He then made it through two more days of radiation—but a cople of annoying side effects crept in. As we were warned, his taste has diminished. As he puts it, everything is starting to taste like sawdust. I don't know, that might be good with ketchup. Or not. Then he started running a temperature. Just a low-grade fever, but (a) it was causing him chills, and (b) we're supposed to report when his temperature goes above 100.5. When it hit 100.50000001 (yes, my thermometer goes to the millionth decimal place—doesn't everyone's?), I called the doctor. Sure, it was almost 11 p.m. on a Friday, but I'm a rule follower, and the rules said to call any time night or day.
I was excited to find out that Vic's NotChemo oncologist was on call that night. Until I actually talked to him. I told him that we had been instructed to report a temperature above 100.5, and Vic's had reached 100.6. He said, "He's on the Erbitux, right?" "Right," I said. "Well then, his counts are not an issue." Now many of you may not know this, but I am practically a doctor myself, having watched medical shows since I was a child, starting with Marcus Welby, M.D. (oh, that Dr. Kiley was a dreamboat) through Emergency! (oh, that Randolph Mantooth—yummy), Medical Center (hello, Chad Everett!), M*A*S*H, China Beach, Scrubs, ER (do I want Dr. Greene or Dr. Carter to be my doctor? I just can't decide!) and of course, Grey's Anatomy (McDreamy, McSteamy, Major Hottie—there are just too many to name!).
ANYWAY, I know enough to know that "counts" are white blood cell counts, and when they're too low and there's a fever, that's a sign of ... well ... something. And I know that chemo has an effect on white blood cell counts. So I get what he was saying. But the fact remained that Vic had a fever, and I was supposed to report it. So I told the doctor, "Well, that's great. So are you telling me that I shouldn't be worried about the fever?" And he said, "Well, his counts are not an issue." At this point, I was so frustrated—all I wanted was a little reassurance. Something like, "Yeah, that list of things to report is for chemo, but since you're on Erbitux, a low-grade fever isn't something to be worried about in terms of his treatment. Now, if the fever gets to [insert some temperature here], that is something you should report. In the meantime, just watch xyz. If that stays stable, you should be in good shape. You might also try abc. That sometimes helps the fever." OR maybe ask me some questions, like "What does his incision site look like? Was he exposed to xyz or anything like that?" Just something that didn't make me feel like (a) I'm too stupid to know the difference between chemo and NotChemo, (b) I'm too stupid to know the difference between a symptom to report and one not to report, and (c) I am just a pest.
We hung up, and I had my scheduled meltdown from 10:47 p.m. to 10:54 p.m. Vic, the ever calming presence that he is, talked me off the ledge. (It's not like I'm prone to overreacting—oh, wait. OK, maybe it was just me. I did always think he was a nice person and a very caring doctor.)
Well, Vic's fever did not go up any further and was back to normal by midmorning, so we WENT TO THE HARRY POTTER MOVIE! It was awesome.
Meanwhile, back in the food department, Vic's diminished taste sensation mae him not want to eat. I gently reminded (read: nagged) him that he needs to eat to keep up his nutrition and his weight. The weight is really important because the mask fits quite snugly, and if he loses any weight, he'll be able to move his head in the mask, which could cause the radiation to go ... somewhere else. Furthermore, the radiation is so precisely positioned that even if he didn't move his head, his lesser body mass could cause the placement of the radiation to be off.
He gently reminded (read: gently reminded) me that he understands that and he won't do anything to jeopardize his health or his treatment.
Still he did not eat much, so I changed tactics and bring out the big guns: Nurse Ratched. She's worked for me before. She threatens him to get him to eat. He does not like Nurse Ratched, so he did not cave in to her. I changed tactics again: bargaining. I suggested that if he did something distasteful with me (like, go car shopping), I wouldn't make him eat dinner. This was enough to get him to eat a little bit more. (The truth is, all the nagging/bargaining/pleading/whatever in the world will never work—he is like the lightbulb: he will eat when he's damn good and ready to. I know, I know. That's not really the way that saying goes. But you know what I mean.) Eventually, through sheer willpower, he started eating more. Which is good, because his radiation nurses would not have been happy with him if he'd lost weight over the weekend.
And so I find yet another thing I admire about him—his perseverence. I simply can't imagine not being able to taste food but still having to shove it down my throat. But he does it, every day.
So now you're caught up to radiation day 4, which started with Nurse Wags:
She's so much better than Nurse Ratched. And cuter to boot!
So let's talk about radiation day 4. As you all should know by now, Vic has a defibrillator implanted in his chest in case he has an arrythmia. (Also just the one kidney, but that's a different story.) They don't want the defibrillator going off during his radiation treatments. This would cause him to jerk around, which could potentially cause the radiation to not be delivered to the right place. So they put a magnet over the defibrillator during treatments and have a heart nurse standing by. And it's a good thing, too, because on radiation day 4, Vic went into V-tach during radiation.
Medical aside: ventricular tachycardia (V-tach) is a fast heart rhythm that originates in one of the ventricles of the heart. This is a potentially life-threatening arrythmia because it may lead to ventricular fibrillation, asystole, or sudden death. We've been the sudden death route, don't recommend it.
As Vic tells the story, he was lying in the treatment room all alone (becuase, you know, it's radioactive in there) when suddenly there was a lot of commotion during which he heard the word "V-tach." Someone explained to him that there were some anomalies on his EKG readout and were calling his cardiologist to see what they should do. No biggie. Right—no biggie for you. You're not strapped down to a table by your head with a band holding your shoulders still. You didn't die last year because your heart decided to stop working. YOU DON'T HAVE JUST THE ONE KIDNEY. Just then, one of the nurses came in and just started talking to him in a soothing voice. Telling him all about her vacation to South Dakota and the Big Heads and Devil's Tower and so on. Anything to take his mind off of what was happening. This did not work, but he did enjoy the company. Fortunately, after a few minutes, they came back in reporting that the cardiologist had said it was OK to continue with the treatment, so they did.
Was it scary? Sure was. But he didn't really seem overly concerned about it, which made me feel a whole lot better. :-)
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