One Pill Makes You Larger, and One Pill Makes You Small

I'm still trying to figure out how to best balance out my latest grouping of medications.

So far I take the chemo Sutent every night between dinner and bedtime, and so far that has been working out just fine. That is the one pill that is not optional and needs a strict regimen. Eventually the Sutent will wear me down and make me feel constantly fatiqued. But it's still in its early stages at this point.

From there I have two different pain pills, one anxiety pill, and one sleeping pill. The trick is to take the pills in an order that keeps me alert and energized during the day, while letting me sleep at night.

So far, I've discovered that the one pain pill works great on the pain caused by the cancer in the bone of my right hip.

The other pain pill is an anti-inflammatory which really helps reducing the swelling around the cancer "bump" on the back of my head.

The one that works best on my hip can make me very drowsy. The one that works best on my head can actually keep me restless when I'm trying to sleep at night.

I don't feel a lot of anxiety, ok maybe a little, but the anxiety pill I've kind of used to help me relax at night in hopes of a sound night sleep.

The sleeping pills just arrived yesterday.

Last night I decided to take one pain pill to handle the soreness in my hip. Then a bit later I decided to add the other pain pill to take care of the pain and swelling along the back of my head. Then to top things off I took a sleeping pill just before bed.

WOW! Did I sleep. Actually I slept too long. I woke up at 5 a.m. and by 6 a.m. I gave up and went back to bed until 8:30 a.m. For two-hours more I sat up and still worked to shake-off the sleepiness.

So, one thing has been decided - no sleeping pills unless I'm desperate for sleep.

As far as the pain pills go, I don't know what to do. I can certainly take the pain pills that don't make me sleepy during the day, but then my hip will be quite sore (and trust me on this one, this thing hurts).

Or I can take the pain pills that work on the hip, accept the reality of a mid-day nap, and take the day from there.

I don't know.

Hopefully through the first two-weeks of January I'll have gone through radiation and surgical treatments that will remove the sources of the pain. Then I can just add all of these medications to the drawer full of other medications I've taken through this past year and beyond.