The first two cycles of chemo caused me to crash the weekend after the medicines were administered, requiring a lot of sleep. This came as no surprise. I was told that the drugs could stay in my system for as long as 72 hours, so if I start the cycle on a Monday, and have two days of the drugs being administered, then they're done ravaging my body by the end of the week, and then it's recovery time.
This time around, though, the tiredness came a lot earlier. Yesterday, I spent the majority of my time in the hospital drained of energy and sleeping on the bed, which was premature given my experience during my past two cycles. While my anti-nausea medicines can make me drowsy, my dose was adjusted during the first cycle to avoid them knocking me out. This happened the second day of my first cycle, when I was given too high of a dose. Today, I was again very tired, and the problem showed up in my blood work: the chemo had knocked down my hemoglobin, and it was now low enough that I needed a blood transfusion. I had to sign a consent form, and the hospital had to find some matching blood in its blood bank, but thankfully that did not take too long. It did push my release back -- the past two cycles, my last hydration day had been a half day, but this time around, it lasted until 3.
Good news is that it appears my energy level is fairly strong again. We'll see how I hold up this weekend, but currently, I am encouraged.
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