I went up to The Christie on Thursday for my 3-weekly review (no Mytomycin this time). My friend from York met me at the station and we grabbed a nice lunch and a quick tour of the art gallery, as we usually do, before going to the hospital. The blood test revealed that my neutrophils are back to normal but unfortunately my platelets are low. I'm certainly getting to know a bit about all the different white blood cells! The oncologist I saw was a bit concerned. He said that because I'd had a fair bit of chemo so far, both 3 years ago and now, the bone marrow is less and less able to make up the shortfall. He was clearly debating with himself whether I should carry on with the capecitabine. However, I assured him that I was pretty much back to normal after the chest infection, and that I was keen to carry on, so he eventually agreed and I got my prescription. However, he was very insistent that I look after myself and take life easy. I'm getting tired of that! I'm tired of being tired, and tired of having to rest, but I guess a lot of people here feel like that, so I'm not alone. It's so annoying, isn't it, when you want to do normal things but just feel exhausted all the time? I asked the onc whether there was anything I could do to help my bone marrow make more platelets, such as eating red meat or something (I'm largely vegetarian, but I would make exceptions!) but he said no, just take care and rest, rest, rest. I did a bit of reading up about platelets on the train on the way home yesterday (spent the night in York with my friends). I knew they were involved in blood clotting, but I also discovered that they release growth factors which are involved in the repair of connective tissue, so they are needed for wound healing. The greatest risk with having low blood platelets (aka thrombocytopenia) is excessive bleeding. People with low blood platelets are advised to brush their teeth with a soft brush and to blow their noses carefully! Well, the things you learn...
I have had a bit of good news also. First time around I took a (very expensive) supplement called Bio-Bran (MGN-3), made from rice bran treated with enzymes from shiitake mushrooms, which has been shown to boost natural killer cells. It's one of the very few supplements that are safe to take with chemo, and I felt (without scientific proof, of course) that it really helped me get through the treatment with minimal side-effects. However, this time around I felt I really couldn't justify the expense, no longer being gainfully employed or able to afford it. Plus I'm on mistletoe treatment, which I can just about afford. I'd heard from the distributors of Bio-Bran (it comes from Japan) that it is OK to take alongside mistletoe, and that it is possible to get it on the NHS if a case can be made for it, so I asked my GP about it. She wrote to the PCT who, after a couple of months, wrote to me saying that there wasn't sufficient evidence for Bio-Bran so they wouldn't fund it. Fair enough. Then suddenly, last week, I had a call from the senior GP at our local surgery (my other GP having retired) to say that the decision had been overturned and they would fund it! I was so surprised, I couldn't believe it. It would have been nicer if I'd been able to take it from the beginning of my treatment and not when I'm already two thirds of the way through, but hey, I'm not looking a gift horse in the mouth. I picked it up from the pharmacy today and have already had one of the three sachets per day. It might be interesting to see whether it helps with the niggly side-effects of capecitabine, such as the little cuts in the fingers and thumbs, and of course the fatigue, seeing as I've had three weeks off the chemo and have only just started again yesterday.
Finally, I'm back doing daily meditation, and that makes such a huge difference to me I can't believe I left it so long before starting again. Life just looks a whole lot better when you are calm and centred.
