Weekly Check Up - Part Two - Thursday, December 18

This part 2 is coming a day earlier than I had anticipated. Eric has his biopsy scheduled for tomorrow. After yesterday's debacle which resulted in a 12 hour power outage and Eric's school being closed for the day, he was excited to go in today for his Christmas concert and class party. I showed up at the school at 9am for the performance and Eric came running to me, crying. His head was hurting so badly that he couldn't do the performance. We stayed and watched his class sing their one song and then I took him home. We left everything behind because he wanted some pain meds and to lie down, but to come back for the party when he was feeling better. Eric is not allowed Advil ever and generally not supposed to have Tylenol either. He gets morphine or hydromorphone for pain. However, they don't work as well for a headache, so sometimes we are allowed to give Tylenol if he has no other symptoms and we check his temperature first. I was planning to do that, but called Eric's Nurse Clinician first just to make sure because of this new medication that he is taking. I figured worst case scenario they were going to tell me to give him hydromorph instead of Tylenol. But I was wrong. There was a worse case scenario. They asked us to come into clinic. They are being super cautious because of Eric's new med, so want to check him out. I asked if we should pack a bag and they said yes. Luckily I already have a bag packed so I just threw that in the car. I did try to give him a dose of Tylenol, but he threw it up, so I gave him an anti nauseant instead. We stopped at the school to grab his stuff and headed to the hospital. 

At the hospital, they accessed Eric's port and drew blood. Since then we've had a steady stream of people in his room. He got vitals which were normal and his NP did a quick neuro exam to make sure everything was "balanced." The NP also ordered a nasal swab - nooooooo!!!! - just to rule everything out. The nurse went way up into brain tickling region just to make sure she got a good swab, since the point is to rule things out. I appreciate her thinking, but not Eric's screaming. Poor kiddo. That one really hurt. It also means he is now on contact precautions (isolation) even though he has no symptoms of a virus. While we wait for the bloodwork, the NP has ordered hydromorph to fix Eric's still pounding head and a giant fluid bolus in case he's dehydrated. Hydromorph makes Eric very chatty so he is currently being very entertaining.   

The NP initially told me that they're going to test everything and if everything is normal we can go home. However, if anything is even slightly wonky, they will admit him and start steroids. This is the treatment for one of the scary side effects from his new medication. She has been back since to say that Eric's Oncologist has given strict instructions not to hurry us out of here. 

Eric's NP has come back again, this time with his Oncologist and Nurse Clinician. Eric is usually pretty grumpy with his Oncologist. I think he's just gotten sick of weekly exams for more than 3 years and his (very wonderful) Oncologist bears the brunt of that. Eric is maybe 45 minutes into his dose of hydromorph when the team shows up at the door and Eric says "Hi Jacob!" Jacob, Eric's Oncologist, was bent over laughing at being greeted in this way by Eric. 

They came to tell us that Eric is, in fact, going to be admitted tonight. Everything checks out great on all the tests from the day and his blood counts are pretty similar to Tuesday, with blasts remaining at 1.0 so that is actually encouraging. They assume the headache at a time that they are watching closely for side effects is just a coincidence, and are keeping us only out of an abundance of caution. Also since he has his biopsy appointment at 8:30am tomorrow, I'd almost (*almost*) rather stay overnight than fight rush hour tonight and again tomorrow morning. 

Eric is no longer in pain and all the tests are done, so now we just wait for our room over on the other side (inpatient side of the Oncology floor) and we plan to be very boring this afternoon and evening!