 |
||
 |
NOTES FROM LAUREN (9/10/05)
Hi Everbody. This is Lauren.
After talking with my dad about writing some more, he suggested
that I talk about what I do when I get chemo.
I have both out-patient and in-patient
chemo. That means that sometimes I have to stay at the
hospital for more than one day (in-patient) for treatments and
sometimes I get a treatment and go home (ou-patient).
I have both 5 day and 2 day in-patient
stays. So far I have done both stays twice. I have to
do each 3 more times before my chemo is done.
Once my counts are high enough, I
check into the hospital. As soon as I get settled into my
room the staff begins giving me fluids through my port. My
port is like a pin cushion that is under my skin. It has a
tube that runs to a blood vessel close to my heart. The
nurses put needles into my port to deliver the fluids and
chemo to my body.
Every day that I stay in the hospital,
I usually get 2-3 chemo treatments that take about 1-2 hours each.
At the same time I receive many bags of fluids. I watch TV
and movies and listen to my IPOD when I receive treatments.
Sometimes my mom reads to me. I sleep during treatments too.
My floor at the hospital has a special
play room for the patients. They reserve a time for me to
have the play room to myself so I am not exposed to other's germs.
I usually play X Box, Ninetendo, and PS2. Sometimes I play
foosball.
The chemo makes me really tired and
sometimes it upsets my stomach and I get sick. I take
medicine to help my stomach, but sometimes it is not enough, I
still get sick.
Out patient chemo doesn't usually
bother me as much. I get a simple "push" of a
medicine. It takes just a few seconds and then I get to go
home.
Thanks to everyone for supporting me.
Hope to see you all soon.
Lauren
(9/7/05)
Hi Everyone, This is Lauren speaking.
On Tuesday I got 2 units of blood and 1 unit of platelets.
My color has come back, my lips are more pink, and I feel better.
I have alot more energy. It takes what seems like forever
for me to receive all of that blood. It took five hours to
receive all of that plus the time waiting for my turn to get
started and the time it took to go through dismissal. We
were at the hospital from 8am to 4pm. We started the day
doing labwork.
My tutor's name is Steve. He is
scheduled to work with me for an hour on the school days where I
need to stay home. I have to stay home because my immune
system is low and it would be real easy for me to catch germs and
get sick. Steve is real nice. We are working on the
basics, math, spelling, social studies, language arts, and will
have science later on. I would rather be in school so I
could see my friends. But the one on one instruction is
pretty swell.
Monday night we went to the Hartman
ranch, it's a name we gave to a place they have in the country.
I got really tired on a walk but got my energy back with the blood
that I received.
Thanks for posting notes. Hope
to see you soon.
Lauren
|
|
|
|