The Neulasta straw

"Can you help me get this thing off?" I asked Bob.

When I left the center I had a Neulasta delivery system installed on the back of my left arm. You know the one, they advertise it on TV a lot now. Recently I had perked up when I heard the commercial come on, because it said it was for patients undergoing "strong" chemo drugs. You start to hear commercials you never heard before when you're going through something like this. So the poor woman in the commercial slips her sweater on over the "thing," has a cup of coffee (tea?) and then takes a short stroll in the garden with her husband.

Come to find out, I'm one of those people getting strong chemo drugs. And in my education I learned that chemo seeks out and destroys quick growing cells including cancer, hair follicles (why!), and white blood cells. So the point of the gadget is to give the patient a shot of a drug that tells your bones to start making white blood cells on the double. Before the Neulasta gadget patients had to drive back to the office a day later to get an injection. This saves us from all that.

The nurse injected the delivery device with the medicine, pulled off the backing, and stuck the thing on the back of my arm. About 2 minutes later it started beeping, and then a winding sound and then SNAP, like a rubber band on the back of my arm. And that was it. (I'm making it sound like I was a trooper, in reality I screamed like a girl. Hey! Let me snap you with a rubber band on the back of YOUR arm!)

Thursday was not good. Thursday was the day after my first chemo, and by all accounts was supposed to be a good day. I wasn't supposed to "crash" until Friday. That's when the pre-meds would wear off. In fact, they told me that Wednesday night when I got home I'd have a burst of energy, be really hungry, and probably have some insomnia. Nope. So Thursday I couldn't get out of bed all day, getting my first taste of what this is really going to do to me.

By Thursday night I was feeling better, nearly human. Bob offered several options for dinner, and I was surprised I was ready to eat. I had totally forgotten about the gadget on my arm until it started beeping at me. They told me to wait a while before removing it, so we agreed we'd take it off after dinner.

"Ow!" I screeched as he started pulling on the tape. I had totally underestimated the stickiness of the stickum and the downy-ness of the hair on the back of my arm. "At least next time I might not have hair here," I told Bob. He kept peeling, tugging, and I kept squirming and squealing. "I have to take a BREAK!" I yelled. By this time I just wanted the thing off me. So we went and sat down. "Okay," he said, "I'm going to just yank." "Okay," I said and started breathing like a pregnant woman in labor. "I'll count to ten." "Okay!" Ten... nine... eight... we were counting together while I'm huffing and puffing. I just knew he was going to pull at some random number so I was braced for it.

At some point while we were counting I opened my eyes and he was holding the thing in front of my face. I might have punched him, I can't remember I was laughing so hard.

Even when I feel like this is all coming apart at times, I am reminded that I have a friend who can and will tease me, play a joke on me, and get me to laugh in spite of myself.

And it's also proof that God loves me, knows me. From Friday's Psalm 139, verse 14: "I praise you, because I am wonderfully made;wonderful are your works! My very self you know." (my emphasis)

More has "come off" since then. My hair, for one. Which happened yesterday.