Crash and burn

Howdy intrepid readers, it is late on Tuesday evening and I write from a not so pleasant place, but more on that in a moment.

Monday started off with a stay at home morning and then took my sister to the airport for her flight home. It was really good to see her and have here for a bit. My younger sister was already planning on visiting us during Spring Break, so will see her in a couple weeks. Got into the office and work a good half day from there, was good to start getting back to normal. That afternoon was softball practice, and seems like I have a really good team this year and looking forward to working with them over the coming months and seeing them improve.

So I know this is hitting me because, even with two shirts and jacket I was cold by the time practice was over. Got home, at dinner and then went to bed early with a bit of the chills. Now looking back this was a precursor of what was to come. Slept like crap in couple hour bursts and not a very restful sleep.

Tuesday started off ok, my eyes were 'burning' a bit today and I thought this was due to just a bad nights sleep. Got off to the office and worked there until I headed over for my chemo treatment this afternoon. Actually ate well during the day and other things aside, felt much better this go around than last Tuesday when I got the Bleomycin. But I get ahead of myself here, when I arrived they took my blood to check my cell levels and tumor markers as they do every week. Well my White Blood Cell count went from 4,000 cells/microliter from last Tuesday (the bottom of the reference range) to 1,000 cells/microliter today. Also my temperature was a bit elevated (99.6) To be sure they did the cell counts twice from two different sites. Knew this might happen, but didn't expect it to crash out so fast and low. By the time I left my temp was down to 98.8 so they weren't as concerned about me.

So what does this mean... well it means that I get to start injecting myself with Neuprogen (this is a drug that boosts the immune system and causes your body to start making more WBC's. We were hoping to not need this, but always knew it was possibility if the counts got low. The problem is that I can't take Neuprogen 24 hours before or after a Chemo treatment. So have to try and squeeze in during the weekly treatments of weeks 2 & 3 of each cycle. Ok so that wasn't too bad, knew this was a possibility, and it just means a boost to the immune system and that I don't have to worry about getting an opportunistic infection while my immune systems is depressed. Also this tell me that the Chemo is WORKING!! It's killing those fast growing cells and means that it should also be doing a number on the tumor in me. So there's the silver lining in this cloud... a very tangible sign that the drugs are doing their job (besides making me feel ill!!) LOL!

Got home and actually wanted some food, my mom made me some rice and it was good, had some water and was feeling ok. As I said much better than last week when I got the Bleomyicn. Around 4:30 started getting cool again like I did last night, and went and laid by the fire. Took my temperature and it was 100.3, well this crossed the magic threshold and I was under instructions to call the Doctor if I ever hit triple digits. So a call into the Dr and the person on call was Dr. Felice (he was our friend Carol's primary doctor) and while talking with him after he consulted my chart and talked to Dr. Heyer and called me back, my temp got to 101.6. This concerned them because with the low WBC counts and a fever, I could be going neutropenic and the fever would shut down what remains of my immune system leaving me vulnerable to opportunistic infections or worse. Dr. Felice wanted me in the hospital so that they could hit me with IV antibiotics to combat the fever and be pro-active and aggressive, so that I didn't end up really crashing. So off Marnie and I went to Reston Hospital, and they quickly had me upstairs in a bed (gotta love it when the Doc calls ahead and gets you pre-admitted)

Within 1 hour and 45 minutes after talking to Dr. Felice on the phone, I was in a private room, had an IV flowing, all blood work taken and just waiting for the antibiotics to come up from the pharmacy. Talk about fast! Well the fever spike to about 102.6 during this time and I still had the chills and couldn't get warm for a while. Also my labs came back and WBC's had dropped to 800 cells/microliter. Finally got the IV antibiotics and within a couple hours the fever was back down to 100.6, so they were doing their job! Dr. Felice actually came by the hospital and talked with us for a good 30 minutes. He is another great Doctor and I would be just as comfortable with him caring for me, as Dr. Heyer, now I know what Bill (Carol's husband) was talking about when he said the entire practice is really good!

At this point, am sweating again, have had no problems with fluids and peeing just fine. So if the fever abates tomorrow Dr. Felice indicated they would release me, otherwise they want me to stay so that they can monitor me. Also they want to see my WBC count start climbing and tomorrow if I'm still here or at home, I start with the Neupogen shots to kick my Immune System into high gear.

Well I'm sure some of you are yelling at me for not being asleep by now (yes Mother!) but I did doze on and off a bit earlier, not really tired, but starting to get droopy eyed now. So will sign off, turn off the lights and try and get some sleep. Please keep Marnie, Shannon, Ashley and the rest of my family in your thoughts and prayers as they deal with this little road bump. As well I could use a few thoughts and prayers myself... thanks one and all!!