Thursday, November 05, 2009

Pamidronate day plus the H1N1 shot

I got my Pamidronate today and went normally. Many nurses have a hard time with my port because of the surrounding tissue and today's was no exception. I don't mind this as much as I used to because I know my port is a bit tricky to access and they're doing what they can. Besides, once a nurse has successfully accessed my port once, they usually don't have problems with it in the future.

It turns out that the cancer center was giving the H1N1 flu shot to all patients today, as long as the nurse could get permission from the oncologist. Getting permission for me took about five minutes; I guess the oncologists were making themselves available for this kind of request. I was originally not going to get the vaccine right now; the Pamidronate makes me tired, and the flu vaccine usually knocks me out for a few days as well. I was worried that the two together would leave me achy and sleepy all weekend.

But then I decided that getting a double-whammy for a few days just once is better than going through slightly milder side effects twice. Plus, getting the shot in the hospital meant that I didn't have to wait in line for hours - I think my wait was about 10 minutes or so. Not bad, huh?

I'm starting to feel the effects of the flu shot now. The arm that received the shot (my right arm, which is also my writing arm and my cane arm) is achy and I'm starting to get really, really tired with a headache and a bit of nausea. I think I'm going to take some stuff for the headache and nausea and make it a very early night.

1 comment:

******* said...

Hope you're feeling better, Chantelle. You've got the flu shot out of the way, one less worry. *Hugs*