Month: January 2015

Pediavance works for me

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This Pediavance stuff was a good find. Each round of chemotherapy I end up loosing fluids. If I only knew about this stuff in my college drinking days.

We will be packing and heading back to Corpus Christi today.

Watch “Chemotherapy round 6” on YouTube

Chemotherapy round 6: http://youtu.be/eL1nE3b2kRw

This video is an update by Derrick Perrin on Derrick Perrin’s 6th and final round of Chemotherapy at MD Anderson.

 

Chemo Souvenirs

On this chemotherapy journey I have picked up some souvenirs along the way. My first came on round one. I was staying inpatient at MD Anderson and they had a reward program for folks who walked. Kendra and I walked a lot so I got lots of colorful dots on my door. At the end I traded in dots for bandanas. Today in my home office I have a red and green bandana hanging from the wall. I’m guessing you could use these to cover your hairless head. Mine were autographed by my amazing nursing staff so they hang on the wall for now.

The next souvenir that has been accumulating in safety pins. I know, not as exciting as nurse autographed red and green bandanas, but trophies none the less. The process of wearing a backpack full of chemotherapy is unique. You have a backpack with IV bags inside and two bungee type umbilical cords that stretch out to my pic line.Without tethering the bungee to your clothing you setup a tug-a-thon with your chemo bag and your skin that the pic line is sutured to.  wpid-2015-01-09-13.07.44.jpg.jpegSo we introduce the safety pin. It attaches to your shirt and prevents arm failure.wpid-wp-1412106258114.jpeg

The safety pins get collected and we start up the next round with a new pin. I believe two pins have done double duty since we only have 3 right now.

Derrick Perrin's safety pin colleciton

My collection of chemo safety pins

Should I keep them or try out what Kyle did? Check out what one man can do with a red paper clip:

http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.com/

There is always the option to eBay them. I’m just happy to have received my last chemo safety pin and be looking at the end of my treatments. If you have ideas on what can be done with used safety pins please comment below. I’m up for suggestions.
Thanks for the love along the way,
Derrick

Fresh Coffee is Good

Coffee, Is it good for you or is it evil? Well that just depends on who you talk to. Like everything too much of a good think will be bad for you. Don’t drink it on an empty stomach and don’t drink crappy coffee.

So after watching a few online videos Kendra and I got really interested in fresh coffee. Were not talking freshly ground, we are talking freshly roasted coffee. We watched some clips that were very informative. I could write out a lot of facts and bullet points here but its best if you watch

So that got us going on finding a local supplier who could roast green coffee and deliver 24 hour fresh roasted beans. We found a guy who roasted in his apartment and we were hooked. Sure it cost more than the “dead” coffee we bought at the local grocery store. We looked at the pros and cons and freshly roasted coffee beat the low cost vacuum sealed bags from the grocery.

We found our local coffee connection was on a break and we needed a new source for fresh roasted goods. So while sitting for chemotherapy treatments at MD Anderson I made it my personal mission to find a roaster in Houston, Texas. I did and their name is Java Pura. You can find their website at : http://www.javapura.com/
We bought some today and will be roasting it tomorrow.

JAVA PURA featured on FOX 26 Morning News from SKYLINE MOVEMENT on Vimeo.

If you are digging coffee videos here is a good one about Bicycle Coffee

Drink happy,

Derrick Perrin

Medical stats are looking good.

My blood pressure that use to be high is still holding steady. At the start of chemo I weighed in at 190. This is good. Well off to bed with this noisy chemo pump.

 

-Dp

Derrick Perrin Monster Hat

People Hold Hands Here

Today starts my last run of EPOCH-R chemotherapy. When I first learned I had a cancer and I would be taking chemo I could not wait for this week to come. Now that it is here I’m not sure if if I’m ready for it to be over. A friend of mine who has had cancer said to me he finds comfort in chemotherapy. I now know what he is talking about. For me it took a lot to sign up for chemo. I began to have confidence in the poison and realize it is the reason I don’t have a tumor and walk with a limp. I start to think where I would be if I didn’t start and you also worry about what can and cant happen when you stop. While on chemo you take on super powers knowing there will be another round and if we don’t get it on this time we will on the next. Well there have been 5 rounds and this is the last. I won’t have a next time.

I have learned a lot over the last 5 months. There is a theory out there that folks with highly acidic diets get cancer. The flip side to those thoughts is that folks with cancer have tons of acid as a byproduct. So in an attempt at humor at MD Anderson I’m going to conclude that holding hands will give you or your loved ones cancer.

How did I come to this brilliant  conclusion?

Well you cant make it across the cancer center without seeing a few folks holding hands. You walk through the Ambulatory Treatment Center, that is where you get injected with chemo, and see a loved on holding the hand of someone getting their medicine. To the cafeteria and there are hand holders there, to the sky-bridge and there are other pairs holding hands there. So if everyone is holding hands, and everyone here has cancer then we can conclude holding hands give you cancer. Right?

Well I’m going to throw that conclusion out the window with the old dish water.
Seeing everyone hold hands is comforting. I even see my own parents do it here, and they don’t have cancer. I encourage you to do it outside of here. It might lower your stress and help you stay healthy. If holding someones hand is not comforting to you then it might be time to get a new group of folks to be around.
Don’t forget to wash.

So I start round 6 of 6 today and It sends us in to uncharted territory. It almost sets me back to the point of starting chemo. At first we didn’t know what was going to happen. We didn’t know how my body was going to handle chemotherapy. Well now we know my body does extremely well with chemo. We know that it took care of the tumor that was in my body. We run this last round and we will start the process of wait and scan. The doctor will not use the “c” word for another 3 years.

-Derrick, I’m the one making folks smile by wearing a monster hat around MD Anderson.

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