Consolidation Day 8:

Today we were back in the clinic for the second week of this round of chemo. Today, Scarlett was very excited to bring her new backpack to clinic with her. She packed one animal from her farm, four chap sticks and her blankie! The backpack is almost as big as she is but she insisted on carrying it herself. When we get to clinic she gets to watch cartoons in the waiting room and then knows that the Child Life girls have left her a bag of toys to play with in her room. She plays nicely until it is time to access her port. She sits nicely on my lap and the staff tries to distract her with toys. She patiently and cooperatively wears her mask to keep the site sterile. But as soon as the needle goes into her port, her demeanor changes. She cries. She doesn’t like to leave our lap. She just wants to go home.

She has been doing very well so far considering the poison being pumped into her body. We have been giving her medication for nausea around the clock. When we miss a dose, she tends to get very cranky. I don’t think she understands or can tell us that her tummy hurts so this is our cue. Today we had to give her morphine twice because her “button” hurt. And she has been having terrible tantrums his past week. Whether that has to do with being sick or being two – I’m not sure. But she has been biting. Not people but pretty much everything else.

Her labs today showed that the meds are doing their jobs. Our goal right now is to completely wipe out her blood cells and start again. Her red blood cells were down to 7.1 although we sure couldn’t tell. She isn’t tired or pale or cold like she was last time. Her white cells (the germ fighters) were down to 0.8. They are almost all gone. So I guess her cold isn’t going away any time soon. This also means she is on neutropenic precautions again. No visitors, special diet, no crowds. Luckily, the one lab that we still want to be high, is still high. Her platelets are still high which means that her blood will still clot for her spinal tomorrow.

Although Scarlett seems to be physically doing well, I think that all five us are emotionally reaching a turning point. Every day is something new. Hopefully we can get through tomorrow and then Thursday…one day at a time.