Coming up for air

Not waving, not drowning, just surfacing, briefly.

It's been difficult to get my head around the chemotherapy side effects this time. Firstly because the effects from the second infusion were so different from the first, so any coping strategy I had devised was just thrown out of the window.

To start with I thought the ear and throat problems were due to a bug, but 
they just didn't go away. Knowing they were chemo side effects made it worse
because I knew the cough wouldn't go away. The sore throat, muteness, deafness and mouth ulcers followed. Then to add insult I pulled a muscle in my back during an especially vigorous cough.