Randam Adam

  For the last week or so the main side effects that I have been feeling is: Tiredness, soreness, getting hot and feeling flustered very easily, insomnia, dehydration easily, and just a general feeling of weakness and aches.   I haven't had the most energy, but still no major sickness yet.  As you cans see from the pictures I have been having drawn. I have to go twice a week for them to test my count levels and see where im at and how my immune system is.  THIS is very important and determines where I can go and what I can do.

Sorry I havent updated in awhile. Been really tired and not sleeping. Plus my computers been down. Will write an update tomm from the past week plus movie reviews

OK, So it is day three after Chemotherapy and I wanted to do just a basic post about what happened and all that I felt and can remember.

Sorry its taken a few days to get this up, I have really been resting and just went out last night for the first time.

  So I arrived at the hospital around 8:40am and I was put into my own room. I will not always have this, just depends on how busy they are, they do have main rooms but like to let you be by yourself your first time so you can have more personal interaction with the nurses and doctors and can ask questions and they keep a closer eye on you.  It was a nice little room with a bathroom that I shared with the patient next door.

  So I was extremely nervous and my blood pressure showed it when they first took it.   But it went back to normal after I relaxed a bit.  Well my dad dropped me off and it was a lot of waiting at first. Then nurses and doctors came in to talk to me and started explaining what they were gonna do. The first thing that was done was that they sterilized my entire chest and the area around when the portacath is at. After that the lovely needle went into my chest.  Seeing as my incisions and the area around it isn't even healed yet this was pretty painful ( I'm told after it heals fully that the area basically becomes numb).  They started me off on a water (or saline drip) that basically starts flushed thru the tubes and make sure everything is going where its supposed to and that all is well inside.

The type of chemotherapy Im on is called "R CHOP" so there are four types of medicines they give me there that day and the fifth part is a pill that I take at home twice a day.

  They say that the first time getting chemo takes a lot longer cause they have to take every medicine super slow at first to make sure that you dont have any major allergic reactions.  So they say that a typical chemo session can be between four to five hours,  I was there for a little over nine. So they said my body did extremely well and had no major reactions.  So nexttime hopefully it will be shorter.

  I would say that the majority of the time I didnt feel anything beside the liquid moving through me, but the third medicine is called a "Direct IV Push" where instead of an IV Drip they have these four needles and they basically squeeze them really quickly into me.  hat one hurt a little bit, kind of a warm burning sensation inside my heart spreading out into my extremities.  It went away after a few minutes though.

My Nurse Gloria.
She was awesome, she checked on me every few minutes to make sure I was ok, and that my body was reacting harshly to the chemo.


So the main things I felt while I was there would be tiredness, soreness and Im not sure if it was my body or the room but I was hot alot of the time.  Besides that it was just alot of lying around. I had my Gameboy DS, newspapers, my web enabeled cell phone, magazines and even a pad and paper.  The only thing I really did was watch some tv and be online and text, I was pretty restless and tired, but its really hard to sleep when there are lights on and its daytime and someone comes in every few minutes to check your vitals and see how you are.
So it was a long day, but I survived, I learned a few things I can do next time, like bring ligt snacks and to wear shorts and maybe a tank top.  I met alot of great and kind nurses there and even some volunteers that were awesome as well.  I am truly blessed thst GOD  helped me find UCI and Doctor Sender and that I feel like I am getting some great care.


   So far the main effects that I am feeling would be: tiredness, a bit of soreness, a little queasy and just a feeling like I am borderline getting the flu.  Ive also had a little bit of a headache for the past few days, but just resting and drinking tons of water.  I'm also talking to people who have gone thru this recently and trying to learn as much as I can about the process and the effects of the chemo and side effects of all of the medicines.

   So please continue to pray, I'm hoping that I don't get really sick, but they say that most part feeling it in the week after the injections.  So time will tell.  If you have any questions or suggestions or just anything at all please leave a comment. I will try to be on every few days to update you guys and keep you up to date!

                                                       GOD Bless,
                                                                         ADP

Sorry Everybody,

   Its been a few days since I had my chemo and I have been just staying down.   So everyone wants to know how I feel and the most basic answer is that I really dont know yet.   I have had a really bad cold for the past few weeks and am still fighting to finally rid myself of that, but I'll just tell ou how I feel at this moment.

   This is gona be a quick summary because I am in the process of getting ready to go out for the first time since chemo to the movies with my parents and my longtime friend Dawnn. We are going to the Irvine Spectrum to see "A Christmas Carol" in IMAX 3D (review to follow).

