Today we saw Dr. Kane in a follow-up to CAKE visit and to check my “numbers” in my blood (who knew there were digits in my blood!?). She wanted to know all about how I felt after treatment, how the medications were working, etc. After the CAKE, I was sent home with three different medications for nausea and I couldn’t quite figure out why so many and which ones I should take first before resorting to the next one. I was able to ask her about it today and she showed me which ones to take first, second and third. Apparently they all work differently, though they all did help curb my nausea. Also, the past week I’ve only been really nauseous when I’m hungry and usually by then I don’t realize I’m hungry till it’s too late, my stomach’s all wonky and the last thing I want to do is eat anything! She said my stomach’s probably more acidic than usual, due to the CAKE and other medications I’m taking. I normally take 40mg of Nexium for my GERD so she suggested I double that by taking it twice, instead of once, a day. Finally, the docs made two incision sites in order to place my port a couple weeks ago. One of them is smaller than the other and has had some sort of thing sticking out of it for a while now. It looks and feels like a scab but when I tried to remove it, it pulled hard on the skin and wouldn’t let go. So I slapped a band-aid on it and left it alone until I got to Kane today. I asked her about it and she says it looks like one of the sutures used to close the incision is just poking up and out right there. It shouldn’t be a problem but if it gets red or otherwise looking worse, I should go back and have Interventional Radiology take a look at and possibly repair it. Not a big issue though. She said I could just keep a band-aid on it to protect it from my clothing in the meantime. Since it’s up on my neck and visible to the world, I got some cute little Hello Kitty band-aids for it. Might as well be fashionable, eh?!

Now for the good news: As we were shaking hands and saying our goodbyes, Dr. Kane told me I look great. She said, “You look even better than you did before you started treatment! That must mean it’s working!” HORRAY!

Now for the even better news: She told me that I’ll be getting a total of “two cycles” of CAKE. A single “cycle” includes two treatments of CAKE. Therefore, I’ll be getting four treatments. She said the after effects of CAKE get better every time I get it so as long as I tolerate the next two well, we can complete it with a fourth treatment. Then we’ll do a CAT scan to see how much the tumor has shrunk. (Do you see how I didn’t even use the word “if” right there!?) If I do my math right -I’m a preschool teacher so I’m not really required to know much math past the number 10- we’ll do that CAT scan somewhere around early to mid-February. Won’t that be a great birthday present for me!

Now for the most bestest news: We did a routine blood count this afternoon, too, to check on those aforementioned numbers. I’m supposed to get my teeth cleaned at my periodontist’s office on Wednesday and they said as long as my “numbers” are high enough, they can go ahead with the cleaning. So Dr. Kane rushed the results and left me a message with the numbers before we even made it home from her office. She said, “Your blood counts look excellent!” Here they are, in case you were curious (and for my own records to compare to next time):

Normal White blood cell (WBC, leukocyte) count in nonpregnant women: 4,500–11,000/mcL3 Mine is: 7,300!

Normal Hematocrit (HCT) in women: 37%–47% Mine is 43.1%!

Normal Platelet (thrombocyte) count in children and adults: 150,000–400,000 platelets per mm3 Mine is 308,000!

CBC information provided by WebMD

I think that means I got an A! Woo hoo! That’s the best news I’ve had in months!

Now we’re headed to Lindsay’s for a New Years Party to celebrate! Happy 2008 everyone!