Tag Archives: Mouth Sores

“Chemotherapy and You”

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I think we may have have survived our first chemotherapy treatment.  I’m a little worse for the wear, but the medications that we were given to control nausea have seemed to have done the trick for now. This is very encouraging as we have been told that the first treatment gives a really good baseline for how the body will react to future infusions, at least in the short run.

In the long run of course the repeat treatments will certainly start to take their toll on the various systems in my body. But at least think the nausea from the initial poisonings chemo treatments might be bearable. (I hope!)

Starting on Saturday however I did start to experience one of the side effects of chemo. Mouth sores! If you remember from Friday, I talked about the fact that chemo works by attacking rapidly dividing cells (good and bad) and in that sense the mouth is one of the most active places in the body. The mouth is constantly changing and replenishing itself, and is often known as one of the fastest healing places in the the body. (Think about how comparatively fast it heals when you bite your tongue, or burn the roof of your mouth).  Hopefully that will keep these sores from staying around for very long, but it’s the same thing that makes it a susceptible area in the first place.

We’ve been reading about mouth sores AND MORE in our new favorite pamphlet “Chemotherapy and You.” We’ve read and been given tons of reading material, but I kept waiting for something with such an awesome title! I also would have accepted: “So, you have Cancer,” “My first cancer,” “Cancer and Me,” or “Why does Billy have Two Mommies.” I even love  tranquil, meadow/forest scene on the cover. It’s Perfect!

I even asked if the Sound of Music field on the cover was where I could expect to be receiving the chemo treatments. It is not. Just when I thought I couldn’t be more excited for the “Chemotherapy and You” book, I opened it up and saw that it was illustrated in the fashion of an airline safety manual. I could hardly contain myself with laughter and excitement and by this time I think the nurse thought that we were both our of minds. Sometimes I just don’t think that they are always prepared for cancer to be this much fun!

Talk to your doctor if you have concerns.

But yeah, these mouth sores suck and are the biggest side effect that I have right now. It’s like have a dozen or so canker sores on the sides and under the tongue as well as on the floor of the mouth.  As well as just the general weakness. I’ve been taking it easy though, trying to not to get up and move around much. But we’ll see how it goes. Apparently this is how I’m supposed to check:

Thanks “Chemotherapy and Me!” Now I know: open your mouth, and close your eyes.

Here is hoping that they go away as fast as they showed up!

I may have spoken too soon

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I feel sort of guilty about yesterday’s blog post. Well, maybe not guilty, but I certainly feel like I’m not painting the whole picture. You see, yesterday’s post was written on Saturday, and when I wrote it on Saturday, I didn’t know that Sunday was coming.

I almost hate to use the phrase, but the only way to put it would be that Sunday was a “bad day.” At least I hope it was, because if wasn’t then that means that the worst from Wednesday’s treatment is not behind me.

The story of Sunday is still a story of the mouth sores. SO TERRIBLE! When they woke me up in early in the morning we knew that it was going to be a serious problem. Christine called the 24 nurse hot-line to see if there if there was anything that they suggested. Oddly enough there wasn’t much available in their database of knowledge. Whoever Christine spoke to even admitted that she was surprised that there wasn’t much info available, other than it’s an expected side-effect and isn’t something that should be of great concern. I get the feeling that while mouth sores are a common side-effect of chemo, the debilitating intensity with which I was experiencing them might just be my own trademark experience.

The nurse on the phone was able to offer us some help, and after a quick trip to the 24 hour Pharmacy at the hospital, Christine came home with a prescription mouth rinse. It was described to her as Maylox-Benadryl-Lidocane mixture. Shake-well, add some water, swish it up and you should be good to go within 20 minutes.  The taste wasn’t too bad, and it did do the job for a while. The key ingredient is the lidocane, which is the same numbing agent that dentists use orally to numb the injection site before administering novocaine. So yeah, it tastes like that.

It worked for a while throughout the day, but by mid-day even with the rinse I couldn’t eat or drink anything. Even water made my mouth burn so much that I couldn’t drink it anymore.

My family was over for the day on Sunday which was great! But I was generally unavailable to them as I was on the couch just trying to ignore the discomfort I was in. Later in the evening Christine and I went for a walk around the block to get out of the house and I broke down a bit. I was weak from the treatment and weak from not really being able to eat and it was just one of those little moments that I had “prophesied” about earlier in the week. I was living a vision of what the next 8 months of my life are possibly going to be like and I cried as we walked around the block together.

By mid-day on Monday I could eat and drink again but it still hurt, but as my mouth slowly got better I began to get a sore throat that even now (on Monday night) it still causing a good deal of discomfort, but at least I can eat now.  My mouth still hurts, but not as much in the burning sores kind of way. It’s still there, but now there is also a dull aching in my teeth and gums. Not really sure what to make of that yet, but now I feel that the worst is over (until next week when I go back to chemo, at least).