Why 30 minutes isn't 30 minutes...

and why Mary cannot drive herself to chemo.

The chemo she is taking gives a burning sensation to the veins as it enters, similar to a potassium IV. They use two techniques to minimize the pain. First is to dilute the chemo with saline. This adds 50% to the 30 minutes. And, another technique is applying a heat pack to her arm while the IV is running and they recommend extending the IV duration by (you guessed it) 50%. That explains why Mary's 30 minute chemo IV took 90 minutes from 5:30 to 7:00PM. And, that should be the duration for all the rest of the chemo treatments.

We also know that the proper blood tests take a minimum of 90 minutes to process. Add an hour for processing orders and the pharmacy and you've got a four hour visit minimum. But, its only one day a week and three weeks in a row followed by a one week break.

The nurse also injected a nausea med given her propensity for nausea. The side effect is that she is a bit loopy and clearly should not drive. Hence our need for re-instituting our taxi team.

The only side effect from yesterday's treatment is sleepiness. Mary fell sound asleep at the lunch table and laid down for a 3 hour nap after lunch. She is awake now at 9PM but I expect she'll proclaim she is going to bed soon.

Mary drove herself to her hairdresser today for a cut before lunch so she was feeling fine but tiredness took over after lunch.

We were hit by a pretty good storm with strong winds that is supposed to last 24 hours or so. It is much like a winter storm (Jan or Feb) and not the typical seasonal fall rain we get leading to winter. Of course, now that the fires have stripped the mountainsides, they are worried about mudslides from all the rain in the fire areas. We lost our cable for a few hours today. The only connectivity we had was our iPhones. Amazing little devices!

This is a shutdown week for me so I am attending critical meetings only and staying home as much as I can to make sure Mary is ok until we know how the chemo affects her. So far, so good.

All in all, good signs from the first round of chemo.