Day 6
Memorial Day was quiet for us here in Seattle. I spent a good part of the day catching up on work projects. John spent the day trying out different kinds of pain killers - "experimenting with drugs" I suppose.
His various blood counts have reached the bottoming out level, with his neutrophils, or white cells, at .01, or barely registrable on any scale. This is all as it should be. His mucusitis, or mouth sores, is now making it hard to swallow, but he can breathe without assistance. His eyes are now sunken with black rings around them. All as it should be. I've said this before, but someday, I hope, doctors will look back on these kinds of treatment the way we do blood-letting.
For now, John will be getting all his medications and perhaps nourishment by IV. In terms of pain killers, the rejected morphine becauuse it makes him disoriented. The second alternative caused a mild allergic reaction and the third wasn't getting the job done when I last checked. Although he is miserable, he is taking it pretty well and the nurses are doing their best to help him cope. All this should last through the week and then start to get better. We carry on.
His various blood counts have reached the bottoming out level, with his neutrophils, or white cells, at .01, or barely registrable on any scale. This is all as it should be. His mucusitis, or mouth sores, is now making it hard to swallow, but he can breathe without assistance. His eyes are now sunken with black rings around them. All as it should be. I've said this before, but someday, I hope, doctors will look back on these kinds of treatment the way we do blood-letting.
For now, John will be getting all his medications and perhaps nourishment by IV. In terms of pain killers, the rejected morphine becauuse it makes him disoriented. The second alternative caused a mild allergic reaction and the third wasn't getting the job done when I last checked. Although he is miserable, he is taking it pretty well and the nurses are doing their best to help him cope. All this should last through the week and then start to get better. We carry on.
