Another one down!!

Hi everyone,

Sorry this post is a day late. Thank you to those of you who called wanting to make sure that everything was OK.

Yesterday went much better than last week. Unfortunately, Grace did vomit on her way to the infusion. I think she was just really nervous given the events of last week.

When the meds were hung, I went to get her breakfast in the cafeteria. In weeks past, she usually becomes ravenously hungry about 20 minutes into the infusion. I became a little concerned when that did not happen this week, and the breakfast went untouched. She started to feel more and more nauseated. The nurse came, and suggested that because Grace had started the infusion with a totally empty stomach (due to the vomiting), that we had created a vicious cycle: Grace couldn't/didn't want to eat because of the nausea and fear of vomiting. The empty stomach, however, was make the nausea worse. If she had started with a little food on her stomach, she probably would have been OK, but we had just started out on the wrong foot.

The nurse called her doctor, who prescribed a dose of Zofran, which is a FABULOUS anti-nausea med used in patients receiving cancer treatments. Grace took the Zofran, and started to feel much better within just a couple of minutes. It was miraculous. She still didn't feel like eating much, but she felt better.

Selfishly, I was glad she felt better because we had plans to meet an old friend for a quick lunch yesterday. Typically, Grace is "amped up" after a treatment, and after she started to feel better yesterday, this proved to be true once again. So, we walked around U-Village for a few minutes and then met Lara for lunch. Grace managed to eat most of a hamburger and some fries. By then, Grace was starting to get very tired, which is also par for the course. So, we loaded her up in the car and brought her home. She spent most of the afternoon on the couch, and felt great this morning and was able to go to school.

We are taking next week off from the steroid (methylprednisolone) therapy. I will administer a methotrexate injection at home next Thursday. The following week, she goes for her infusion on Wednesday in order to be sure that she feels 100% healthy by Friday so she can go to Encampment with her Brownie troop that weekend.

Thank you to Christine for a wonderful dinner last night!

Thank you everyone for reading.

All my best,
Sabrina