08/30/11 Ugh

Not so good today. If I could sum it up, I would use the word “irritable.” It is to be expected, irritability is one of the side effects of taking steroids.  I guess I didn’t know what to expect because Adam’s personality is definitely the opposite of irritable (in normal circumstances).  Like Roxanne told me, we are learning a new “normal.” Right?  I definitely didn’t expect to be literally kicked out of bed to turn on the lights this morning.  And there was a minor freak out when some of his orange juice squirted on his shirt.  Ugh! Four years of manners training for him to be pushing me around and snappy.  Really?  He could at least say, “please” when he demands a straw in his water!

After rounds, I find out his hemoglobin is low which will cause him to be tired and irritable.  Maybe even headache-y.  Ok, I should have known better.  Irritability is as irritability does.  Maybe the fact that we are in the first week of chemo, I should be a little more open minded in Adam’s behaviors?  Oops.  But the good news is, everything is working!  Everything should be low after all the medications he is taking.  We are going to start weaning off of the IV fluids and his organs are showing no side effects, so we are taking away one of the meds.  Woohoo!       

I am off to Parent-Teacher night this afternoon, but I hear we might meet with a discharge nurse!!  Hopefully we can chalk it up as a miracle and bust out of this joint.  Will keep you posted.

Ok, checking back in… Just got our first print out of Adam’s labs (thank you Nurse Lisa)! And my first mathematical formula of the (school) year.  It looks like this: (segs + bands)(WBC x 10) = ANC.  ANC tells us the level of Adam's immune system is at and how susceptible he is to germs/disease/etc.  Now we’re talking in a language I can speak! So, his white blood cells are low (check!), red blood cells low and needing a transfusion (check!), and platelets are low (check!).  These are all great because it means the chemo is working!  Chemo doesn't play favorites to the bad cells.  It just kills everything in sight.  The other good news is we haven’t seen any terrible side effects!  His immune system is at a low-susceptible level, but we are in the super protected iso unit, so the air is filtered, the soap is powerful, we’re all good.  No runny noses in the unit, though, that would be bad.  Still on track to go home on Sat!