   SO basically a summary is that I am tired, and have what I would normally associate with flu-like symptoms (weakness, overall body soreness, feeling warm or feverish, a tiny headache that has been ing for two days and abit of an upset stomach).  So none of the major side effects yet, im told that they typically are seen in the first seven to ten days so i still have awhile til im there. So we will just have to wait and see.

  Thanks for all of your thoughts, prayers, texts, facebook messages , tweets and just general well wishes.

  I know its totally backwards, but tommorrow I will write a full length post about the my 9 hour day getting chemo and include pictures and all of that fun jazz. I just wanna have time to include as much information as I can.

   So once again thanks all for all of your love and I look forward to hearing from youin on way or another and I will try my best to do all that I can to stay healthy and keep you all informed!

                        GOD Bless,
                                        ADP

Sorry I haven't updated in awhile.  Well I had my 

surgical implantation of the portacath last Weds 

(Oct 28th) it went good. It was a bit more 

intense then i thought it would be.I knew that

they were gonna be cutting open my chest, but 

what I didn't know was that they were gonna be 

making incisions at the bottom of my neck and 

putting tubes down them.  So I was awake for the

surgery, the procedure itself wasn't that painful,

the afterward is!

It feels funny and so far 

its been pretty painful. 

It just hurts to move my 

neck chest or arm because 

they cut thru the muscle. 

I'm sure the thing that hasn't been 

helping is the fact that I started 

getting sick the night before the 

surgery and have had major head,

sinus and chest congestion.I

have been sneezing and coughing 

, which you can imagine 

doesn't feel the greatestto have your chest muscles

flexing when they just cut thru them!

So I really think that this darn cold and all of 

the coughing has seriously slowed down the rate 

at which the incisions are healing. They told me 

that I shouldonly be really sore for a few days

and here a week later I'm still in some major 

pain. But besides that I'm doing all right. I was

told I could take the top bandages off today 

cause they were falling off and they would be 

taking them off tomorrow anyways. So here is what 

I can see now.

They put some sort of glue

on the incision to help it

heal but the problem is that

they didn't wait for it to 

dry and now the sutures and 

part of the bandage are glued

to the incision. So this 

should be interesting and I 

really hope that they can take 

them off without ripping

open the incisions.

OK, so I  am starting chemotherapy tomorrow at

9am at UCI Hospital.  I went and gave      

at the lab this afternoon so they have all of

my starting       counts,and then I went and 

got two of the six medicines that I'll have to

take during each round of chemotherapy and 

I just found out today that there's is a co-pay 

for each one and now this is another bill that

I'm gonna have and I hope I can handle it on

top of everything else that I have right now.

So tomorrows chemo will be a bit longer then

the rest because its my first time and they 

have to take       and give me a lot of

different medicines orally and thru injections

before I start the actual chemo treatment.

They say I should expect to be there 6-8

hours possibly. So I just gotta bring reading 

materials, charge myphone and GAMEBOY DS and 

just be prepare to sit for awhile (now Im 

wishing I had a neck pillow and even one of

those butt doughnut pillow thingies).  Once

again my chemo is called "R-Chop" and I will 

hopefully do an update tomorrow to let you all

know how it went. I'm sure it wont be as long

as this one I promise.  Once again thank you

for all of your thoughts and prayers and I love 

you all!

GOD Bless, 

               ADP

Im having the portacath put in tomm (Weds 28th) at 7am at UCI. Please pray everything goes well, plus Im getting a bad cold, which is not good at all. God Bless

So I went to the movies this past Saturday with my friend Dawnn & saw three movies, but since I already have seen one of them, so I will only review the two new ones!

SAW VI
OK, so I'm just gonna start off saying that I was not a fan of SAW V, and I d how The entire movie was all about flashbacks and what happened in the past movies. I felt like I paid to see the movies that I already have seen and owned.

So I haven't watched the SAW movies in awhile, I was told by a close friend that if u watch them all back to back that they intertwine and connect amazingly. I'm gonna have to do that soon.

So its been a year since SAW V and honestly I don't remember that much about it besides the fact that I felt jipped. I will say that this newest installation in the SAW franchise is more y and gory then previous ones. I loved the storyline and how I understood everything without having to re-watch the old ones.

This movie is definitely better then V (in my opinion) and if you are a fan of these films then you should be pleased. It starts off with a bang (or slice) and jumps right into the story. It has you really rooting for these characters to succeed at first ans then the more you learn about their past the more you kind of want to see them fail!

Its probably because its so close to home but let's just say that there are some health insurance people involved and I really wanted to see them suffer. You get to see what goes on behind closed doors and how they use loopholes and pure logic to decide coverage for individuals or choose to drop them, basically a sentence for most.

So if you like mystery, seeing people get their come-uppance and lots of and gore, then this is a film for you.



