Feeling not so grouchy :-)
We went up yesterday to Salt Lake. Jeremie had an appointment with LDS this morning. Then we came right around and came back home. The end.
Ha Ha Ha...kidding! So Jeremie and I had worked ourselves up into quite a pair of paranoid messes last night. He was starting to have some shoulder pain. Which got my mind back to what if'ing to death. What if leukemia came back, what if, what if, what if. And apparently my poor spouse was thinking the same thing!
So what a pleasant surprise to go to our appointment today and have our minds set at ease. This isn't usually the case you know. Usually it is the down and dirty everything is terrible and here is why. But today Jeremie's numbers are still climbing their way toward normal. White-blood cell counts are all normal. Hematocrit is super fabulous. Liver looks better than it has since November and his kidneys look magnificent. Jeremie's low grade fevers are probably due to his body working hard. And his pain isn't to be unexpected with bone-marrow activity. And honestly if it was disease coming back, what would we do? So we both left the appointment very excited to get home :-)
Jeremie is stronger than he has been for months. He drove most of the way up to Salt Lake and he drove to Fillmore today. He is eating better. We switched around some anti-nausea med's. Worked like a charm. Received some validation that he really is doing well. Oh and of course this weekend we went to the Harley Store. Nothing means healed like Jeremie having to visit the Harley Davidson Store :-) Ha Ha Ha.
I was so excited after our appointment today I jumped up and down in the elevator and smacked a big kiss on his cheek! Today is one of those days I could just skip everywhere I go. I know, I know it could all change tomorrow. But today I'm excited. It just feels good to be excited.
Like usual...your prayers, your thoughts are keeping us going! Miracles continue to surround us!
Lots of Love,
Cori
Monday, April 25, 2011
Thursday, April 21, 2011
04/21/2011
Barf...for someone who hates writing I sure do a lot of it. I had a paper to write today. I have another one tomorrow. And I'm pretty much sick of charting at work too. I'm pretty tired...so today I'm having a mental pity party for myself. Tomorrow is another day, so I'm making the most out of it today :-)
Well moving onto bigger and better things. Jeremie is still home and doing pretty good. When you compare Jeremie to other cancer patients going through what he is, he is doing pretty good compared to that scale. When compared to the rest of us, he is doing pretty crappy. On paper he looks amazing! His white blood cell counts are normal. His neutrophil counts are normal. His platelets are at 101,000 (normal 150-450,000) so he is just about there. Monday his hematocrit was at 24.0, but we re-did his labs on Wednesday and they had increased to 26.4 on their own. So his bone marrow is just trying so hard!
He had a transfusion yesterday, even though he was above the threshold (which is 24). But he had been feeling dizzy and lightheaded when he was trying to stand up and walk. So they went ahead and transfused 2 units of blood. We also did it here (St. George) just in case his hematocrit dropped lower than 24 while we are in Salt Lake. It takes between 4-5 hours to complete a blood transfusion for 2 units.
Jeremie has been experiencing low grade fevers for the past several days. Unfortunately we pushed things pretty hard this last weekend. He wanted to try and go to Village Inn (he ate Rice Crispies! Grrrr...I buy Rice Crispies by the gross..I'm a little tight with money...seriously need to learn to say NO to that man!). Then on Sunday he ran to Home Depot with me (I needed to replace my dryer vent). Then we hung out a MeMe and PePe's that night and he sat up at the dining room table for several hours. Usually you think that wouldn't be a big deal. But Jeremie literally was laying down for 6 solid weeks. His muscles throughout his body have atrophied (shrunk). So sitting up, is quite a work out for him. Then Monday we spent...literally...three hours at the opthamologists office! Three hours!!!! Three hours!!! (Oh and he has dry eyes that are causing excessive tearing. Probably because of damage to tear producing cells from radiation. Possibly will heal on their own, possibly not. He was prescribed some eye drops, and they are working well.) And he had spent an hour at the infusion clinic that day as well. Tuesday we had an appointment with the oncologist here. Wednesday he spent the day at the infusion clinic getting blood. So needless to say, Jeremie has had a very active and busy couple of days. We are thinking (hoping) the low grade fevers are because of all this activity.
Meanwhile this is such fun with five little monster children, a full-time job, oh and I'm trying to finish my stinking Master's program!!!! Ugh...seriously...do you know what I want to do? I just want to play in my yard. I want to pull my weeds. Then I want to come in and re-organize my laundry room and house. Then I want to take a couple hour nap and eat. And maybe find a little time to have a real good cry, have a migraine, and take two days to get over it. Ah well...just feeling a bit on the whiny side today. I need to re-find my center. I keep trying to remember all my blessings, and all the things I'm grateful for. Because there are so many! Just have to keep it pulled together for a bit longer.
