May, 18, 2010

Today was a really good day. Brenn and I stayed together in the hospital last night, and we had to fast starting from midnight. Brenn and I stayed up until about 10:15 last night, trying to get as much food into her as possible and watching movies. We had a pretty good time.

Brenn slept really well last night as well. We had blood work done at 4:25 this morning, and she didn't even wake up for it. I was impressed. They made her role over in her sleep so that they could access her VAD. Once they got the blood that they needed, they cleaned her access and she rolled back to where she started and was sleeping right away.

We woke up around 7:30 this morning, and were told that we would have to be in the clinic by 8:30. This meant that we had to call Christine and make sure she would be here on time, which of course she was. Brenn was really scared to go and get her Lumbar Puncture, and bone marrow aspiration. Both Christine and I stayed in the room for the procedure this time. They do not allow first timers to stay with their parents, but as Brenn was on her second procedure now, they said that it would be fine if we stayed. It was interesting to watch, but also heart crushing. They put a needle that is about 4 inches long into her hip, and take out some marrow, then they take a "core sample" of bone and marrow from her hip (which is not a very nice thing to watch happen to your helpless 5 year old. Then they take some spinal fluid out of her back, and inject some of her chemotherapy drugs in, and the procedure is then over. All this would not be that bad I guess, but she is awake and can feel the procedure happening. When they were taking the bone and marrow sample, she was crying out and saying "owe, owe, owe" it was horrible.

Once the medicine wore off though, she cannot remember what happened to her. The rest of the day was quite busy for Christine and I. I went to Ikea with my mom and Samantha for an hour around lunch. When I got back, it was meetings with the nutritionist, and discharge nurse, our clinic nurse, and the ward nurse. Lots to know! I think we are starting to make strides into what we need to know. The nurses have all been quizzing us on all the things that we need to know, so as long as they know what they are talking about, then I think they are good. We are starting to feel a lot more confident in the knowledge that we have. I am sure that there will be a million questions within the next week or so, now that we will be out of the hospital and doing things on our own, but I think the base line is there, and they have set us up that if we have any questions, it doesn't matter what time of day it is we can call any one of our team and get the answers. This place is really good.

Again I can not say thank you enough to everyone for all of your thoughts, prayers, and care packages. We are all incredibly blessed, because of all the caring people that we have around us.

Scott