Hickman Port Day

Today, Mom had her Hickman port installed. Everything went well with that this morning and they did it under sedation, not general anesthesia. That sure makes things easier. Indra was with Mom the whole time. Following the procedure, they went to the bone marrow transplant center to meet with the doctor, then to the pharmacy before going back to the hotel. Shuttles made transportation relatively easy, which is great. After they got back to the hotel, the home health nurse came to hook Mom up to her IV. It's extremely important for her to remain fully hydrated while on the Cytoxan.

The doctor is having Mom follow a neutropenic diet, where she can't have fresh veggies or fruits. That will be a challenge for this vegetarian once Mom gets home, but it shouldn't be too much trouble to get that figured out. It sounds like proteins and carbohydrates are good bets. Canned goods are okay, if we wash the can thoroughly before opening and then heat everything up really well.

In other news, today Mom was informed that after Wednesday she can't be in contact with Will. I sure wish they would have told us this earlier, as this is kind of a tough concept for an almost three year old. She is his favorite person in the whole entire world. Until Wednesday, if he has contact with her he can't have a cold and he has to wash his hands, etc. Anyway, once he can't have contact with Mom I'm not entirely sure what to do. I picked Marilyn's brain for ideas earlier today and she thinks maybe Mom wearing long sleeves and pants, along with gloves would be the smartest thing. I think that's a great idea. We'll have to experiment once Mom gets home. My greatest concern is that Will doesn't feel like it's his fault that he can't have contact with her, that Grandmama is upset with him or like he did something wrong. I'm going to begin working with him on the concept of not touching and finding other ways to communicate for a little bit until Mom's white blood cell count comes back up (it'll drop 5 to 7 days following her chemo dose and then take a few weeks to come back up). Whew, heavy stuff for such a little guy but he is a smart cookie, so we'll see.

Mom's infusion appointment is set for 8:30 tomorrow morning. The infusion will take four hours. From what I've read, the bulk of people feel the onset of side effects between 6 and 10 hours following infusion. So, we'll be looking at having a good read on Mom's reaction to Cytoxan sometime late tomorrow evening. Duke will be including anti-nausea medications in Mom's IV and they've also prescribed two different pills she can take at the hotel, if she needs to. It looks like she'll lose her hair about two weeks following treatment. Mom already has one very nice wig and she ordered another today.

We are praying for a good reaction to the medication tomorrow, without too much nausea. Thanks for all your thoughts, prayers and support. It means a lot!