Morphine and Ice Cream

I'm back.

I'm eating again as well. My mouth is healing quickly as my neutrophil count increases and I swear that I will never take my mouth for granted again. Wow - that was amazingly painful and unnerving.

I was doing great until after dinner on Friday night when I started to have some stomach issues, then started to get a fever, which went away a few hours later. Saturday I stayed in bed as I could feel myself getting sick and knew from talking to the nurse that my counts were at their lowest. The nurse also made it clear that I would be apt to catch anything I came into contact with and that if my fever went above 100 that I should probably go into the ER. My mouth started to get much more painful, so I ate Jello and an ice cream until trying out some mac & cheese at dinner time. My throat started to get sore that night and my fever came back higher - from anywhere to 99.8 to 100.8. The on-call oncologist (ha!) said to stay home as I wasn't shaking or shivering, and my fever went back down. I thought I was in the clear.

That is, until Kelly called on Sunday. "Why didn't you go into the hospital?!" "Because the doctor said I would be fine." "Who did you talk to?" "The on call oncologist (ha)." "That can't be right. I think you should go in." ... 5 minute time delay... "Jenny is on her way over to bring you to the ER. I called today's on-call doctor and he said to come in immediately. I can't believe that you didn't go in last night - why didn't you call me? I would have told you to go in!"

So Jenny shows up at my door with bags of groceries that can either be put into a blender for a smoothie, popsicles, fudge-sicles, a smattering of healthy soy things, and a squash (which is not going into a smoothie under any circumstances). At this point I am very glad to be going to the hospital. I can hardly talk because it requires mouth movement and am out of the only food I can eat - Jello.

Long story short - Kelly was right. I really needed to be in the hospital as my counts were freakishly low - much lower than the doctors had expected they drop to and much lower than is safe. So, they admitted me into a special "girl in the bubble" room until my counts went up, which they expected to be 3-4 days. I spent three nights there in all.

Maybe I'm strange - people think I'm joking when I tell them how much I like airports. I can also say that I like hospitals. Maybe it's just Abbott. I don't know. But I really feel comfortable there, well cared for, and that I'm getting the treatments I need to feel better. The nurses are fantastic, the doctors I have been in contact with are great, and I have my own room. Plus, they bring me food. AND the nurses bring me ice cream.

One example of why I love the hospital...

"Good morning Carrie - how are you feeling?"
"Good morning - I'm ok - my mouth is kinda sore... May I please have a shot of morphine?"
"Sure! Let me go grab that - is there anything else I can get for you? Are you hungry?"
"Um... do you have any raspberry sherbet?"
"Yep - I'll be right back."

Sweet.

My mom drove down on Sunday and hung out at the hospital with me during the day. When I got home, my mouth was feeling a great deal better, though not totally healed. I was able to eat soft foods easier, so mom heated up some homemade soup and made me a grilled cheese sandwich - I gummed down two bowls and a second sandwich. Oh food, how I missed you.

I am now basically quarantined to my house and the outdoors - no enclosed public buildings that may have cooties. No restaurants or stores or anyplace fun. I am ok with this as I have a greater understanding of how vulnerable I am right now and respect that.

One lesson I have learned this past week is that I am not in control of my body right now and I need to understand and accept that. No matter how positive my attitude is or how many Tylenol I take, my body is going through changes that I cannot control. I am learning to work with the changes, but I need to respect that I am not as strong as I am accustomed to being and cannot respond to these changes as I would normally respond to others.

I had a hard time with that this week - maybe a tougher time with this concept than the overall fact that I have breast cancer. Having cancer, to me, was a diagnosis with a solution and an end date. I had options, I chose my option. I had doctor appointments, which I went to. I had surgery, and recovered. I need chemotherapy, which I started. I got sick, and that's where I got lost. It freaked me out a bit that my body isn't reacting to the treatments as well as I thought it would. I thought that being young and healthy would allow me to ease my way through this without too much change. I knew I would lose my hair and that I would get a bit sick, but I wasn't prepared for my body to stop working on my behalf. Now I know more, and will care for it accordingly.

So, I'll be at home. Chillin' with the 'Lil Bigs. (That's my dog, Bixby;) I might even get Ginger for the weekend. (I call her 'Lil Jiggs, only because it rhymes. She's not little, or jiggly.)

Random thought - I wonder if anyone named their pet Chemo? I know a Kila, and a Nemo... maybe if you spelled it with a K - Kemo? It's a cool sounding word, but maybe strange connotations... hm. I'll ask Alice... when she's ten feet tall...

Carrie