It's Needle Time Again!

Seidman Cancer Center
Chagrin Highlands

10 a.m.

I've no more than blinked. And it's that time again ...

Later this morning I will head up to Seidman Cancer Center near Chagrin Falls, where two needles await me:

• Needle One: Xgeva (ex-JEE-vuh), an injection (generally monthly) intended to strengthen my bones, for some other meds I'm on weaken bones. Catch-22. Sort of. The puncture will occur in my triceps, and for some reason the damn thing always hurts--lots more than, say, a flu shot.
• Needle Two: Lupron (LOO-prawn), a testosterone-killer that I've been on for several years (quarterly stabs). Prostate cancer loves testosterone, and if there's none there to "eat," well, the cancer grows more slowly--though it does not stop. It just takes a more scenic, leisurely route. This injection takes place in an upper butt cheek (TMI?), and they actually keep track of which cheek's turn it is! (Share the glory!)
• Actually, the variety I'm taking now is called Trelstar--pretty much the same difference. Here's a link to their site ...

I'm not aware of any evident side-effects of Xgeva (other than (1) pre-poke terror, (2) poke-pain), but Lupron is another puppy altogether. Here's a partial list of the wonders it delivers to me:

• weariness and depression
• death of libido--and I mean death of libido
• heavy sweating (my sweats, for some reason, prefer the hours of the night ... appropriate ... darkness and all ...)
• bone weakness (see above)
• some others I will not mention: this is a family site, after all!

I'm also on Casodex (KASS-uh-dex), a drug that does the same thing as Lupron, Same side-effects. I began taking this one, oh, a year ago when my cancer cells began ... evolving. Figuring out Lupron. A workaround. Other drugs will follow when the dastardly disease figures out Casodex ...

I also have Provenge in my system now--the result of the immunotherapy treatments I underwent in January and February. It's a drug that empowers my T-cells to focus more efficiently on my cancer.

Oh, and I take big doses of calcium each day (bone stuff).

I'll pause here and finish the post when I get back this afternoon ...

[PAUSE]

1:40 p.m.

Back home from PunctureWorld. No real surprises--except they'd scheduled me for a PSA test today--a test I'm also scheduled for in two weeks--so they canceled today's. (Whew.)

The aide who checked me in, hearing my birthday was on 11/11/44, said that hers was 8/8/88. Could not top that one!

So ... puncture-pain ... gone for the nonce ...  I see my oncologist in a couple of weeks, and I'll hear about what's going on in the invisible regions of me ...