Sunrise
Happy Birthday to Nurse Tracey for the 1st April and Uncle Guy for today xox
Rory is run down and sad. During chemotherapy he is merely existing. Sean and I keep hardening our hearts to drive Rory forward through the MAP chemotherapy protocol. It is difficult to see and difficult to do. Prior to the use of chemotherapy, given pre and post tumor removal, the survival rate of osteosarcoma patients was <20%. Even though chemotherapy pre-surgery resulted in only 50% cell death of Rory’s tumour it is still the best weapon we have in our arsenal. We must use it.
Rory had a better sleep last night. We give him half a sleeping pill (zopiclone) to minimise the amount of time he stays awake when he pees and when the nurses disturb him. It also prevents tossing and turning which works the uridome off. In spite of this Rory is still feeling tired and like rubbish today. This morning there was an elevated level of glucose in his urine so we have stopped the dexamethasone. He has gained four kilograms in two days so he has been given furosemide to empty out the stored water. They have moved Rory into Room 1 which has a toilet to make things easier. Nurse Tracey has been checking on him daily, as has Dr Kath.
Sean was on duty the last 24 hours on the ward and I swapped with him at 11am today. Taking turns with Rory in the hospital makes life tolerable for us. We can have a reasonable sleep every second night, get out for a walk in the fresh air, eat healthily and spend time with Colt. This morning Colt and I climbed Mt Eden to see the sunrise, making sure we kept a 2m distance from everyone else who was out. There were small bubbles of people on the summit quietly standing still when the sun rose. The atmosphere was reverent, it was like being in church. You could feel how thankful everyone was for the experience.