Cold Turkey

Has it been almost two weeks?

Well, let me catch you up.  Xeloda has been not too bad.  During the two weeks I was taking it, the worst side effect I experienced was fatigue.  If I have a big day, I am completely spent at the end of it and I have to go to bed early.  It really hit me hard at the beginning, and it kind of tapered off as the time went on.  Sometimes just the thought of doing something is exhausting and I psych myself out of it.  I haven't really had nausea, but I vomited a couple of times, seemingly out of nowhere.  I have also noticed an extreme lack of appetite.  I seem to be eating about half what I normally would and then I'm way full.  It's kind of weird, because I have never in my life had this problem.  I've lost a little bit of weight as a result, but I'm not too worried because I can't really exercise.  Until I'm in a size 4, I won't worry too much about it.

On the last couple of days of taking Xeloda, I started to notice hand and foot problems.  It felt like this... On the first nice day of the year you wear sandals for the first time in months.  You go on a walking tour of a large city. The next day, your feet are absolutely killing you, and you don't want to wear those shoes for another week until the bottom of your feet feel better.  That's how it felt.

Then, on the day after I took the last dose, my feet actually felt better as the day went on, whereas the previous night had made them feel worse.  Clearly, getting the drug out of my system was what helped, since sleeping had not made them feel any better.

I've been off the drug for about four days now and I'm still tired, but my appetite has come back quite a bit and the hand and feet problems are nonexistent.  But that's not the only drug I'm referring to when I say "cold turkey".

For the last few days I had been thinking about not taking my pain meds.  I had stopped taking them briefly almost right after I started taking Xeloda (after that steroid incident where I felt great for one day), and I was in a lot of pain, so I started back on them right away.  Even with a constant level of Oxycontin in my system (once every 12 hours), I had a few really weird painful episodes a week or so ago.  One day, I woke up around 4:00 in the morning and I had wincing pain in multiple areas of my abdomen.  It was so bad I was whimpering and crying and I was just in absolutely so much pain I couldn't think straight.  I had to take Ibuprofen on top of the Oxycontin just so I could go back to bed.

However, I haven't been feeling any breakthrough pain for awhile, and I thought maybe this weekend was a good time to see if I could stop taking them.  I was reluctant, because I really didn't want to start feeling that bad level of pain again, but on Saturday morning I was kind of busy and I didn't take them right when I woke up.  I did a few things, didn't feel any pain, and I still didn't take them.  Before I knew it, I was driving to see my mom and I hadn't taken anything for several hours past my scheduled dose.  Let's get to the point.  The last time I took anything for liver pain was Friday night, and I have been feeling good.  I am hopeful that Xeloda is working and I'm looking forward to telling my doctor about it when I see her on Thursday.

Based on this information, I don't think I'll get a scan until I complete another round of Xeloda, so the official verdict will have to wait.  I've felt this way before, so I'm not trying to get myself too excited, but it's kind of hard not to be happy about this.