Too much medication

D +9 (D 147)

I have a special request of everyone. Since my first diagnosis, Chris and I have made several friends through our blog. Joe and Karen are two of those friends. Joe was diagnosed with MDS(precursor to leukemia) last year and had a transplant in January. As of this week, his transplant is failing, meaning that he'll probably have to have another one. He's been fighting infections throughout this and I can't help thinking that he's been through so much already. Joe and Karen are a great couple and they have so much ahead of them. Please say a prayer for them.

I continue to have odd flashes of bone pain all over my body. The pain usually occurs in a joint or a long bone and lasts for about a minute. Imagine someone tapping you on the bone with a hammer. That's almost what it feels like. My knuckles are also starting to ache again. It makes it hard to handle things. The occupational therapist thinks that I should try doing exercises that will test my dexterity. I told her that I knit and she thought that that should do it. My stomach is covered in bruises from all of the neupogen shots that I have been receiving. The bruising is because of my low platelets. The doctor said that I should get used to it, since they'd pretty much be permanent until I can start making my own platelets.

Today was a really rough day. Laren and Chris were here all day worried about me. I got extremely nauseated this morning right before breakfast. I had the emetic bucket in my lap, primed to throw up. This is the worst feeling, because you know that you will throw up bile and that's bad enough when you are on your own, but when you have two witnesses, it somehow makes it worse. Long story short, I hate to vomit in front of people. Lucky me, I managed to keep it together, but I felt so nauseous, I had to lay my head down. My doctor came in just after this and was concerned. He got my nurse to bring me a cocktail to hang on my IV to treat the nausea. This particular one knocks me out. The doctor came back two hours later and found that I was still slightly nauseated, so he ordered another medication to treat me. This was an IV bag of Ativan which completely takes me out.

The doctor said that I should take the day off today and that it would be fine if I slept for most of it. That's pretty much what happened. I remember falling asleep at 1pm and waking up at 4pm to drink the smoothie that Chris and Laren had picked up for me. As soon as I finished it, I fell asleep again and woke up a 7pm.

I feel a little bit better. The nausea comes and goes and I still feel like someone stepped on me. This is better than being passed out in my hospital bed. I'm sure tomorrow will be a better day. This means that I'll have to catch up on my walking and pedalling. I'm so ready to get out of here and the nurses assure me that the more active I am the faster I'll get out. You'd think I'd be exercising 24/7.

My counts have fairly remained the same. My white blood cell count is 0.1. I'm desperately trying to bring it up to .02. If I could only make one WBC it would be a party. My other counts are slightly higher due to the blood transfusion I had yesterday.

Chris and Laren have been donating blood and platelets for me. Laren spent all day donating platelets for me. This takes $600 off my medical bills. I can't thank her enough for being so thoughtful. Chris donated whole blood and is going back to donate again tomorrow. I couldn't have asked for better people in my life. I am truly blessed with my friends and family and especially Chris. I don't know what I did to be so lucky, but I hope I keep doing it.