​At This Point We Can Only Go Up

The end of December was spent in the hospital trying to recover from complications of my new chemo. After my first dose of the chemo I noticed that food that had a normal level of spice would be extra spicy to me. I just figured it was a lovely side effect that I would have to deal with. It’s a good thing that I don’t really care for really spicey food anyways. I had my second dose of chemo the Friday before Christmas. Almost right away my tongue sensitivity increased. I then took a good look in the mirror and realized that my tongue was covered in sores. I learned real quick that drinking ice cold anything numbed up my tongue so I could eat a bit of something mushy. Well, there goes eating a big Christmas feast.
 
Christmas morning, I woke up feeling a bit more sluggish than normal. I got up and pushed through. I just had to get showered, dressed and get the presents to the car. Thankfully, once I sorted out the presents to go with us, my hubs loaded up the car. We were just going to my mom’s house so I could just relax when I got there. With Christmas being on a Wednesday my in-laws decided to postpone Christmas to Saturday so we would get a full day celebrating with each of our families. It’s always fun spending Christmas day with small kids. Even though my nieces aren’t so little now, they still have the magic and excitement in their eyes. When walked into my mom’s we were bombarded with look at this and look at that. No wonder my sister needs loads of coffee. LOL We opened presents, had dinner, or mashed potatoes in my case, and then headed home. In all it was a great day. I started to run a fever that night but didn’t think anything about it.
 
The day after Christmas I was supposed to have a video follow-up visit with my doc, but with the sores feeling like they were getting worse I called and switched it to in person. The minute she saw my tongue she asked why I didn’t call the office. Umm, because it was the holidays? I then got a mini lecture on that I need to let them know when I am running fevers and am having a hard time eating. She had them draw some blood since I was there, but I needed to keep them informed if I started running another fever. I made it through the night before another fever hit. When I called the doctor’s office to report it I was told to pack up immediately and head to the emergency room. Ugh! I grabbed a charger and my tablet and told the hubs let’s go. My mom just happened to stop by right before we got our marching orders, so she came with us.
 
Now, I guess there is never really a good time to be in the emergency room, but it felt like everyone that might have some little, tiny thing wrong with them, was in the emergency room. Finally, I was called back and put into a bed. Then the poking and prodding started and the argument that I have with almost every nurse starts. Do not even think about sticking a needle in my left arm. Having lymphedema means no blood draws, no blood pressure, basically anything that would cause compression, can’t be done on the arm. Due to this my poor right arm gets double duty. Normally my port would be used for some of the blood draws, but it had developed a clot, so they couldn’t get blood return through it. They were able to run hydration and pain meds through it. Thank goodness.
 
We knew that I was going to be admitted, it was just a matter of logistics before I could get moved to a room. Finally, around 9pm, I sent my mom and hubs home. There was no point in the two of them just hanging around waiting for me to get a room. After mom and the hubs left I got to chatting with one of the nurses. Apparently, the number of ambulances that showed up that night was more than normal. Therefore, throwing everything out of sync. About an hour later I was finally taken up to my room.
 
The first night I spent on the floor that was a step below ICU. Meaning I had a ton more nurses to keep me up half the night. They wanted to make sure I didn’t have a staph infection, gone septic, or another long list of issues before they would release me to a slightly lesser floor. I spent about 24 hours there before they were satisfied that they were just dealing with chemo induced neutropenia. What is that you ask? It is when chemo dramatically reduces the number of white and red blood cells that you have. It can cause fevers, mouth sores, chills, body aches and extreme fatigue. At the same time my body was having a hard time maintaining the minimum level of potassium it needs. So, they started pumping me full of antibiotics and potassium.
 
After one night I must have improved enough to be moved up a floor. The entertaining part of changing rooms is being pushed around in your bed and watching to see if the guy driving is going to take out a door. Once I was settled in my new room my hubs and sis came to visit. While they were there one of the nurses came in and it was brought up that a blood draw was going to happen at 4am. 4am?!?! WTH!!! I then asked if they could get the blood clot meds for my port so that we could use it for the blood draw instead of having to search for a vein in my arm. The nurse said that she needed a doctor to put in orders for the meds, but she would try. A little while later the nurse came back in to do her thing and my sister asked what the status was on the meds for my port and the nurse said that she was still waiting to hear from the doc. This wasn’t good enough for my sis and she took off down the hall to the nurses station to find the head nurse and get this handled. Next thing I know the meds have been approved, my port got treated and at 4am it was used for my blood draw. Need something done? Give my sis a call. LOL
 
The next few days were a bit of a blur. New Years happened in the middle of it. The hubs came by and we had an early cheers to 2025 being better than 2024. Finally after being in the hospital a week I was deemed well enough to be sent home with a boat load of new medications.
 
After being home a few days I took a look at my calendar and realized that I was scheduled to do chemo again that Friday. I messaged my doctor right away letting her know that it wasn’t a good idea. I could barely walk to the bathroom without thinking I was going to pass out. One could only guess what would happen with another dose of chemo. She agreed to put off chemo but still wanted a blood draw done to see where all my levels were at. We ended up postponing chemo for two weeks. We decided to resume chemo at 50% the dose, instead of the 100% dose we did the first time. I ran a few fevers and was super nauseous. I could barely keep any food down so I became dehydrated and weak. Again, I messaged the doc that I wasn’t up to doing the second dose. Instead we did a dose of hydration and another round of potassium (labs where showing I was low again). Depending on how I feel I might do another round of hydration on Monday to hopefully keep my feeling well enough to do chemo this Friday coming up. Keep your fingers crossed for me.