I thought I would explain a little bit about what chemo is like. Above is a picture that our friend, Phil, took of me one time while I was at a maintenance med infusion. Regardless of if I do "chemo", I usually always have doctors appointments on Thursdays or Fridays for infusions of some meds. That is just the way my life is and I don't mind. The medicine is a privilege that other aggressive cancers do not have. I am fortunate.
Anyway, they infuse the med into a port-a-catheter in my right arm. The shortened version of the name is "port". My port is in my arm while most BC survivors have ports in their chest. Mine is in the arm because my surgical team had difficulty getting the port attached to a major vein in my chest. No biggie, though. The arm makes it a little more convenient and accessible. Yet, the port can be finicky, but it is better than trying to access a vein directly with chemo.
The main reason for the port is that it streamlines the process of getting the chemo into the vein. With regular vein access, chemotherapy can sometimes burn the veins when going in. Once the needle is in the port, there is no pain for the infusion of chemo. A lot of times with any cancer surgery, some lymph nodes have been removed and access to one side of the body may be compromised because of this (more on lymph nodes in another post).
My chemotherapy that I am currently on is Abraxane. I was on Gemzar as well, but Gemzar is just as hard-hitting as Abraxane but causes quite a bit of the harsh side effects. it was causing me to have extreme fatigue, my platelets were low and my red blood cells were low. Two weeks ago, the fatigue hit so harshly that I just slept most of the week. We had decided to strip off gemzar once we saw progress on the scans.
The reason we kept abraxane is because it is a member of a drug family called Taxanes. I have had other Taxane drugs and have responded well to them, meaning my cancer has retreated while I was on them. My doc and I feel that our good response that was shown on the scans is mainly due to the abraxane over gemzar. According to abraxane.com, the drug actually delivers a form of Paclitaxel to the cell to slow tumor growth or halt it. Paclitaxel is a potent anti-cancer agent that is evident in cancer drugs such as Taxol, Taxotere and Abraxane.
I would like to tell you what Abraxane does at the actual cellular level, but the web site is not really clear on this. It just says it interferes with cellular production, which is good. I might make a list of the common breast cancer drugs if you all would think that would be helpful. Please always feel free to ask me questions either via the blog comments or my email address listed at the top of the page (loloplunkett@gmail.com)
Herceptin is another drug I take...it is a maintenance drug, yet a wonder-drug. Herceptin is the drug that has changed the story for girls like me, it is has literally saved so many women's lives. When a woman gets breast cancer, it can be fueled by a protein called her-2-neu. These cancers are deemed the most aggressive of breast cancer. Yet because of Herceptin, my cancer is more treatable.
Tykerb is another drug that attacks the her-2-neu cancerous cells. It also attacks her-1 cells. The problem with cancer is that the DNA can evolve. Technically, there are her1, her2, her3 and her4 cells that can grow on breast cancer cells and help the cells to grow and divide quickly. Her2 is the most aggressive or more well-known of these cells. Yet, the cancer can evolve to use her1 or her3 or her4. With someone like myself, who has had growth while on Herceptin, it is believed that my DNA has probably done this very thing. I believe this.
However, Tykerb and Herceptin are believed to be synergistic and work well to abolish growth. I am on both of these and they are working. Also, on the horizon is a drug called Pertuzimab (label name not known). It goes after her1 through h4. I believe I will be on this drug at some point and that is when my cancer will finally stabilize for good. I believe I will be stable before then, sometime this year. I believe these drugs could shrink my cancer to oblivion and strike its potency.
I am a lucky girl to have cancer at this time in the evolution of drugs. That is why I truly believe in my healing. I know there has always been another drug or procedure to guide me to my next step. And, although I am in the middle of a battle, my faith guides my every step. Don't get me wrong, I use my brain too...but that is just one of the tools in my arsenal.
I am forever-indebted to the people who came before me and decided to make these drugs. I plan on making sure to mention all of this in my book so people understand the relevance of all this hard work. Like i said, Herceptin and other drugs have changed my story from one of early death to a long life ahead of me. This is true for many other young women I know. WOW!
Blessings,
Lolo
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