The STEPFATHER

I knew that this was a remake , although I have never seen the original I read all about it before I went to go see this film. To kind of get an idea of the caliber of the first and to see what they did different in this remake.

First off I would like to say that I really like Dylan Walsh (who plays the stepfather) in his role in the awesome series Nip/Tuck. I'm not really familiar with Penn Badgley (the son) hes on some teeny-bopper show. The mother looked oddly familiar but I couldn't place her face (maybe cause it looks like shes had a lot of plastic surgery done)


So the movie kicks off with this calm scene of a guy showering and cutting and dying his hair, its a very low key and relaxed scene. Then as he leaves they pan down and show the family that he has just killed. So from the get-go you know tha he is a killer. In my opinion it would have been better not showing that up front, so that you are left wondering if he is really the "family killer".

This movie is full of suspense and very creepy Looks from the "Stepfather". It does really build up the tension throughout, but it makes you wanna scream at the screen "Hello! He's clearly psychotic, RUN!!!!" This movie plays really well against the audience and leaves you wondering what happens next, but as it builds up towards the final confrontation you have to wonder "Is it gonna pay off in the end?"

My answer is that it doesn't, although I thought this film was OK, it really didn't seem to have a big pay off at the end for the audience. I saw almost every twist and turn coming so was not surprised at all and my friend who isn't a major movie-buff at all wasn't impressed either, which says a lot!

So my recommendation is that if you wanna see this film it wont kill you to wait until its on DVD. Seeing it in a theater and paying big bucks to see it on the big screen wont make that much of a difference.

I hope these reviews were helpful or insightful in some ways, so until next time....

          I'll See You At The Movies

                      ADP

                                                    I'll See you at the Movies!
                                                                                              ADP

OK, so I heard from the doctor today and they finally have a clear-cut diagnosis for me. After testing my tissue samples for a third time and getting three different specialist opinions they have arrived at a conclusion.

  I have "Diffused Large B-Cell Lymphoma" not Burkitts. So what this means is that I don't have the more rare and potentially dangerous Burkitts. But Burkitts is an easier treatment of chemotherapy that is usually shorter in nature so that sucks! Plus Burkitts also one of the fastest growing Lymphomas is one of the most receptive to chemo as well.


  So Chemo is typically 3 rounds or cycles(2-3 months long) and just to be sure they want 2 do localized radiation treatments on my groin after chemo is done. I was told that they don't anticipate my life should dramatically change while undergoing chemo, but there will be certain times in each cycle where my white cell counts will drop and it is dangerous to be out in crowded public places.  They say because I'm young and am gonna have a shorter round of chemotherapy that I shouldn't have all of the side-effects that is the stigma associated with chemo.

  So a round of chemo consists of getting the chemo on day 1, and then taking medication for the next five days or so. Then you start it all over again 16 days after your done with that and it just repeats that cycle until your done with the recommended rounds. Not sure about the details of the radiation yet, thats a different office that handles that. The type of chemo that I am going to be receiving is called "R-CHOP"


 So now I'm waiting 2 hear back from the hospital my appointment to have the portacath surgically implanted next week. Then I should be in chem by the end of next week or the beginning of the week after that by the latest.

  So its good news, but scary at the same time, so I will keep u posted on any new information that I hear and please leave comments, suggestions or whatever you want and I will answer them.

                                           Thank you and GOD Bless!

                                                               ADP

 Ok, so I got a call from the doctor this morning and the preliminary results from the pathology re-review came back and there are still some uncertainties so they re getting more of the tissue to run different tests and calling in another specialist to get his opinion. They say its peculiar because one test says something & then another hints at something different.

 They have what are called "markers" or "flags" that they look at when they test the tissue samples, and some say intermediate grade lymphoma while others say its the more rare "Burkitts" lymphoma. They of course cannot start any treatment until they are one hundred percent positive of what I have.

  They hope to know something for sure by tomorrow. So we will see on that what happens and if I hear anything back tomorrow.

  I went and had an EKG and Echocardiogram today. Just checking out the general health of my heart and to see how strong it is cause the chemo can effect it and give you problems if your not in good shape to begin with.

 Im still waiting to hear about the portacath being installed in my chest. Thats prpobably the scariest things to me, that they are going to install a device into my chest and attach it to my organs and heart.  They use it to withdraw blood and its where they can administer the chemo drectly into my heart and organs , they can bypass using my arms and not have to damage the tissue or veins.

So I guess thats all 4 now. I will try to update on here as soon as I know anything more. As always thanks for caring enough to read this and I hope to have some more positive and concrete news soon!

            GOD Bless,
                            ADP