Day 13 of 12.

Yesterday was another tiring, stressful, and frustrating day. Lauren was scheduled to receive the chemo drug, Thiotepa, via IV, which everybody knew she was supposed to get it. However, the order for it was not entered into the computer until 5:30 pm. But she needed to be pre-medicated and hydrated before she got it. So they didn't actually start the chemo until around 7:15 pm. It is a 2-hour drip so she wasn't done with it until close to 9:30 pm. At this time Lauren was sound asleep. She would have easily slept until morning. But with this type of chemo we needed to give her a bath right after and she can't have any adhesive on her skin, so instead of tape holding the tube into her port, she was wrapped in gauze-type (like an ace bandage) tape. This needed to be changed as well as her clothes. She was not happy when we woke her. She was very groggy and cranky from the pre-medication, which makes her sleepy. When she finally did wake and sit up, she needed to go the bathroom. In the bathroom she started having convulsions/hiccups/irregular breathing...it's hard to describe, but it freaked me out. I didn't know if she was going to throw up, or pass out. It passed after awhile. We called the nurse (the same one as the night before), but it stopped before she got there. I don't think that nurse really believed me. So after we bathed Lauren, we changed her bandage and the sheets from the bed, she needed to take her other chemo, Etopside. She resisted at first, but gave in and drank it like the trooper she always is and then promptly fell back asleep. It was 10:15 pm by this time and we still needed to wake her in an hour to take her last and final dosage of chemo for this round. Yeah! My biggest beef is that this whole sequence of events could have taken place during the day when Lauren was awake. By waiting so long it just added so much avoidable discomfort to Lauren, not to mention the stress it puts on me and Hilary.

Here is the topper. I just noticed that I got a text message at 4:30 am this morning from Hilary. Lauren has a fever. This means she needs to be admitted for 48 hours. That will take us to Friday. On Friday she is scheduled to get her stem cells back and we'll be staying at the RMH for 10 days. So that means the soonest Lauren will be home is Dec. 8th. It looks like we'll be having Thanksgiving at the hospital. Oh well, what can you do?? And what am I supposed to do with that 11.5 lb. turkey in my frig?

I hope everybody else has a good and safe Thanksgiving.