Hairy Christmas!

Some time in December, my hair started growing back. I'm still mostly bald but you can definitely see dark hair coming in on my head and a lot of gray stubble on my chin. 

To my amazement, this didn't start until over two months after my last infusion! The first stuff we noticed was very wispy, white or light gray hair on the side of my head above my ears. Then the gray stubble started on my chin. I have heard various things from people about post-chemo hair growth, some saying it will grow in curly and others saying it will grow in gray. I hadn't noticed if anything came in curly, but I was starting to wonder if I had lost my dark brown hair. 

Thankfully, it looks like I haven't. My chin (which was already salt-and-pepper before I got sick) isn't showing any signs of dark hair, but what's coming in on my head is more dark than gray. My beard is not growing very fast on the sides of my face, making me wonder if it's going to come back in dark but, somehow, the dark hair is taking longer?

Anyway, I'm happy to see my hair coming back. It's still probably going to be another month or so before I have enough that I'll need to trim it, but time will tell. 

On a related note, I've been rather impatient with my inability to (physically) do much now that I'm done (for now) with chemo. My wife pointed out that my incredibly slow hair growth is a good indicator of how long it's taking the rest my body to heal. It's been helpful for me to see things from that perspective.

 

A New Kind of Therapy

So many therapies. 

When I first had the prostate cryoablation in April, everyone in the medical profession seemed to be calling it "cryotherapy" (probably because it sounds less invasive.) Next came "chemotherapy", which was a gentle way of saying, "We're going to poison you, repeatedly, for months, in order to try to poison the cancer in the process." I'm also undergoing some "hormone therapy" by means of the testosterone inhibitors and blockers that I'll probably be taking for the rest of my life. 

Now I'm on to a different kind of therapy.

On Wednesday, I had my first physical therapy appointment. Originally, they weren't going to be able to get me in until some time in January, but they called on Monday and asked if I could start on Wednesday. I was keen to start as soon as possible, but rather apprehensive about it, too.

Between my lack of physical activity this year and the abuse my body has taken from both the cancer and it's treatment, I am currently in the worst shape in my life. For example, when I need to lift up a leg to put a shoe on or get into a car, I have been using my hand/arm to reach down and help lift it. For whatever reason(s) my lower body has fallen much more out of shape than my upper body, which was confirmed at this first PT appointment. 

Part of the appointment was diagnostic. They had my medical records, so we talked about the weaknesses I'm experiencing and what some of my goals were for PT. I came up with such lofty goals as "be able to stay balanced again" and "be able to hike a mile in the woods again." My therapist then ran some tests of balance, resistance, stamina, etc. The simple resistance tests made it clear that, while I did still have some upper body strength, my lower body was pretty wimpy right now. 

I suppose that's not too surprising, considering that the had cancer spread to my lower spine and both hips before we discovered it. I remember looking at my PET PSMA scan from back in March and being blown away by how much cancer "lit up" in my hips in particular.

Anyway, I feel like I'm in good hands with this physical therapist. He seems to know his stuff. He gave me a set of exercises (stretches, really) for me to work on at home and went through each of them with me in the PT room. By the time I got home from the appointment, I was pretty wiped out by everything we had done, so that was the only set of exercises I did that day. 

I have managed to go through at least one set of each of the exercises on each of the days since. My therapist wants me to do two sets, though, one in the morning and one later in the day. So far I haven't managed it, partially due to how I feel and partially just due to stuff we've got on the calendar. I'm determined to get into it, though. It's the only way I'm ever getting back to hiking, biking, and kayaking.

With that, then, I'm off to do my PT exercises for today!