Deanna's Discovery: Chemotherapy

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) - Cancer. We all fear it. We're saddened by it. We're angered by it. But few of us really understand it. What is treatment really like? And what is it like to live with this disease? As 24-Hour News 8 anchor Deanna Dewberry battles breast cancer, she takes you along for testing and treatment, giving you a glimpse of life with cancer.

My day starts early with a stiff drink. It's supposed to taste like a pina colada, but it doesn't come close. It's barium sulfate, a rather foul tasting substance used for CT scans. When digested, that not-so-tasty pre-scan treat highlights organs and body systems, giving clues about the cancer's possible spread.

The scan takes pictures of sections of my body while I lie perfectly still for 30 minutes.

An hour later, I'm lying perfectly still again as my surgeon removes tissue from my breast tumor. Clinical trial researchers will use this sample to gauge how well the chemotherapy is working.

And the day's not over. Now I'm poked and weighed as I wait for my chemotherapy treatment. Almost five hours after we arrived, a nurse I adore delivers some news I don't.

"We are not going to give you the drugs today," Linda tells me, shaking her head.

That's right — no chemo today. My white blood counts are too low. Two weeks later — same song, different nurse, same verse.

"Your platelets are great," Maggie, my oncology nurse, told me. “But it's that neutrophil count."

Again, the white counts are too low, so no chemo. My doctor is forced to reduce future chemotherapy doses. It's a minor setback, but it scares me nonetheless.

"I just want to make sure that we're going after this as aggressively as we can," I tell my oncologist, Dr. Anna Maria Storniolo.

"You've got so much treatment in front of you that I actually think that giving you the dose reduction is probably the way to go," says Storniolo.

She assures me that each patient is different, and a lower dose is likely still an effective dose for me. And it’s then that I'm reminded that the cancer journey — as it's so often called — is one filled with hills, valleys, detours and the occasional u-turn. That doesn't mean we won't reach the final destination — cure.

"It's a journey that even at its best is the better part of a year," says Storniolo.

And during that year, my life does go on. I'm a wife and mother, and for my son, life has changed little other than the fact that Mommy has no hair. Although a cancer diagnosis has changed my life, I refuse to let it become my life. This is my life: Mornings comfortably mundane, spent with my husband and son — breakfast and school work — chatting and rushing. This is life with cancer.

It's just life.

Movies often depict the worst case scenario in cancer care. And many people think you must get chemo in a hospital bed, and you're too ill to work or play. Although chemo does take a toll physically, many patients are able to work and continue activities even while in treatment.