Brisbane to Gold Coast Bike Challenge

Last weekend Michael and I rode in the 100Km Brisbane to Gold Coast bicycle challenge. It was a sunny day so I got absolutely roasted by the sun when the course turned due East along the Hope Island road. My legs were cramping by the end and Michael was certainly getting away from me on the hills. Looks like I still have a long way to go to get my pre-chemo fitness back again. Anyway, Michael was kind enough to wait for the "old fella" and we crossed the finish together four hours after starting. A great day!

Bridge to Brisbane Run

Yesterday I competed in the Bridge to Brisbane 10Km Fun Run. This time I was way back with all the old codgers sponsored by nursing homes and hiding their walking frames, but I finished in one hour and thirteen minutes, even if I did walk a few times. Now I've managed to do that I will have to keep the training up for another twelve months and run it properly in 2012.

Temodal - The unexpected side-effects

Click on photos to enlarge.

BEFORE CHEMO:That is me on the right at 70kgs in late 2009.














AFTER CHEMO: weighing 80kgs in March 2011 - 10kgs overweight with a fat gut! I have some work ahead of me to get rid of that 'food baby'...











Now I know that everyone reacts differently to chemotherapy, so my experiences will not necessarily be the same as the next person's. However, I would have been interested in reading this before I started so I might as well share it with the world.

Nausea - the literature talks a lot about nausea so I was expecting this one. Of course, they always tell you that you will be taking anti-nausea medication to manage it and that is true. My experience was that the only thing that worked was Zofran. And here is a tip my Oncologist Dr Paul Mainwaring told me: Take the Zofran half an hour before you take the Temodal. It seems obvious in hindsight, but at first I did not know what I was doing, so I just lined up all my tablets and took them all at once! - Not good!!!

The other thing I discovered about the nausea was that, for me at least, I found that the nausea was always at its worst when I had an empty stomach. As a consequence I started snacking a lot of the time to keep the nausea at bay.

Tiredness - The literature talks about this side effect as well. But I was not prepared for the absolutely overwhelming tiredness that I experienced. I have been pretty active in the past but I found that it took an enoumous amount of mental discipline to get myself out there doing things during chemotherapy. Fortunately, my mates rallied around and made sure that I was still doing the odd bush walk and bike ride with them.

Weight Gain - Now this is something that I certainly was not expecting! The effects of the snacking associated with the nausea being worse on an empty stomach plus the tiredness (both described above) resulted in consuming way too much food for what I was burning off in exercise. The photos before and after Chemo show the result: a 10 kg weight gain in 12 months.

No blood problems - Strangely enough, the side effect most commonly described in the literature did not occur once for me in the 12 cycles I undertook. Every month I had a blood test and every month Dr Mainwaring would tell me that the 'bloods' (i.e. the results) were great! By the end I was hoping that there would be bad result so I could have some time off. Alas, that was not to be...

Cycle #12, Finally crossing the Finish Line

After a visit to my Oncologist yesterday where my blood tests showed everything to be normal, I have been given the go ahead to start my twelveth (and FINAL) dose of Temodal (temozolomide) next week. As you can see from the size of my gut in the photo, I have gained a lot of weight in the past year from being so sluggish. That was one of the side-effects I was not expecting, so I will do another post at the very end to talk about the side-effects they don't tell you about. It might be useful for those readers considering starting a course of treatment with Temodal.

Starting Chemo Cycle #9

I have delayed the start of cycle number nine until today, 6 December 2010, so I could fit in a bush walk with Michael Weare on the week-end just gone. It was a very wet walk at Mt Barney to survey the lower section of the Eagles Ridge route. We saw some interesting granite country and vowed to return next year after this therapy is over and I will hopefully have more energy.

The usual monthly blood test was done last week and showed that my counts were all in the normal range so the next cycle can proceed as planned. My oncologist, Dr Mainwaring , is very pleased with my progress. I'm just happy that the end of this marathon treatment is now in sight! The last cycle will be in March 2011.

A Quick trip to Hayman Island for my B'day & cycle#5

This is the view of Langford Is. from the summit of Hayman Island.

For my Birthday in the first week of August, Cheryl organised a short stay at Beautiful Hayman Island in the Whitsunday Islands. Unfortunatley, because we delayed the start of

the cycle, it ended up coincided with my five days of Temozolomide for cycle #5, but I was not too sick and had plenty of good distractions like walking the island trails and snorkelling.

Cheryl at the lookout above the boat harbour.

Tired of being tired

Here I am halfway through my third cycle of Temodal and I can't get over how tired I feel all the time. It does not matter how much sleep I have, I always want more. I find that to do anything active requires enormous mental discipline.Yesterday I did get myself over to the cliffs at Kangaroo Point and managed to climb, on a top rope, a fairly easy climb (Samson's Pillar-Australian grade 16, or about a 5.10a in the USA decimal system) that I have done many times before, so that was good but it showed me how much fitness I have lost.

I am getting so fat from lack of exercise that I am disgusted in myself and even though it was pretty cold this morning, I rode my bike to work to burn up a bit of that fat.

Is this common for Temodal? I assume that my body is tired because it is so busy repairing the damage being done by the Temodal. It looks like I need to write this year off as far as energetic activities go. Ah well, so be it, at least I'm alive. 2011 is shaping up to be a big year of catching up. The trouble is that I keep getting older!