Friday, June 8

End of Round 2

12 hours ago now I finished the last drop of my 2nd round of chemo. A very big thank you to everyone who stopped by, wrote me an email, and/ or prayed for me while I was at Virginia Mason. I really appreciate all the emails (33 when I got home and checked this morning!) I will be making an attempt to write you back if you write me an email. (What better thing to do in my free time?) So don't hesitate to write me, feel free to talk about whatever you like, it doesn't need to be cancer related.

Prayer requests for this upcoming week would be that the pills I need to get down will "get down" and that once down will stay down. Also that the shots I have to take every evening will boost my white blood cell count and that my white blood cell count won't reach epicly-low levels like it did last time. (Which ended me up at Overlake a couple weekends ago.)

Right now I'm at home waiting for some meds to show up at the pharmacy so I can continue to be anti-queezy for the rest of the day, weekend and week. I appreciate all the support, thanks for the song suggestions you sent along BTW, and if there is any way that you feel like you'd like to help please drop me a line.

Thanks again for all the prayers and visits and emails. I really enjoy them all.

Oh, a story from yesterday: Yesterday morning I was feeling pretty queezy so the nurse gave me a shot IV of a stuff called Raglan. She gave me 30 of whatever the dosage was (ml, mg?) and took off. Let me tell you, I would rather have been throwing up every 30 minutes that the side effects I experienced from that medication. I couldn't stop twitching my legs and I got really anxious about the week ahead of me and I was slightly paranoid. The effects lasted for 4 to 5 hours and afterwards I was very very greatful when they were out of my system. They told me afterwards that 30 was kind of a high dose and that 10 might be better, but I am going to avoid that stuff because it was so incredibly horrible to my body. (I couldn't sleep either) Thanks for your prayers yesterday, it was a really strange experience that I can hopefully avoid in the future.

~B.

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous3:27 PM

    Ben, I know you are plugged into the Saturday night service as am I. You are in our prayers. Please let us know if there is anything we can do to support you and your family.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous5:20 PM

    Dear Ben:
    Yesterday I was riding the Metro bus to work. There was a mid-20s guy on the bus, wearing scrubs and with a stehoscope and an Overlake Hospital id lanyard around his neck. This was a dead giveaway to me... so I asked what his job was at Overlake. He is a day shift nurse on the oncology floor! He graduated from the SPU nursing program 2 years ago and remembered having you on his floor two weeks ago when your white blood cells decided to go AWOL for a few days. His name is Graham, and he is now praying for you, too. Hopefully, you will not need to revisit his floor, but if you do, he's happy to pray with you.

    Once school ends for the summer (2 more weeks) I will be available to do whatever you and Lisa need. I can clean (I use only baking soda, vinegar, and castille soap plus lots of elbow grease, so no nauseating smells or toxic residues to worry about).

    I love to read out loud - have you read the Frankie Schaeffer book, "Portofino"? A light summer read with side-splitting evangelical humor. That would be a fun one to read to you if you like to listen to books. It isn't long - well, okay, it is 290 pages. But they are small pages. :)

    I can cook whatever you feel like eating.

    I can help organize and pay bills to keep the household finances under control while the rest of life seems so out of control.

    I can drive you to appointments, pick up medications, do grocery shopping, paint walls, etc.

    I'm telling you, Ben, after 30 years of raising kids and keeping house, I'm pretty game to try anything.

    I am happy to come over and sit with you overnight so Lisa can get some sleep, if that would be helpful.

    God bless.
    Mare Sullivan
    821-6884

    ReplyDelete

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