Thurs, 30 August 2007
My Dear Friends,
My apologies for all the typos in the last entry. Lindsay typed it from my scrawls on a piece of paper. I had trouble reading some of it!
Been doing OK. Still pretty tired. This antibiotic drip sometimes takes 3-4 hours instead of 2-2.5 hours. I keep turning it up.
The first time I did this myself it was a bit overwhelming. So much for avoiding the medical field as a profession! On Friday morning, the nurse came and set up the bag & showed me how to flush (inject) the saline and heparin (to prevent blood clot in the IV line) but on Friday night, I was on my own.
My sister and my neighbor/friend (the university professor) were with me. They helped me decipher the instructions. At one point, I called the 24 hour nurse. I got an answering service! We had to figure things out on our own as I was in the middle of set-up but the on-call nurse ended up calling back an hour later.
The Professor stayed with me until after midnight, bless her heart. I had dozed off so she woke me when the drip stopped. We were watching "Little Miss Sunshine", a highly-overrated movie. (Neither of us liked it. It starts with a woman picking her brother up in the hospital after a suicide attempt then later the Grandpa overdoses on drugs and DIES in the hospital! Not good after what I went through last week. And this was supposed to be a comedy. I laughed twice in the first hour.)
The Professor came over again a couple days ago to wash all my dishes and scrub my kitchen floor. She's a good friend.
Anyway, I've been doing this antibiotic twice a day (morning and night). They said my blood looked OK, no kidney damage yet!
I have two appointments next week: one with Dr. V (infectious disease) and another for a colonoscopy (to see if that was the source of the infection). Ran into my oncologist at chemo on Monday. She told me Dr. V ordered the colonoscopy so not to worry about cancer there. She scolded me for not asking the question (why are they doing it?). Of course, I'm still worried.
A pharmacist called from the medical supply place after they delivered my next week's supply of meds & accessories. I asked her if this was overkill since my chemo nurse on Monday told me my blood cultures were clear. The pharmacist said my blood cultures were positive. I asked if that was from my arm or the port. She said she didn't know, she only had one result. (Of course the port showed infection, we knew that.)
The pharmacist tried to scare me by saying if I ignore the infection and it grows in my blood, I could get a fever, then septecemia and die (in so many words). She said the antibiotic level is appropriate.
I wish these medical people would stop telling me how sick I am when I feel fine!
Well, I have to go to work this afternoon, after I disconnect myself from this pole, so I'll close here.
Thank you for your continued prayers. It's good to be home.
Love,
Jeanette
PS: Hello to all of Mark's coworkers who wished me well at his softball game on Tuesday! :)
My apologies for all the typos in the last entry. Lindsay typed it from my scrawls on a piece of paper. I had trouble reading some of it!
Been doing OK. Still pretty tired. This antibiotic drip sometimes takes 3-4 hours instead of 2-2.5 hours. I keep turning it up.
The first time I did this myself it was a bit overwhelming. So much for avoiding the medical field as a profession! On Friday morning, the nurse came and set up the bag & showed me how to flush (inject) the saline and heparin (to prevent blood clot in the IV line) but on Friday night, I was on my own.
My sister and my neighbor/friend (the university professor) were with me. They helped me decipher the instructions. At one point, I called the 24 hour nurse. I got an answering service! We had to figure things out on our own as I was in the middle of set-up but the on-call nurse ended up calling back an hour later.
The Professor stayed with me until after midnight, bless her heart. I had dozed off so she woke me when the drip stopped. We were watching "Little Miss Sunshine", a highly-overrated movie. (Neither of us liked it. It starts with a woman picking her brother up in the hospital after a suicide attempt then later the Grandpa overdoses on drugs and DIES in the hospital! Not good after what I went through last week. And this was supposed to be a comedy. I laughed twice in the first hour.)
The Professor came over again a couple days ago to wash all my dishes and scrub my kitchen floor. She's a good friend.
Anyway, I've been doing this antibiotic twice a day (morning and night). They said my blood looked OK, no kidney damage yet!
I have two appointments next week: one with Dr. V (infectious disease) and another for a colonoscopy (to see if that was the source of the infection). Ran into my oncologist at chemo on Monday. She told me Dr. V ordered the colonoscopy so not to worry about cancer there. She scolded me for not asking the question (why are they doing it?). Of course, I'm still worried.
A pharmacist called from the medical supply place after they delivered my next week's supply of meds & accessories. I asked her if this was overkill since my chemo nurse on Monday told me my blood cultures were clear. The pharmacist said my blood cultures were positive. I asked if that was from my arm or the port. She said she didn't know, she only had one result. (Of course the port showed infection, we knew that.)
The pharmacist tried to scare me by saying if I ignore the infection and it grows in my blood, I could get a fever, then septecemia and die (in so many words). She said the antibiotic level is appropriate.
I wish these medical people would stop telling me how sick I am when I feel fine!
Well, I have to go to work this afternoon, after I disconnect myself from this pole, so I'll close here.
Thank you for your continued prayers. It's good to be home.
Love,
Jeanette
PS: Hello to all of Mark's coworkers who wished me well at his softball game on Tuesday! :)
posted by Mark Kappe @ 7:14 AM
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