Chemo Day Care - 20th July 2009

Today is 27th July 2009. Seven days after Aidan's check-up. Why the delay in updates one may wonder? Well... Continue to read and you will find out the reason.

On 20th July 2009, we took Aidan in for his first check-up after his final round of Chemo. As per the normal routine, blood was drawn and the readings were as expected. All the counts were low. It takes 10 - 14 days after the Chemo for all the counts to pick up.

The doctor ordered a blood transfusion as Aidan's haemaglobin count was only 8.4 when the minimum should be 10. Aidan slept through most of the transfusion and when it was completed, we got in the car and headed home.
It was when we reached home that the drama began. Aidan started having chills just as we got into the house. He was trembling from head to toe and started burning up with fever. Trust me, when I say "burning up, I mean burning up". He was so hot that I started to panic. I thank God for the ability to think although I was panicking. I gave him fever medicine and started sponging him. It was over an hour before we managed to bring the fever under control.

I called the hospital and they told us to bring him back for admission immediately. These days the word "Admission" is a bad word for mummy. Upon hearing that word mummy went off on a tangent. I could not bring myself to think of another long stay at the hospital. I just sat and sobbed and sobbed for a good half hour. Jacob was home from work by then and knew that I was cracking due to stress and fatigue. He got everything organised, made sure I had something to eat and drove us back to the hospital.

I had managed to catch a quick nap during the drive to the hospital and pulled myself together by the time we arrived. We took him to the emergency room and they dripped him straight away. Audrey, my sister, was waiting for us at the hospital. She had come prepared to stay the night with Aidan just in case I was still off on a tangent.

We were then ushered back to the ever so familiar Paediatric Ward. It was almost midnight when we all settled in. Finally it was Jacob, Kakak and I who stayed the night.

The next day, Aidan's doctor came in. He told us that he had read about such cases but had never seen it till now. Aidan had reacted to the transfusion much later. In almost all cases, the children react during the transfusion. Trust my son to be the non conformist.
The doctor advised us to stay for another night just in case Aidan developed a fever again. After the fever at home, he had only once developed a slight fever at the early hours of the next day. After that the fever seemed to settle.

Thank God it was only a three day stay at the hospital and not longer. I found God given strength to make it through the stay. However it seems to be taking me longer to get back to my normal routine and sleeping time. I have been too tired to do anything for the past week and only now am getting back on my feet.