Saturday, March 28, 2009

Quick Update

Grandma's 80th Birthday party went very well.  It was great to see everyone, especially people who traveled great distances.  Meike, our German Exchange student from 1998, visited for the party and is going to be in the US taking care of Mom until Sunday.  She is a pediatric oncology nurse in Germany so it was perfect for her to come and take care of Mom.  
On Saturday we had a 500 card game tournament, our pictures taken and dinner for 19 with two birthday cakes, one with 80 candles.  You can check out pictures here.
On Sunday we went to Hope Church, where Mom's friend Mary is a pastor and then everyone parted different ways.
Meike and I took mom on Monday for her fifth (second to last treatment) on Monday.  It mostly went smoothly but I left directly from the hospital when she was finished to head back to Worcester for an early Tuesday morning experiment and prepare for my abstract meeting.
Her next two treatments on Tuesday and Wednesday did not go as smoothly.  Generally she feels pretty good during the treatments and it isn't until the weekend after the treatment that she starts to feel bad and then generally she feels better mid-week.  However this treatment she started to feel poorly immediately.
On Thursday she had her shot, which is normally a 5 minute trip to the hospital, but she wasn't feeling well so they ended up having her stay and run some fluids and have the doctor stop by.  He prescribed her a new drug, which so far hasn't seemed to be helping too much.
Basically she has been feeling pretty terrible the last couple days, just sleeping a lot.  It makes her sick to talk or think about a lot of this stuff, so I'll be probably writing posts until she feels better.  But I am sure she would appreciate comments and encouragement.  Meike just told me she is eating a root beer float and some doritos, so I think that is pretty encouraging!