drewleavy
Self-portrait with Medication
I take a few dozen pills at various times throughout the day. It can be difficult to keep track of it all. I wake up and must eat food first for the dexamethasone. That's an artificial steroid (actually glucocorticoid steroid) that keeps the swelling in my brain down. It's the most important med in my fold-out aluminium case. It's also the most side-effect packed - among other things it's weakened my leg muscles, left me bloated and overweight and disrupted my sleep intensely. And I have to take other pills to protect my stomach and my bones from its effects.
A major knock-on of the weight gain seems to be back problems on top of myopathy (the degradation of my muscles). So I'm on a lot of painkillers. Oxycontin, Pregabalin and good old paracetamol. I take a lot and still need Oxynorm for 'breakthrough pain' - the stuff that wakes me in the night.
There's the anti-seizure pills too. I've been having little seizures once in a while as a follow-up to December's Grand Mal which left me on life-support for a short while. These ones aren't very bad, and often I have an 'aura' or flashing lights, so I take a lorezapam under the tongue immediately. And prophylactically, I take clobazam and Phenytoin. Susan also carries a bottle of midolazam and an oral syringe in case I have another Grand Mal seizure.
Susan has created a spreadsheet of times and doses of all of these and more. She's made labels for all the compartments in the open-out case. And she co-ordinates between the hospice, the GP and the chemists when it all runs out.
And so here I am. My morning dose of dexamethasone, omeprazole and paracetamol, washed down with movicol powder (did I mention the digestion gets screwed up too?). I'm in the middle of my first Temadol chemotherapy cycle. In 10 days, I will be adding four more pills a day. Temadol, aka Temazolomide, a chemo drug that will hopefully shrink my 19 (last count) brain lesions. I take that drug for 5 days along with some very strong anti-nausea pills. Then, wait two weeks and we have an MRI look at my brain. See what the Gamma Knife Surgery and two rounds of chemo have achieved.
For the shot, I put up one of my Esprit Gemini 250ws strobes with a 40cm Beauty Dish on it to the front right and a medium round, silver reflector propped up to the left. I put my M9 with the Voigtlander 35mm f1.2 Nokton Aspherical on a tripod in front of me and put it on self-time. The shots looked well-light on the camera display, but were dark in Lightroom, so I adjusted accordingly. I had Diego Velazquez in mind in composing, lighting and post-processing. I hope this comes across somehow.
Self-portrait with Medication
I take a few dozen pills at various times throughout the day. It can be difficult to keep track of it all. I wake up and must eat food first for the dexamethasone. That's an artificial steroid (actually glucocorticoid steroid) that keeps the swelling in my brain down. It's the most important med in my fold-out aluminium case. It's also the most side-effect packed - among other things it's weakened my leg muscles, left me bloated and overweight and disrupted my sleep intensely. And I have to take other pills to protect my stomach and my bones from its effects.
A major knock-on of the weight gain seems to be back problems on top of myopathy (the degradation of my muscles). So I'm on a lot of painkillers. Oxycontin, Pregabalin and good old paracetamol. I take a lot and still need Oxynorm for 'breakthrough pain' - the stuff that wakes me in the night.
There's the anti-seizure pills too. I've been having little seizures once in a while as a follow-up to December's Grand Mal which left me on life-support for a short while. These ones aren't very bad, and often I have an 'aura' or flashing lights, so I take a lorezapam under the tongue immediately. And prophylactically, I take clobazam and Phenytoin. Susan also carries a bottle of midolazam and an oral syringe in case I have another Grand Mal seizure.
Susan has created a spreadsheet of times and doses of all of these and more. She's made labels for all the compartments in the open-out case. And she co-ordinates between the hospice, the GP and the chemists when it all runs out.
And so here I am. My morning dose of dexamethasone, omeprazole and paracetamol, washed down with movicol powder (did I mention the digestion gets screwed up too?). I'm in the middle of my first Temadol chemotherapy cycle. In 10 days, I will be adding four more pills a day. Temadol, aka Temazolomide, a chemo drug that will hopefully shrink my 19 (last count) brain lesions. I take that drug for 5 days along with some very strong anti-nausea pills. Then, wait two weeks and we have an MRI look at my brain. See what the Gamma Knife Surgery and two rounds of chemo have achieved.
For the shot, I put up one of my Esprit Gemini 250ws strobes with a 40cm Beauty Dish on it to the front right and a medium round, silver reflector propped up to the left. I put my M9 with the Voigtlander 35mm f1.2 Nokton Aspherical on a tripod in front of me and put it on self-time. The shots looked well-light on the camera display, but were dark in Lightroom, so I adjusted accordingly. I had Diego Velazquez in mind in composing, lighting and post-processing. I hope this comes across somehow.