Fever climbing up!

"Fever climbing up, almost 39. Pray her counts come up quickly to help fight infection. A child next bed is in lots of pain so he has been screaming all day and night. Maeve is very tired but cannot sleep because of the screaming."

Please continue to pray for Maeve's fever to come down. Ask God to help her to rest well too as she has not been able to due to the screaming.

Prayer needed

"Maeve is having fever again. We are bringing her to the hospital now."

Please pray for the fever to subside and there will be no complications.

Pray for Joanne to have strength to take care of Maeve.

FBC results

Today's blood taking was stress free. My brave one had psyched herself up all the way to the hospital and by the time the nurse did the finger prick, she was happily chatting with me about Aurora and how Aurora was probably scared of the spindle too. Children amaze me. The results are mixed. On one hand, her nuetrophil level (the soldiers in the body that fight infection) is good because of the booster GCSF jab, so she is less likely to be at risk these few days. That said, her temperature is steadily climbing and is now at 37.4 so will monitor every hour again for the next few days. On the other hand, her platelets and haemoglobin level is very low and we have to be extremely careful this weekend to ensure she doesn't bruise through bumps or falls as she may bleed profusely. If the levels dip much further (they are expected to dip), she may need a platelet transfusion on monday. So pray it goes up instead of down so that we don't have to do that. Thankfully I have a girl, rather than a boy, and a really girly girl at that, so she is happy to do quiet activities like art and craft, dress-up and such, which will decrease the likelihood of her injuring herself.

It is the dead of night. Finally, time for myself. No baby trying to eat my ear, no child arguing with me why vegetables are not good for her. In this whole whirlwind of care-giving, it is hard to find pockets of time to, say, read a book, or drink a cup of tea. So I do these things in the blanket of night, after I do my pumping (my one duty I will not give up as it is the only thing I can do as Paige's mother, since I can't physically care for her when we're in hospital).
Sometimes i feel tremendously guilty that i want a break from maeve, but it really does wear me out, having to persuade, cajole, threaten, before I can get her to eat, bathe, gargle with salt etc. Pre-cancer days, we'll take away her food and let her go hungry so she learns not to procrastinate and push her food around, but now, the last thing we need is for her to lose weight. So now, i have to pull all stops, eat with a video on, promise of ice-cream after, 3 bites and a sticker reward, and sometimes, threats (do you want the nurse to put a nose tube in to feed you??) Bad Bad mummy i know, but sometimes threats work. Sometimes. She also follows me around everywhere I go, in case i disappear. She has become that insecure. So when i'm off to the toilet, she's there at the door, all smiles and patience till i'm done. If i even suggest leaving the house for a bit, she becomes a basket case. Today i carried paige out to the corridor for a stroll and maeve stood at the gate calling and calling till i returned (she knows she can't leave the house on account of her low counts). So what i'd really like is to generate a hologram of me that stays at home while the real me sneaks out for a cup of tea. When i suggest I need a tea break (please darling, just 20 mins), my smart little one makes me a pretend one with her tea set. (here mummy, earl grey tea, no milk, just the way you like it!)The only time she is remotely at ease without me is when daddy is around, but since he comes home so late and is usually pretty exhuasted when he's at home, there really is no chance for me to be off-duty. So my second wish is to suddenly inherit a copious amount of money because I am actually related to the queen or something, so that hubby doesn't have to work, that it, until maeve's chemo is over. While I get upset sometimes that hubby stays at work till evening, i know that that is the only way he'll get anything done. No one can mark with 2 kids under the age of 5 at home! I guess i am far more blessed, in that i don't have to work, and hubby's income is enough to provide for our little family. i need to remember to count my blessings, even when sometimes, i can't actually see the blessings. Tomorrow we're off to check maeve's blood counts, which means, finger prick as usual. she's not a happy bunny that's for sure, but she is psyching herself up for it. Am praying for a gentle nurse who won't squeeze so hard to collect the blood.

Dreams

While I've been having nightmares upon nightmares, Maeve had a really nice dream last night and I guess God sends her these sweet dreams. She dreamt that she was getting married (as an adult) and walking down the aisle. She even described her groom and her wedding dress! It is a dream I hold on to as I DO want to see her date, break a few hearts, get married. For me, this dream is a promise from God that that WILL happen and Maeve will get well and will not relapse, and that I will not lose her through cancer.As nice as the nurses and some doctors are, I do not want to see them anymore after her 4th round of chemo. I'd like for her to go back only for check ups and finger pricks and never need to ward again, except when its time to remove her port in a year's time. I hold on to God's promise that after weeping for a night, joy comes in the morning.

It is so nice to be back home, eating home cooked food, sleeping in my own bed, cuddling up with my 2 darlings, with one trying her best to lick the other! The ward, to its credit, is really cheerily painted, yellow walls, fish and other sea creatures swimming on the walls, and nurses who do their best to make treatment bearable. It is nonetheless, an oncology ward, and the stories behind these walls are both uplifting as well as terrifying. After so many stays, I've come to be familiar with the names of the children tagged on the doors of the rooms. There was a long term stayer, and I noticed the name, simply because it was such a beautiful name. Like Maeve, she has lymphoma, but in this case, hers was a relapse. I was shocked one day when I was told she had gone to ICU. I could not sleep the entire night, even though i didn't know this child personally. Just the thought of a little child in ICU devastated me and created such fears for my own child. Each parent in this ward maintains an unusually chirpy exterior, voices a little higher, smiles a little brighter, to cheer on their little troopers, but within each parent, is truely the heart of darkness. Everyone sympathises with those whose children have passed the stage of cure, and thank God that it is NOT their child. Here, I've also seen children who are amputees and it is hard to stomach. How did their parent explain to their child that sorry, the doctor has to cut your leg, hand, off? So for these reasons, it is good to be home and almost pretend that everything's normal again. After all, at home, Maeve's a typical 4 year old, jumping, running, skipping, climbing the gate, no matter how much i tell her not to.
These few days will also see me getting paranoid as her counts drop once more. I suspect her counts are even lower this time as she has been very tired, wanting to sleep an hour after she has woken up. So pray for protection for her as well as our family, so that none of us will fall sick or even come into contact, unwittingly with sick people. Since I don't leave the house at all, it isn't an issue for me, but Bern works in a school, the hotbed for germs! so pray for protection especially for him.

Dwayne, Chistabel and Maeve.AVI