low-income transportation service from the next county north to take me to daily radiation treatment for two months. I hope this does work, as that would be a very large pile to taxi fares. Thank you, young man.