Statute of Limitations on Chemo Brain is Extended or: Where Did That Noun Go? Check Back in Five Years.

The New York Times Well blog reports that chemo brain doesn't necessarily fade away after a year. It can last up to five years. Or more. Researchers measured the cognition of 92 surviving patients who had blood cancer treated by chemo as well as bone marrow or stem cell transplants. According to the Times, the results should be the same with people treated for breast and other cancers. Read the abstract here in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
Judging by the abstract (which I'm sure isn't fair) this study seems pretty loose. Are the same chemotherapy drugs used to treat various kinds of cancer? Were certain chemo potions more likely to render their recipients word-less? I looked for the complete article via Smart University's online library, but could not find it. I'll keep trying.
[Illustration: women hunting for nouns that escaped from the tips of their tongues. Also deer.]

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Losing My Mind

Pieces of my mind are loosening, falling. I could not think of the name of my cousin's eldest child tonight. I was emailing all the relatives to see if they wanted the coffee table and a painting that I have that were my grandparents' and I couldn't remember his name. I kept seeing his face. I knew his brothers' names and I couldn't think of his. I looked at the family email address and I could tell that it was based on the three boys' names and that it started with J. I said to L, name some names that start with J and then he did and I remembered. Jonathan. How could I forget?

Yesterday I was telling someone that I was a grandmother, that L's son married a woman with a child, and then I drank with my students (one drink, a black and tan) and three hours later I was about to say to the same person, I'm a grandmother. I thought it to myself, of saying it to her, and then I realized I'd said it earlier. But what if I hadn't realized it?

Today in my writing group we were asking one another questions and I said, No one asked me a question, then T reminded me she had just asked me a question. That's why I was answering it, why I had been talking. How could I forget?

There is chemo brain, it is real, we know because it was in the New York Times. I am too young to be senile. I forget words. I say posy instead of peony because I know the word is there, out there in the world, but I can't think of it. I slow my speech because then I have more time to find the words. I see them up there, ahead in the distance, like my cousin's face. Floating just beyond my reach. How will I be able to teach if I can't find words at the end of the sentence?

I just read the NYT article again and I see that tamoxifen can make it worse. I'm taking fish pills, they're supposed to help. I think about meditation. I think about taking a meditation class. When I was drinking my black and tan I said I had decided to take an improv class but I'd forgotten that I'd decided to and my student (my student who is 20 years younger and who does not have chemo brain) laughed in a bemused way and asked, How can you forget what you decided?

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Driving to Distraction

My emotions have been pretty even all this time, but my brain has been scattered all over the landscape. Or maybe I'm prematurely experiencing the symptoms of cancer therapy. I feel like I already have "chemo brain"--memory lapses that come from chemo. Tonight I had a class in Far-away Suburb. My plan was to stop in University Suburb in the late afternoon, because it's on the way. There I would pick up some papers at WRU (Well-Regarded University) and meet a student in a coffee house to talk about her thesis. When I got out the car in the first suburb I realized I'd left all my class papers at home. So I met with the student for about 15 minutes, talking about her thesis but also about her breast cancer six years ago, drove back home, realizing there was no way I could get from home to Far-away Suburb *and* prepare for class and still get there on time. The only option was to drive back to University Suburb, take the 6:50 p.m. express train that got to Far-Away at 7:08 (covering something like 20 miles), and walk the few blocks to the class, which starts at 7:15. I parked near the train station at the first meter I saw, feeding it with all my quarters even as I saw a sign that said parking was limited there to 20 minutes. Parking restrictions are enforced fanatically in that suburb. I decided that getting a ticket was better than being late. I made the 6:50 train, graded papers at top speed, got to class on time and later took the train back to the first suburb, where I found that I hadn't gotten a ticket. If chemo brain is worse than this, I'm afeared.

The other night I threw up for no reason, except as dress rehearsal, perhaps, for chemo nausea. The only thing I'd had that night that L hadn't had was apple cider, and that didn't seem like a reasonable culprit. So I can say with authority that chemo ain't so bad, especially before it's started.

But I'm still afraid of it. And of fatigue. And weakness. And losing all my hair.

And of course the cancer coming back.

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