Thoughts leading up to Chemotherapy

MONDAY, JULY 28, 2008 10:50 PM, CDT
So the past weekend was spent getting used to the fact that I have cancer again. I'm very lucky to have my parents living nearby, and they will do anything to help my family and I out. We spent a day out at a petting zoo followed by lunch on Saturday. It was a great way to spend time before the chemo knocks me out. We had a big discussion about the new regimen my team of doctors suggested on Thursday.
I received EPOCH-R last year, and did very well with that. The doctors were extremely confident about my remission, but of course here I am 6 months later with another tumor in my chest. They suggested an experimental regimen that is similar to my previous one called EPOCH-CR. The extra "C" is for Campath. Its a drug that is used to treat a type of Leukemia, but has not had much use with Lymphoma patients. It has a lot of side effects, which aren't very pleasing to look at. While I respect my team's reccomendations, I don't want to undergo any extra treatment than I need. Its hard to tell if this treatment would have any extra benefit that I wouldn't get from just repeating EPOCH-R again. I'm basically stuck comparing risk and reward of this Campath treatment, but with no published research about Campath and lymphoma, and just 6 previous patients who have undergone this treatment, its hard to understand if there is a realistic benefit to making myself as sick as Campath will. Its a decision that I have not yet made, despite the fact that I might start chemotherapy in less than 3 days.
Today I stopped by NIH for my bone marrow biopsy. This procedure involved me lying on my stomach while a very large needle is placed against my hip bone, then twisted in order to access the bone marrow cavity. At that point the bone marrow is sucked out.
Last year I had a BMB, and it was extremely painful while the marrow was sucked out. I don't think the body was designed to allow sucking of material located inside the bone. The doctor who did the procedure today was generous with the lidocaine, and it wasn't as painful as last year. However, it is still eery to feel the marrow being sucked out of my hip, despite the absence of severe pain.
I also had my echocardiogram to check on my heart. This is a pretty boring procedure when compared to all of the other stuff I have to go through. I didn't have any heart problems last year, and hopefully I won't this time around. Since the tumor is smaller this time, I'm confident there will be no damage there at this time.
I didn't receive any information about my biopsy from last Friday, so hopefully I'll get some news tommorrow. My next scheduled appointment is Thursday, when I'll have a Pet Scan and meet with the doctors to discuss all of my diagnostic tests. So Tuesday and Wednesday appear to be free of anything cancer related as of right now, but I know enough about this disease to know that things might change any day.