Day whatever

I haven't written much lately, I know. I've mostly been in pain or tired. This round of chemo has taken much more of a toll on me, and the things I used take for granted before have become major points of consternation. Some time around my last post I asked Brent to bring a ball to kick around at the park. It was a really windy day, which I didn't realize till I got outside, and we had a hard time getting that ball back and forth to each other even in a small area. I felt good that day, though. I felt like I was getting exercise and staying strong and so forth. It was one of those perfect fall cancer days.

I can't quite remember when the shift happened. The teams of doctors round on me every morning when I'm still half asleep. Mostly they talk about my fevers and the status of my various infections and how well or if my cells counts are improving. But at some point the Nephrologists got pulled into the mix. I felt awful and weak all the time. Sometimes I had to ask for help getting to the bathroom at night. My Potassium levels were low, and my blood pressure was high, and no one was sure what was causing it. Low Potassium is bad for the heart rhythm, and can cause high blood pressure, and mine had been steadily rising.Whatever the reason was, I've been having to take on several IV bags of Potassium every day to keep my levels up. I took it IV because I tried both oral versions and they both made me puke violently. But IV Potassium is really hard on the veins. So I ended up circulating through lots of different IV sites each time one would get crabby. After making it through two rounds of chemo already, I thought I knew about what to expect, but the whole kidney involvement thing was new. And the extreme nausea was new. And being on Dilaudid for abdominal pain was new.

Erin and Amie came out to visit when all this was going on. I thought I'd be getting out of the hospital by this time and be in the recovery zone well enough that I could do fun stuff with friends. But I mostly had to try to entertain them in my room by showing them my different sleeping poses. We also had a coloring party (thank you to Liane, Leica, Elizabeth, and Andrea for those goodies).

I also had both of my brothers come out during this time. I tried not to abuse my power, but it's nice to have someone who will adjust my pillow for me, put my socks on me, clear a path to the bathroom for me, and even spoon feed me on request.

At least the liquid diet doesn't look any worse than the regular diet here

There was finally some news from the Nephrologists yesterday. They had done some extensive literature review and came across one case where someone developed low Potassium from Posaconazole, the anti-fungal I've been tanking They did some urine study, with my pee, to determine that this drug was the culprit all along.

So as all my drugs get pulled off or adjusted or whatever over the next few days, I'll probably have more upbeat posts for you. Fingers crossed.