Incivik; Triple Therapy; Need help & honest Answers!

[ontrackbasis]

I am just getting ready to start triple therapy on July 1, 2013. I am scared with what I am reading. My Dr is starting me off with all 3 at once, and has chosen Incivik,. On top of being concerned with the pegasys n Riba now I am concerned with this Incivik.. Any help would be great... honesty too... Apparently the Pegasys & Riba will be for 9 months and the Incivik will just be for my first 12 weeks on treatment...

I am wondering if I will be able to work as my job can become very demanding at times.

Thank you to all of you who share your stories... I am getting tired of people trying to tell me how I feel who have never personally done treatment.

[Dee1956]

I think you are so right, the more fat the better though if you get a specific problem please ask,
Sometimes during tx I was too sick to search and needed the help of my friends.
Hang in there

[dontworry_behappy1]

You see the magnifying glass in the heading of this forum.  It's on the left.  If you click on that magnifying glass you will see where you can search to forum for answers.  There are 100S of posts about the bathroom side effects of incivek.  Some going into lengthy detail.  It would benefit you to read some of those post about relief you can obtain from side effects of incivek.

The more you know about this treatment and its sides before hand...the better off you will be.  It's not easy and demands your attention.

DWBH

[ontrackbasis]

Thanks for your info. I am taking the two Riba pills per day... one in morning and one in evening which are each 600mg. These darn incivek pills are what are really making me hurt I thnk. I have to take 6 of those a day (2 at a time) which each pill is 350mg... for a total of 2100mg per day.

I have one week behind me thank God. However, I have been noticing some problems when I goto bathroom... some discomfort... kinda like crapin fire! I have noticed it got better tho past 2 days which I think may be from the amount of fat intake with each dose. I increased it to 25-30g of fat instead of the recommended 20.

Anyhow, thanks so much for your response. Greatly appreciiated,

[his3707]

Most important.. Stick to the dosing schedule for the first 12 weeks with incivek.  Set alarms, pill boxes, whatever it takes.  I worked a part time job, it was very rough but without that job time would have gone by so slow.  Keep busy no matter how you feel.  Just keep going.  I am 15 months post treatment after doing 48 weeks.  Treatment was a success and it is starting to be hard to remember how difficult it was for me.  watch your blood levels carefully, anemia can sneak up on you fast.  That can make you feel the worst!   Best Wishes!

[CD8]

***living my life withOUT HepC.  lol

[CD8]

Hi - I beganTriple therapy October 2012.  Have been partial responder twice in years past without the Incivek.  This time, by week four, virus was non-detectable and has stayed that way.  I got the convulsive shivers after Peg interferon shots for a while, long hot showers helped.  I work Monday thru Friday days so I do the shot on Friday evening.  Was able to continue to work but used a lot of sick leave.  Sometimes I felt like I was crawling on my hands and knees just to survive - but I did it anyway.  Big challenge to find food with 20grams fat that I could actually ingest due to severe nausea.  I tried anti-nausea script once but did not like side effect so just learned to deal with it on my own (soda crackers, 7Up). I never had to actually throw up.  After 12 weeks had severe anemia so had to get some Epogen Procrit shots for a while and stop my Ribavirin for 2 weeks, normally was taking 1200mg per day.

It has been hell, but I have no choices left.  In 2006 liver stage was 1 via a biopsy.  2012 biopsy showed stage was 4 = cirrohis.  Very frightening.  I don't smoke, drink, drug, eat very healthy, but liver is dying anyway.

Am 55 yo female. I live alone but my parents are my neighbors.  My mom would check in on me but I tried to refrain from involving her much.  Never had her do my errands or anything although she helped with mowing the yard.   I tried to shelter them and my 2 sons from this as much as possible - so as not to overly worry or alarm them.  Frankly, if I had to do this again, I may consider short-term disability.  I just don't know if I could have the strength to repeat something like this.

My biggest challenge was food.  Am vegetarian so coming up with 20 grams of fat 3X a day was overwhelming for me.  Especially when nothing tastes good anymore.  It's a sad day when you can't even enjoy your favorite guilty pleasure like ice-cream or chocolate.   :)

I am not trying to introduce negative thoughts to others - but for me I wished I would have known what to expect before I started this so that I could have been more prepared.  I was so sick I could barely go to the store... and so much food was wasted because it looked good but then it did not taste good.  I finally conceded to 'healthy' fast food options.  But all this is moot after about 14 weeks or so, once the Incivek gets out of your system.  I suppose I am still a little queezy from the Riba... but it's easy to ignore.

It's difficult at work because it becomes obvious something healthwise is going on but it's not something I wanted my coworkers to know about.  Big trust issues when it comes to HepC.  There are still a lot of uneducated people out there.  My boss and cubie buddie know and that is all.  They have been sooo supportive of me, I feel lucky and grateful.  Frankly, I had to come up with "stories" to appease other people's questions of me.  I finally resorted to telling people I was on chemo but told them I would prefer not to go into details when they asked what kind of cancer I have.  Awkward.

I have 9 weeks to go of Peg interferon and Ribavirin.  Have to do 48 weeks total.  Most of my hair fell out but it will come back.  I didn't get a rash but was itchy.  I lost about 10 pounds and have managed to keep it off - YAY.  

Would I go thru this treatment again if I had too?  Of course!  The thought of living my life with HepC is exciting to me.  It has been my downfall since diagnosis in 1999.  I so very much want to get healthy both physically and mentally.

Virginia Mason in Seattle believes they can reverse my cirrhosis back down to at least a level 3.  How cool that would be to no longer feel like my back is pushed up against a wall.

Best wishes to you all.  My thoughts are with you.