Wednesday

I spent most of the day in Dalhart yesterday. I left before 6am and drove the 75 or so miles home to shower and get ready for work. In the past, Josh has tolerated the early days of chemo pretty well, so I decided to try driving back to Dalhart each morning to get some work done.


They give Josh his chemo at 4am and 4pm. He slept through most of the day. He has not shown many side effects although he is very tired and doesn't have an appetite. He wakes up long enough to take his medications and then goes back to sleep. When I go back to the hospital this evening, he was complaining of a head ache. We don't know if it is a side effect of the chemo or maybe from his lumbar puncture. Tylenol didn't do much for him so they finally gave him some fentanyl.

They delayed giving him his blood pressure medication this evening because his BP was running a little low and his heart rate was running a little high, but that may have been associated with the headache.

Each step along this journey there has been so many ups and downs and twists and turns. We find ourselves feeling apprehensive at each step, not sure what is coming next. He continued to run a fever through the night and his heart rate remained on the high side (over 100). This morning (Wednesday) the oncologist came by. He is not overly concerned about the fever as it could be a side effect of the chemo (etoposide).

Josh woke up around 3 am (Wednesday morning) and started a discussion with his nurse. He had lots of questions about how sick he had been a few weeks earlier (this is the nurse that was on duty when his BP dropped so low). He was very open with her about his faith in God and how he knew that God was at work in his life. The nurse told him that she had spent a lot of time praying for him that night a few weeks back.

He finally went back to sleep around 5 am. This morning, the doctor told Ilene that if his head ache persists, he will consider doing a "blood patch" over his LP sight to stop any further leakage of spinal fluid. They took a blood culture to make sure he doesn't have an infection, and they are watching him closely for other adverse side effects. We continue to pray that Josh will tolerate the remainder of chemo well and will be able to go home on Saturday.