One of the many unpleasantries the doctors don't tell you about before beginning chemo is the length of time the chemicals remain present in your body. Friends regularly ask 'how was the last chemo session', thinking after a 4-our hospital visit and 48-hours of being connected directly to a chemo box that it's over. Simply put, it's not. The chemo keeps work as it's swimming in the blood. My time and focus in between chemo sessions is getting it out of my body. I've documents in many of my previous posts the various side-effects and the process of conquering them; and the general time it's taken me to restore my body back to full vitality (especially since the removal of the ferociously nasty oxaliplatin). Since completing chemo session 8 of 12, I took a trip to Miami with my parents to get some sun and silence. I've been on a steady in-take of green juices here, and I hired a physical trainer and been visiting the gym and ocean daily. My first day at the gym was profound. It was a stead 60-min of cardio, running, and general muscle strengthening. Within the first ten minutes of running my salavia started to generate the medicated chemo mouth. As I lifted weighths my muscels squeezed the chemo and the scent started to push through my pours. The lifting and the running really squeezed out a whole level of toxicity that neither yoga or the sweats at the Russian Baths had accomplished. I knew what my body was climaxing towards as I worked through my program with my trainer, for 2-minutes after my workout was complete I approached the first setting of flora and fauna and gave all the contents of my stomach to the earth.
Monday I return to the hospital for chemo #9. I am two thirds complete. For the final third I've been asked to add a new medication to my 'cocktail' - irinotecan. I haven't made a decision yet. I feel I've suffered enough, yet at this moment - after all the running, swimming, and lifting I feel stronger than ever. I will continue meditating on it until I reach the hospital.
Almost there.....
