Although better today, she is still having some diarrhea and nausea problems. Every time that they think they have those things under control. They come back. Mary Jo said to let you that "this is the worst thing that she has ever gone through, including child birth and kidney stones."
The rash and itching that she had is completely gone. When we met with Dr. Engelhardt and the transplant team this morning, Dr. Engelhardt said " at least we fixed one thing." But, now she is feeling bumps in her mouth which are probably the onset of the horrible mouth sores that we have read about. She is also starting to feel some pain when she swallows.
I haven't said anything about the morning meetings. Not only does Dr. Engelhardt come. He brings your nurse, two nurse practitioners, a fellow transplant doctor, a dietician, and a pharmicist with him. Pretty impressive, but scary at first. Everyone is there and available, if you have any questions.
Dr. Engelhardt is always upbeat. He has consistently assured us that all of these side affects that Mary Jo has been having are something that every transplant patient, in varying degrees, goes through. Everybody's body is different.
Mary Jo and her nurse, Jayme talked before I got here this morning which seemed to help with the frustration that she was feeling yesterday. It's that good day, bad day thing, both physically and emotionally. Jayme is a great nurse.
Jayme said that she would be more worried if Mary Jo wasn't having all of these side effects because that could indicate that the chemo was not doing it's job. Thinking about it, I guess indirectly one of the chemo's jobs is to make you feel terrible.
With her WBC at near zero, Mary Jo basically has no immune system, now. This will continue for several days. Jayme told Mary Jo that it usually takes around 15 days before most people start feeling good again. That correlates with everything that I have read.
Jayme came in a minute ago to get some blood cultures. They are trying to identify the cause of the low grade fever that Mary Jo had last night. Things like that remind both of us that Mary Jo being here in the hospital is a good thing.
They are constantly monitoring everything. So, they can immediately do tests, and take action to rectify any situation that crops up. The response might not be as quick, if we were going to the outpatient clinic.
One thing that our stay here at Vanderbilt is keeping us from this weekend is, our niece, Kelsey's graduation from Western Kentucky University. Mary Jo and I are Kelsey's Godparents, and we are so proud of her. She will be graduating summa cum laude with majors in Art History and Sociology.
Kelsy was recently awarded a highly competitive Fulbright Research/Study grant to pursue a one-year master’s degree in art history at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England. We had looked forward to being with Kelsey on this important day in her life ever since she enrolled at WKU. We are constantly reminded of the ways that cancer has changed our lives since Mary Jo was first diagnosed in October of 2009.
Even though, I have read a lot about the side effects of the chemo, and how the stem cell transplant process affects people, both physically and emotional. It is still hard to relate to it. Until you are actually in the middle of it.
As I said earlier, Mary Jo's attitude today is much better about still being in the hospital. But, the reality is the bad days are not going to go away for awhile. We are slowly adjusting, and hunkering down for the long haul.
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