Been a long time since I posted here. Felt like writing something so this is the best place. So, since my last post I have under gone two different cell transplants. After 8 rounds of chemo, there is still a small amount of cancer cells left. So to eradicate this thing once and for all I am going through a one two punch of cell transplants.
The first transplant was with my own cells. The goal during this procedure was to hit met hard with chemo and radiation, and I mean hard. I would be hit so hard that they would need to transplant my own cells back to help me recover. In a span of a week I went through two days of the most intense chemo I had ever received and also had to go through four days of radiation twice in a day. I actually keep chemo down in an ok manner, but the combination of chemo and radiation made me suffer in new ways. I never barfed from chemo, but it was pretty violent and the migraines where out of this world. I eventually got through the chemo/radiation week and started to recover which took abut a month of hospital recovery.
So now the second transplant has come. This time the cells I’m receiving are from my brother, and those cells will actually attack the cancer cells. Basically my immune system isn’t attacking the cells, but by transplanting my brothers immune system in me, it will see the cells as foreign and attack.
Thankfully, I get to spend significantly less time in the hospital. While I did suffer through a week and a half of daily clinic infusions, and two days of hospital chemo. I am now through the initial transplant and am in a time of monitoring. I need to go to the clinic daily so my doctors can monitor whether or not it’s actually working. Altogether it will take 100 Days for my doctors to monitor me, hoping some reaction will happen.
Frankly, I’m scared. I want to believe that it’s over, that this will cure me and I’ll live a normal life (which my doctors have told me that this is a big procedure). While being in the hospital isn’t fun, I know when I am being intensely monitored, something is happening and progress is being made. Now that I’m left to my own device, even through I’m going in daily for visits, there are times that I wonder what exactly is going on inside of me.
I can act normal, play video games, and visit friends, all I want, but am I getting better? In fact, after I got out of the ICU, I felt just like everything was over. I was normal. It’s a hard line that cancer patients walk, the feeling that there’s something uncontrollable that’s inside them. Something that will kill them. To combat the disease, one must suffer through some tough medical procedures, even though they see no apparent problem.
So what do I do? Well, follow the doctors orders, be myself and hope for the best. It’s the only thing I can do. I hope in the mean time I can share the story.
Sometimes life throws you an egg, and it lands in your face. Laugh it off. Sometimes life throws you a baseball (or curveball) in your face. Laughter may help one, but time will heal both.
At this point in my life, video games aren’t just a hobby. It’s hard to really describe; to say that gaming is a “way of life” makes it seem like I let gaming influence parts of my life that don’t involve gaming. The fact of the matter is that gaming has become a way to truly test ones decision making skills, and also to partake in social interaction.
I’ve gamed since I was a kid, and back then it was just a way to kill time. I was never really a great student and never felt the need to finish homework. So my afternoons were just time to finish that next part in a game. When I grew older I soon realized the difference in single and multiplayer competitive games. one was a great novel and story to finish, the other a way to really test my skills.
It sounds like a bit of a stretch to say video games test skills that you will use in your life, outside of gaming. Though, video gaming is one of the best ways to test ones decision making and critical thinking skills.
This became the experiences I craved. Situations where my knowledge and learning capabilities were tested, but also my ability to out think my opponent. I soon gravitated to online multiplayer experiences.
I am now at a point where I no longer want the most fun and coolest experiences, I want games that will truly push me to my learning limit. The best way to do this, is to play with a constant group of people. You will learn so much more if you share your knowledge or even just play against consistent opponents.
If you ever want to take your gaming to the next level, to experience gaming in a whole new way, then I highly recommend seeking out either a stable group of friends to play with or a gaming community.
Gaming for me right now, is the ultimate outlet for my frustration and stress. I can truly focus on something other than my medical condition or my overall well-being. With a stable group of friends to play with, gaming isn’t just a simple hobby or something I occasionally partake in. It is a passion, and I don’t see myself stopping anytime soon.
It's been about five days since I've moved back to Seattle and my days have been filled with different meetings and doctors visits. Me and my mom have been settling down pretty nicely and our days have been busy but consistent. While I have received a fair amount of warnings, cautions, and preparation speeches from my doctors, I am more prepared than ever to tackle this on. On the bright side I've organized a fair chunk of my birthday, one that will most definitely remind myself that I'm still young and (sort of) healthy. Let's hope I can finally get the internet into my room this evening.
Chemotherapy as a procedure is one of the most known types of medical treatments in the modern world. Chemo and cancer go hand in hand, both are practically inseparable. When you go through cancer you’ll most likely have that moment everyone else has when going through such a disease. You’ll look at your nurses and see them hang the bag and think “this is it”. Whether you then tell yourself that “this is suppose to fix me” ultimately based on what round of chemo you are going through.
At first, it isn’t anything but unnerving. You ask yourself, is this chemical really suppose to “heal”? In the end though, it’s not, it’s suppose to kill literally everything good that’s going on in your body as well as the cancer. After the first few minutes you feel fine, maybe even an hour, but things start to go south.
Now, I like to say I take chemo pretty well compared stories that I overhear. I’ve never vomited from chemo and the side-effects only last for three or four days for me. I also look pretty well bald, though eyebrows are something I would like to keep. Chemo, though, makes you miserable without making you feel sick.
From my point of view chemo is the real source of the hardships cancer brings. While cancer is this disease that is slowly taking over ones body, it may be isolated to maybe a leg pain (in my case). Chemo affects everything your body wants to naturally do, grow and heal. After chemo you’ll go through your daily life, thinking that you just are sick, but slowly you’ll begin to realize everything that’s wrong.
