Thursday, September 25, 2003

Thursday, September 25, 2003 3:00 PM CDT

Susan here...

Well - it has been a rough day. Nathan woke up in pain and very cranky. He is also on steroids that help control his nausea and that makes him cranky too. The nurse did his line care on his catheter and he has been having very red irritated skin around the site from the tape we think. When she removed a piece of tape it took a piece of skin with it. It was very painful. He is now without any kind of bandage to let him heal. Chemo causes fast dividing cells to die and so his skin is not able to heal itself right now. Afterwards he decided he really wanted a banana and there was not one to be found in the hospital so Luke ran to the grocery store to get him one. When he tried to eat it it was very painful and so he was upset about that. Oh and he also got a really strange rash on his forehead that popped out when he started screaming and then slowly went away. No idea what that was about.

They then came to give him his stem cells back. He was screaming in pain at that time and they gave him some morphine and I read to him and he calmed down and went to sleep. There were lots of people there - 2 nurses, 2 student nurses, the oncology fellow and the doctor. It took about 40 minutes to give him the stem cells. His blood pressure jumped during the transfusion and he has had to have 2 does of a medicine to reduce it. they aren't really sure why it went up but they aren't too concerned. He continued to sleep and his nurse was going to stay with him anywyay so Luke and I went and grabbed some lunch. He was awake when we got back and much more chipper. He ate a orange push up ice cream and then sat in the chair and decided to take a nap.

His counts are lower but still not at zero yet. He definately has mouth sore int he back of his mouth and throat - we can't see them though. He also has sore skin on his bottom. He will be getting the morphine ever two hours and eventually continously. He will also be on an antibiotic when his counts drop and he will start on the IV nutrition tonight.

We have some pictures to post but will have to do it tonight back at the apartment. I am at the hospital currently.

So basically - he has his stem cells back - but now comes the hard part where he will be in pain and feeling badly until his counts start to rise again in about 8 to 10 days we hope.