9/5/08 Mom Update

Mom update:
Mom is in her “off week” so she did not have any chemo this week. I think she only has 2 (maybe 3) more sessions left. She went in yesterday to get her blood levels checked. Her white blood count looked good so she doesn’t need more bone marrow stimulating shots (for now) so she is happy about that. She said her arm is pretty bruised up. She can only get them in one arm (the opposite side of where her cancer was) and it can only be in the arm. Her red blood count is low. The nurses were amazed that she was even walking, but the funny thing was she said yesterday was her best day, she was feeling great. The doctor didn’t want to mess with anything b/c she isn’t having any symptoms. He said she is rare so he has to go outside the norm with her. If she starts to get (overly) tired or passes out then he will start her on hemocrit shots but for now he doesn’t want to mess with anything and chance a reaction.

She never has a “why me” attitude. She focuses on what it takes to get better and deal with things. She was even telling me about 2 ladies she met in chemo… how she has helped them to know what to ask the doctor, deal with their symptoms, etc. She said that one of them had a daughter with her a couple of weeks ago that was just hysterical that her mom had to go through that and told her about me and how we cope with it and she followed up with her yesterday and said things are a lot better now and the lady even found a wig that she likes. That's just like her to think of everyone else.

Her focus has been on the wedding… she has been counting down the days. In fact, at her first appointment she told the Dr “my daughter is getting married on the 20th of September in Vegas, so you need to do what you need to do to get me to that wedding”. She loves playing slot machines. She will wander around until she finds one that “talks to her”… she will put in $20 and every time she gets to $100 then she cashes out and sticks in another $20. Normally, she will come home well ahead of what she went into it with. I asked her how she plans on doing that this time, if she is going to wear a mask or whatnot and she said that she is going to take some masks but isn’t sure if she is going to wear it. She said she will just gauge how comfortable she is and if she doesn’t feel good about the people around her she will move on until she find another lucky machine.

She isn’t letting this cancer change her life. She tries to keep things normal. You can tell she is tired and moves a little slower, but her personality hasn’t changed at all and she keeps an amazing attitude.

So there is the update for this week. Keep the prayers comin’!!