scantankerous

tomorrow another scan day is upon us. every 6 weeks now for the trial. i feel many things. on the one hand, nervous, because as you remember i had that allergic reaction to one of the drugs at the beginning of the cycle, and so, did not get the full dosage of that drug. on the other hand, i feel semi-ok, because the drug i get every 2 weeks is still a tumor-fighter, and also, i had such a positive scan #1. immunotherapy drugs as described to me are supposed to work well after the time you've received them, so there's that too. 

BUT IT'S A SCAN. scans regardless of one's cancer status, are nerve-wracking buggers, as we've discussed 😐. any scan can show the disease going any way at any time, no matter the last one. the reality of one's lack of control is underscored every time you get one. not making a big deal of it in your head requires some serious mental gymnastics. 

so scan day is monday and cycle #3 with both drugs begins Thursday. for the allergy-causing drug, they'll likely give me a benadryl-sterioids-anti-nausea aperitif (hehe), and then have said drug drip much, much more slowly into my system. it should be okay, i've done this before (see: 2020, carboplatin, desense), and this time it will not be so intense that i'll need a nurse to sit with me for 12 hours to make sure i don't go into anaphylactic shock (i never did, by the way. the worst that happened was a rash on my arm). 

today i'm working on not getting too keyed up for any of this. i've learned over the last 2.5 years (fuck!) to put some weird blinders on, grit teeth, and just march on through this stuff because, honestly, what is the alternative? you do it because you have to do it and because at the moment it seems to be working and you want that to continue, or, at the moment it is not working and you want things to turn around so how else will you find out what happens?

today i'm working on not imagining landscapes where a figure of myself appears and then fades away. isn't that weird? it actually sounds the setting of a 80's music video when i type it out. i'm also trying to come up with a better term than "scanxiety" to describe this feeling. "scanxiety" is cute, but doesn't really cut it, in my opinion. "scantankerous" gets a little bit closer...