My whiteboard calendar is mocking me. You know the color coded one that I keep on the kitchen wall to track the activities for the four of us? My family loves to tease me because I'm a little obsessive about it. But now, I think I need a one day calendar. I could wake up in the morning and say, “what are we going to try to do today?” I really shouldn’t plan any farther ahead than that. Because, I thought we were moving forward - there had been no vomiting for a day and a half - but then tonight, after having a relatively good day, Shannon vomited up her dinner and now she’s horizontal on the couch and so angry and frustrated. This is as down in the dumps as she’s ever been. Damn.
At our hematology appointment today, Dr. Rodriguez listened to all of Shannon’s symptoms and told us she feels this is most likely tumor and treatment related. The cells dying in the tumor are wreaking havoc in the adjoining healthy brain tissue. Shannon has lost 11 pounds. So, we will wait a week on starting the maintenance dose of chemo and try to give Shannon's body time to recover. A follow up appointment is scheduled for next Monday to check Shannon's weight and see if she's ready to start the Temodar again.
After hearing from Dr. Rodriguez, Dr. Laack called this afternoon and upped the steroid dose to try to curb the nausea and any brain swelling there may be, and to hopefully spark Shannon's appetite. Shannon is under doctors orders to stay home, stay out of the heat, rest, drink lots of fluid, and eat lots of calories.
So that stuff that I wrote on the color coded calendar for this week - hockey, golf, St. John's Block Party, shopping at IKEA... never mind. We'll get up tomorrow and see what we can do...
