Delayed Reaction

I am not a fan of this picture, but it is effective at showing that I have recently lost my eyebrows and most of my eyelashes. I don’t like the picture because I look tired (probably from hiking up the steep streets of Seattle) and because my eyebrows look grey. I think they look grey because my new eyelash buds are lighter colored, and my skin below is white. Those two things in combination with my few remaining dark eyebrow hairs and the end color mixture is grey. At least that is my theory.

I am not sure why my eyelashes and eyebrows waited to fall out until almost a month after my last chemo treatment. Maybe the hairs died a long time ago but did not fall out until the new hair growth, which is itchy, caused me to scratch. The scratching may have forced the hairs out. I will ask my oncologist during my appointment that will follow my PET scan, which is tomorrow.

Otherwise, I feel less tired than I did a month ago. Things are improving with two exceptions. I have had two occurrences of a strong stomach pain during the night. Both times I went to bed feeling normal, and then awoken with extreme stomach pain. The first occurrence was Christmas Eve/Christmas Morning, and the second was the night before Rebecca and I flew back to Denver (Jan 5th). Both nights the pain lasted over an hour and slowly dissipated enough to fall back asleep. The second night I was awoken twice and both times the pain lasted about an hour. I will ask my oncologist what he thinks this could be, but it could be associated with Crohn’s, not my cancer or cancer treatment. If necessary, I will ask my gastroenterologist as well. I will meet with my gastroenterologist after my PET scan because fortuitously PET scans are very effective at showing inflamed sections of the digestive system. These pain occurrences could be an ulcer, a symptom of my GERD, a symptom of my gallstone, or something else entirely...we will see.