I'm sorry that I've been so absent from this blog but today is the 2 and 1/2 week mark for me in the hospital.

The hospital is terrible. I really really really hate it here. It has done a fine job of breaking my indomitable spirit and causing what people keep telling me is, "depression." Apparently, I've never been really depressed before. Thanks, Hosp.

The good news: my counts are finally up. I want to leave today. Or I would settle for tomorrow. They're pulling me off all my anti biotics to see how my systems fares on its own.

How did we get here? No doubt the most disturbing part of this month has been the radical turn around from Superwoman to nosediving hard and landing in the H. Why was this treatment cycle so much worse? Why am I such a pansy? Turns out I'm one of .03% of people who is missing an enzyme in my blood that helps metabolize this drug I was taking: 6-MP. Without said enzyme it was like I was taking 10X the chemo dose that I needed. So that's what crushed my counts and for so long. Shout out to Dr. K for figuring that out before I start another 70-day cycle of 6-MP.

That's all for now because most of my thoughts are pretty whiney and I've been trapped in a white box for 2 and 1/2 weeks with little stimulus.

All I need

I just need some white blood cells. I can't leave until I have them. I am getting really miserable and desperate trapped here. Please, please, please think good things for my WBCs. I know you probably already are, but just in case... my sanity is on the line.

I'm alive

I realize it's been about a week which is terribly uncharacteristic of me.

I'm still in the hospital. It's been a rough go. I won't go into details now, but the bottom line is, please think very good thoughts for my white blood cells.

The good is that I am better than I was. Or something. I'm aiming to get out of here Wednesday?

Set backs

Well, well, well. What a humbling week!

Yesterday afternoon I checked BACK into the H because Friday night's test results suggest I have a staph infection in my blood. Yarg. This is AFTER I tried to convince everyone at work that I was doing a great job taking care of myself and that I was on the mend... ready to hit it! Yarg. Again.

So the deal-io is that I'll stay here until my blood cultures re-grow so we know what we're dealing with. There is a small chance nothing is in my blood and that the blood from Friday was contaminated... that's my hope. Anyhoo, in the mean time they gave me a serious dose of anti-biotics which I reacted to not well. My head got all hot and red and itchy and then later on I threw up a whole lot. Let me tell you, a great St. Patrick's Day. I sincerely hope yours was better. So between the Adivan and the Benadryl IV and the fact that I'm still pretty freakin dehydrated and anemic (more anemic today--Hematocrit is at 18!) I am finally slowing down and sleeping. And I get 4 more units of blood.

The good news of yesterday is that the UW called to congratulate me on my acceptance to the class of 2008!

Sleep-good, pee cup engineering-bad

Don't these guys have GREAT HAIR? Maybe I should get my wig styled like them?

I'm in the H again, just had my first spinal tap, and am now being dripped toxic, reproductive system murdering drugs.

Today I took a 3 hour nap before coming in and it really changes how I feel about life--in a good way. I need to remember that. I need to remember that when I feel like death and depression and pain that sleeping is pretty much always the cure. I also need a little cot for my office so I can start taking little naps AT work.

I just started my Adivan drip so I'm not long for this world, but I wanted to say hi!

Also to tell you the latest amusing H story. After my tap they made me lie flat on my back for 4 hours to help my body recalibrate sans 8ccs of spinal fluid. I had pho for dinner. You do the math. That means peeing lying down which is something I haven't done since that one night that I peed on Sarah when I was 20 when we were passed out. Sorry, Sarah. I feel like I've now publicly acknowledged I was the pee-er. That's a story for another time... Anyhoo, the whole experience was bound to end in disaster the minute I saw the woefully inadequate little cup they had in mind. So my pants and panties are around my angles, my new shave job exposed... and nothing. Shy bladder. For 10 minutes. It wanted it to come so bad. And finally victory... all over the bed and me and my nice nurse. But, much like childbirth apparently removes any sense of modesty so too has cancer. People touch me and look at me and put me in funny clothes and today I peed the bed and someone else had to clean it up and I can't say I was even that embarrassed. It was just bad engineering.