A weekend away

It might be that everyone I know is planning and taking somewhat exciting trips and letting me know about it but apparently my body decided it needed some tlc and attention too. Apparently the place to get that kind of attention turned out to be a clean floor at Georgetown Hospital.

While I don't think Fred was responsible for my thrush - he apparently is very effective at killing things in my body. After spending most of the week feeling pretty tired and weak and dealing with the thrush, I had my blood taken Thursday. Parking a block further from the hospital and walking to the hospital (3 blocks) and then through the hospital, getting blood drawn and then walking back was totally exhausting. I drove to work and spent the day having various meetings but constantly commenting about how tired I felt. Finally at 3:00 I headed home (note I had worked about a 1/2 day) and had a phone call from my case manager saying I was neutropenic - or I effectively had no neutrophils (a type of white blood cells) and pretty much no white blood cells at all so no immune system. This is the point where avoiding infection is critical and monitoring for any fever is crucial. The lack of a system to fight anything means any infection can get serious fast. A fever of 100.6 means automatic hospital stay - Thursday afternoon I was at 99 and it seemed rising. Friday morning I had a temperature of 100.2 and then 100.3 about an hour apart so I called into Dorothy. My oncologist decided I should be admitted so then I was home, paranoid and waiting for a bed. This was all done by about 10:30 - after a couple of calls to tell me we were still waiting, Dorothy told me to head to the ER where they would start antibiotics. It was then 3:30.

Of course, by then my fever was back down, I was wondering if we were overreacting and didn't really want to go to the hospital, especially the ER. Jason, my upstairs neighbor and friend took me to the ER which was totally packed. After fitting me with a mask that apparently is what they wear when treating tuberculosis patients I was sent back into the waiting room. I'm not sure I ever felt so panicked in my life, I'm sure I must have but sitting in a room full of people who you know are sick when you know you have no immune system is not fun. Of course it could have been the mask but I think I may have started hyper-ventilating a couple of times. I was also ready to bolt. I spoke to Dorothy who told me I had a bed and I should stay - apparently she had been spending the day getting beds assigned and then taken away by other departments but there was a bed on the cancer/clean floor that was mine.

I stayed in the ER - we were brought back and put in a curtained area by 5 or so and then more waiting and tests were done. They drew more blood - from both the mediport and from a vein, urine sample and chest xray and discussed how we were starting antibiotics. They gave me two - one of which was related to penicillin that I am somewhat allergic to (started my feet and mouth tingling and my feet started feeling swollen) and people would occasionally pop in. I sent Jason back home to his wife and babies at around 6:30 ( what does it say about their life that the er seemed more calm than day to day life with babies?) and hung out. I signed papers confirming I was spending the night and checking in around 6 -but didn't get brought upstairs until 10. By 8:30 or 9:00 everything had been done, my room confirmed and I was waiting for an orderly. During this whole time, I had no fever and actually felt pretty good - better it seemed than all the people surrounding me in the ER and I was feeling a little bad for using resources, when they are so busy.

It also seemed pretty inefficient - the ER was crazy busy, people were stacking up in the waiting room - I had a bed assigned upstairs yet was still using ER resources for another 3 hours after they knew where I was going. This also did mean I had a dinner of a nutrigrain bar and a snickers followed later by some cracker jacks. While not exactly a well balanced meal - it turned out most of it was acceptably part of the neutripenic diet.