Good News/Bad News

The good news is we get out of CHOP today, the bad news is we have been here since Wednesday night. We took Shane to clinic on Wednesday for his routine easy treatment. He was not his usual nosy, mobile self, instead he chose to nap on PopPop. His counts were OK, with only some concern over his platelet count. We were asked to come back Friday to get a transfusion. It was a long day in clinic because they were crazy busy after the holiday weekend. We got home, played and then Shane went down for a nap. When Paul got home from work, we woke him up and he was HOT. His temperature ranged from 102-104 and in cancer patients 101.4 is ER worthy. While we have been fortunate to never have a fever (ever), the timing couldn’t be worse. We were leaving that night to get a second opinion up in Boston. There is a rhabdo specialist up there and we had some questions concerning treatment options. Oh well, life happens and we have to be sure he is OK. We head down to CHOP and they test to see if he has a blood infection from his port. In the meantime, his counts have almost doubled since clinic, so it looked like it would be a quick one night stay. Eh, unfortunately he maintained a fever, which depleted his numbers and we were staying until they rebounded. By yesterday they lowered a little, but didn’t plummet like the docs expected. He looked better, but was still staying. He got a platelet transfusion, which caused a high fever and whole body shakes- an allergic reaction. So, here we are day 3 and finally we can go home. His numbers are up and now we just need to wait for our release. According to the doctor, we have led a “blessed chemotherapy life” having not to experience this until week 23. Honestly, I will be praying we make it through the fall/winter without another trip like this. It was hard, unexpected and frustrating. Shane definitely does so much better at home, who doesn’t? We’ll be back here Wednesday for the same treatment, thankfully it doesn’t affect his numbers. This was probably caused from the overnight chemo treatment and maybe a viral infection on top.