Quick Update.....

We've been here for over two weeks now. It's been a fairly smooth adjustment. I feel more settled now that I have a library card. It just didn't seem right to live for more than a week without being able to check out a book. I'll also be able to use the Internet there, too, which will be wonderful. I feel like I am cut off from the world around me without the Internet. My job transfer has been much more complicated than I expected, but I think it has at last fallen into place and I should be able to start work the week of March first.

Mama went for her first visit to the cancer specialist the Tuesday after we got here. This specialist said pretty much the same thing that the one at home did -- that this cancer is incurable and treatment will help prolong her life for one or two years. He decided on two chemo drugs to start with and will possibly add two more. She went for her first treatment this Tuesday. When she got home, we were encouraged, because she felt a little dizzy and tired, but not terrible. The next day, she went to have a porta-cath put in her shoulder so she won't have to use an IV for each chemo treatment. On the way home from the hospital, she developed a fever. We had been told to take her to the local ER if she got a fever over 100.4. Her temperature was 102.3 when we took it, so we rushed to the ER. When they checked her temperature there, it was 103.8.

She has been in the hospital since then. Her fever keeps spiking and coming back down. The hospital she is taking the treatments at is over almost two hours from here, so the local hospital she is at have been trying to get her back there so her specialist can look at her. So far, a bed hasn't come available there. Today, the doctor told us that he thinks she is just having a reaction to the chemo because she shows no signs of infection. He might possibly send her home tomorrow if her fever stays under control. She has been really miserable. I'm wondering now if it is going to be like this with every chemo treatment.


So it has been a stressful week. I appreciate everyone's thoughts and prayers so much. I really hope my mom can begin to feel better soon.