Snow day...

Between 10 pm last night and noon today, we were dumped on.
About six inches of heavy, wet snow that stuck to everything.
Ev.ry.thing. 
Now, I'm watching it melt. Weird winter this year.
They say we'll get more snow tonight and tomorrow morning, then
Friday and the weekend will hit 50 degrees and bring rain. 
Might be some flooding. More weird. 

Carol is holding her own.
Her chemo was Thursday. This time only took four hours.
The first one was eight hours. They do the first of the new
treatments slower to make sure there is no bad reaction.

I can tell this new mix is harder on her than the last.
She's been tired every day since and her skin is pale and there
are dark circles under her eyes. I'm hoping her immune system
builds up so she can get back to her old self soon.
And, she's losing her hair again.
That doesn't seem to bother her much. She says she'll just have
to get a couple of wigs like she did before.  
At least she hasn't been nauseous and she's not in pain.

This Thursday is her birthday. She said she wants a new toaster
and a steak dinner. I think Ann and I can handle that.

Bassackward...

What good is it to

have all the answers if you

don't know the questions?

Better news... UPDATE

Her numbers are better.
White cells went from .08 to 3.3... hemoglobin from 7.0 to 8.3  
after 2 units of blood Saturday... platelets from 108,000
to 119,000. This is with three antibiotics every six hours.

Blood cultures came back showing no infection, which is
great news. Her low numbers were strictly because of the
new chemo recipe knocking the hell out of her immune system. 
That makes her highly susceptible to infection.

We thought she was going to come home today but there
was a glitch. Her temp jumped to 100.2 last night. Doesn't
sound like much to us, but for her that shows her immune
system isn't yet stable or strong enough. Her body needs 
to hold normal temp for at least 24 hours before they'll let
her come home. 

Still, it's progress.  We'll take it.

UPDATE: Carol came home Wednesday. Back to normal. (normal-ish).
Next chemo is Feb. 11... fingers crossed no complications.

Realization...

Carol is in the hospital again.
White cell count is almost zero.
They're saying the new chemo is  probably the cause,
so they'll adjust the dosage for the next time.
In the meantime, they've given her two broad-
spectrum antibiotics to get a handle on the infection
until the infectious disease guy gets a read on the
blood cultures and decides if she needs a more
specific antibiotic. 

I am a slow learner.

I wanted to have complete faith in the medical people.
Took me almost four years to realize that so much of
what they do is a crap shoot, a flip of the coin, even a
damned guessing game.

What they have to figure out now is how much to cut back
on one of the chemo drugs so that it doesn't knock out
her immune system again, yet still be strong enough to stop the
spread of the cancer. And, they'll be adding Neulasta(?) to
her regimen which is supposed to boost the immune system.
They keep saying if this cocktail doesn't work, there are
plenty more available to try. Try. We'll see. Try again.

She's been really tough through all this, so far.
I can see the worry in her face now.
Too many speed bumps lately. Too close together.

Humbly requesting more of your generous good thoughts,
good prayers, whatever you can spare.
 

Plan B...

or are we up to C or D?

First dose of her new chemo cocktail was last Thursday.
So far, no more side effects than the last.
We'll have to wait, I guess, to see if this one stops the spread
of the cancer. And for how long.

She's still gathering energy. Being mostly inactive for the past
four months, it isn't surprising that she is nowhere near her
old level of energy. I'm glad she's finally 99% out of pain. 
She's still on oxygen, though. That bothers me a bit.

I apologize for not writing much lately.
Could be because I'm tired and I bore myself.
Always thought it very rude to bore my friends.

I need to work harder at finding the spark that used to
inspire ideas and even bring a chuckle now and then.
Would be nice to laugh more. 
Gonna stop before the whining causes nausea.