The final insult to all of the indignities of cancer, having someone look up your butt, losing your intestines, not living the way you want to, and Lord only knows what else is happening comes the neuropathy. This is a numbing sensation that I developed in both hands and both feet. Now with all I went through, one would think I was prepared for this. Nope! Not at all!
On the last, notice I said the last, day of my treatment I developed this weird tingling sensation in feet and hands. At first I thought I was just really cold. Chemo centers are not your typical household temperature of 72 degrees. They can be cooler due to how everyone is feeling and in the St. Clare's Center in Denville, there are roughly 20 patients getting treatment at the same, but varying times. The nurse gave me a blanket and I actually felt better for the treatment time period. Only the tingling did not go away. It remained and so far remains to this day. Upon seeing the doctor for my sign out he stated at that time that it could last about 6 months to a year. Guess what? This too is crap! It is 2011 and I still have symptoms in my hands and worse ones in my feet.
I was sent to a neurologist up in Newton who basically hooked wires to my legs and hands to see the reactions of the muscle tissue. Two trips warranted him telling me that I would probably only have about 80% use of them the way they once were. Basically I am to treat myself as a diabetic would. I have to watch for cuts and bruising and make sure I don't pick up any type of infections on my feet. We wouldn't want to amputate them now would we? He had to be kidding! All those diplomas on the wall and the guy was a jerk. I decided I would seek out any and every cure for this condition.
Finally on one of my cruises, there was an accupuncturist. She was from Hawaii and not only had studied Eastern medicine, she studied Western medicine. We started with the hands seriously as I needed them more for my job as an anatomy teacher so this was important. The feet could come later. It was a week of daily treatments of the needles and learning how to relax my mind if I had a mishap such as handling a knife and fork. In the beginning I hated going out in public afraid I would drop things randomly. The feet and legs have been a problem that no one seems to be able to fix. I do intend to go back to accupuncture as I made such good progress. All I can hope is that it will work. I will keep you posted once surgery to meniscus is over with and therapy begins.
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