Side effects

Medical science is amazing.  So many people (including me) are alive today due to recent advances but with each advance, there are negative reactions otherwise known as "side effects" that can wreak havoc on otherwise grateful patients.  Side effects are just a part of the whole package.  If you want to get better, you'll have to go through dozens of types of new sicknesses as a penalty for beating the major disease.  This is old news.  Everybody seems to understand and accept it.  

After having two transplants and given dozens of potent drugs every day, I knew I would experience negative side effects.  The part I didn't realize is the huge variation of those side effects from one patient to another.  Other patients and I would frequently compare symptoms.  One would have massive nausea, while another would have a severe skin reaction and another might have nothing, all from the same new drug.  This leaves the doctors chasing individual problems for each patient even though the cause may have been the same medication or procedure.  

My own most frequent side of effect from the past eight months is severe fatigue.  I took a day off today and slept for eighteen hours!  When healthy, I functioned just fine with about six hours each night.  While I was in Seattle, I would have normal energy one day, then be exhausted the next.  It was completely unpredictable.  The only change between two months ago and today is the days of being exhausted are less frequent.  Every now and then, I realize the team of doctors and nurses who repeatedly told me it takes about a year to get back to normal must be correct.  The length of time to heal seems to be the only aspect of side effects that's consistent for everyone.