The worst part, is that things you want to enjoy aren’t there anymore.
I could go on about how horrible cancer and chemo is, the point I want to get across (or try to get across) is effect of chemo mentally and emotionally. While it is a drug that will help you get better, it does so in the most intense of ways.
If you have family or friends that are going through chemo, just be there for them. Their medical state shouldn’t be your concern, you can’t control that. What really is being destroyed is a persons identity and emotions.
Most nurses are hot. Really, there are nurses that have good looks that match their overall helpfulness. Now, nurse Allison how about dinner? Joking aside, I've met alot of amazing nurses in my travels. They are really ones that really take care of you. They make sure the doctors orders are being pursued and overall make sure you are fine minute to minute. Not to say that other people on your team don't help, but the nurses are the ones who really are the face you see through out your treatment. One of the biggest, and most obvious, pieces of advice I can give to a person in the hospital is to talk to their nurses. Though, talking about pain is already hard to do and describe, I urge everyone to take it a step further and talk about yourself. It's truly a hard thing to be in the hospital, for both you and the nurse. So make it easier for nurses to... care (see what I did there?) about you by letting them get to know you. Really it's something that may seem very obvious to anyone, but I had a thought today that I might further express in other creative forms later in life. From your own point of view, you're just one patient. Walking down the aisles of my hospital I got to see the multiple people who were suffering the somewhat of the same fate. The reality of the situation was that I was the young healthy guy on my floor. The hospital I visit is for patients the age of 19+, everyone else goes to the childrens hospital. I am 22, I pass by people that look like that cancer just adds to the list of problems they suffer from. As much as I want to say that everyone who is in the hospital is healthy enough to be in a good mood, it isn't true. Now imagine how a nurse is suppose to deal with multiple patients, with different moods. I want to say that they have a good job for meeting different people, but they have to meet people while they are literally at their worst. When i'm in the hospital I try to be bright, but also honest. I try because I don't want to believe that nothing is wrong. Though, I have more than myself to really help me.
Another eventful morning followed by a quiter afternoon. Waking up at 6am, I had to head to the hospital for my procedure that I mentioned before in my journal. I've done a procedure like this before, but when you start to gown up you begin to realize that you are you were never prepared to what will happen next. At this point I know nothing will ever go wrong unless I cause it to go wrong, but when they start to put you on the cold table and start to drape sterile sheets over your head, you begin to worry. Then the pokes to get you numb, then the numb pain that you don't really feel but at the same time your body is outright screaming to you that something isn't right. Overall the nurses and doctors said I did great, but my groggy sleepy self had other things to say. I talked to my oncologist Dr. Stephen Smith, and was ready to hand me over to the transplant team. For the next three-ish weeks I am heading into the hospital for meeting, blood draws, and transplat prep, every day. I'm happy to move but I don't know if I will even enjoy it. I am now sitting in another hospital waiting for my next round of chemo. I'm actually staying in a newly constructed wing, and it shows. The equipment just has that "new" feeling. I might just write about the different nurses I have encountered in my travels. I've become very used to the questions, both medical and personal, they usually ask about. One of my favorite question to answer is the classic "so what do you do?". Of course, my answer is usualy talking about video games. While some actually game, most think it's just a fun hobby. Any nurses or doctor's interesting is usually piqued when I talk about Dota 2. You see, talking about 10 million dollar tournaments and how I used to get paid for coaching people is a very entertaining and interesting topic to both explain and hear about. It's going to be a rough week, and month now that I think about it. Though i'm trying to keep it positive. i just want to go home and fit as many Dota 2 games as possible until whatever next hospital event I need to complete.
I’m sitting in my hotel room watching an episode of Undercover Boss on TLC. For some reason shows on TLC are seemingly so boring, but are actually very interesting and engrossing when you start watching them.
Tomorrow I will be undergoing a small procedure to put in a line into my chest. Meaning I will have a tube hanging down that will make it much easier to draw blood and tranfuse other items into me.
The whole morning was very daunting. Two meetings about new cautions and procedures that both the hospital need to complete, and also myself on a daily basis. By the end of the week I will have to inject (via needle) two different drugs, three times a day.
I have received alot of news in my fight with cancer, and yet I receive bad news pretty well. The news of this reminds me the gravity of my situation and what is needed to defeat such a disease. I try to face whatever I must get through as just time that I need to kill, time I need to just forget about. So far the physical pain of chemo or other procedures has been easy to forget about, though being poked with a needle seems to be my worst enemy. I’m pretty sure it would be to alot of people.
Later in the day I met with a group of friends. First a small date with my friend, Marie, who seems to be one of those friends that at first, you thought you would easily drift away from, but in the end you somehow always find time to spend with them. You may even find the time spent with them as some of the most entertaining.
Afterwards I ate dinner with a group of friends old and new. I’m moving to the city in a week and I then can easily see them more. I haven’t seen some of my friends in months, and in all honesty I felt my old self creeping back up. Full of anxiety and self-conciousness. I thought I wouldn't how to act in front of them. This might be caused by literally being in a different world, full of doctors and medical procedures, and then being put back into the social world. When I finally caught up with them I Immediatly didn’t care. I didn’t care about any problems or any worries of that world really.
I was just with friends, getting food. Having a good time and just being young. When I get to be like this I remember why I’m fighting. To get back to this. Each one of my friends are truly someone I find interesting, and I just feel normal when I’m around them.
Another procedure another step closer, but many more hurdles lay ahead.
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