Even though I'm swimming in my little pity party for myself today. I'm so excited for the future. I'm so excited that Jeremie is doing well (albeit, I'm always a nervous wreck anticipating the worst all the time), I love the opportunity I have everyday to learn. I love my school. I love my sweet children and want to give them everything. And I love the opportunity I have to pick weeds at my house.
Well I hope all I have to report over the next several forever is that Jeremie continues to grow strong, continues to stay in remission, and continues to heal. Please continue your prayers, good thoughts, good vibes and good energies. They are healing him/us...I KNOW IT! Thank you so much! And Aunt Rexann, thank you so much for keeping him in the Temple :-)
Love to all,
Cori
Well moving onto bigger and better things. Jeremie is still home and doing pretty good. When you compare Jeremie to other cancer patients going through what he is, he is doing pretty good compared to that scale. When compared to the rest of us, he is doing pretty crappy. On paper he looks amazing! His white blood cell counts are normal. His neutrophil counts are normal. His platelets are at 101,000 (normal 150-450,000) so he is just about there. Monday his hematocrit was at 24.0, but we re-did his labs on Wednesday and they had increased to 26.4 on their own. So his bone marrow is just trying so hard!
He had a transfusion yesterday, even though he was above the threshold (which is 24). But he had been feeling dizzy and lightheaded when he was trying to stand up and walk. So they went ahead and transfused 2 units of blood. We also did it here (St. George) just in case his hematocrit dropped lower than 24 while we are in Salt Lake. It takes between 4-5 hours to complete a blood transfusion for 2 units.
Jeremie has been experiencing low grade fevers for the past several days. Unfortunately we pushed things pretty hard this last weekend. He wanted to try and go to Village Inn (he ate Rice Crispies! Grrrr...I buy Rice Crispies by the gross..I'm a little tight with money...seriously need to learn to say NO to that man!). Then on Sunday he ran to Home Depot with me (I needed to replace my dryer vent). Then we hung out a MeMe and PePe's that night and he sat up at the dining room table for several hours. Usually you think that wouldn't be a big deal. But Jeremie literally was laying down for 6 solid weeks. His muscles throughout his body have atrophied (shrunk). So sitting up, is quite a work out for him. Then Monday we spent...literally...three hours at the opthamologists office! Three hours!!!! Three hours!!! (Oh and he has dry eyes that are causing excessive tearing. Probably because of damage to tear producing cells from radiation. Possibly will heal on their own, possibly not. He was prescribed some eye drops, and they are working well.) And he had spent an hour at the infusion clinic that day as well. Tuesday we had an appointment with the oncologist here. Wednesday he spent the day at the infusion clinic getting blood. So needless to say, Jeremie has had a very active and busy couple of days. We are thinking (hoping) the low grade fevers are because of all this activity.
Meanwhile this is such fun with five little monster children, a full-time job, oh and I'm trying to finish my stinking Master's program!!!! Ugh...seriously...do you know what I want to do? I just want to play in my yard. I want to pull my weeds. Then I want to come in and re-organize my laundry room and house. Then I want to take a couple hour nap and eat. And maybe find a little time to have a real good cry, have a migraine, and take two days to get over it. Ah well...just feeling a bit on the whiny side today. I need to re-find my center. I keep trying to remember all my blessings, and all the things I'm grateful for. Because there are so many! Just have to keep it pulled together for a bit longer.
Even though I'm swimming in my little pity party for myself today. I'm so excited for the future. I'm so excited that Jeremie is doing well (albeit, I'm always a nervous wreck anticipating the worst all the time), I love the opportunity I have everyday to learn. I love my school. I love my sweet children and want to give them everything. And I love the opportunity I have to pick weeds at my house.
Well I hope all I have to report over the next several forever is that Jeremie continues to grow strong, continues to stay in remission, and continues to heal. Please continue your prayers, good thoughts, good vibes and good energies. They are healing him/us...I KNOW IT! Thank you so much! And Aunt Rexann, thank you so much for keeping him in the Temple :-)
Love to all,
Cori
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
04/12/2011
Another day that will go down in history. Well at least for our family! Jeremie is home! Woo Hoo!!! Such a wonderful day. Almost as significant as 02/24/11, the day of his transplant. Jeremie came home at day 49 of his transplant.
We were a bit sneaky and brought Jeremie home this weekend. Kind of a dry run, see where we were at. It was a wonderful weekend. I had not been home on a weekend for 9 weeks. It was absolutely wonderful. It felt so good to be normal. So it was so difficult to take him back last night.
We had our appointment with LDS Hospital at 10:00 am this morning. We were sort of nervous how it would go. But ultimately this is Jeremie's ride. He gets to decide how this is going to go. Like usual we needed to take what information they gave us. Wrap it into our family, our goals and how we hope to live this out. So our oncologist came in (I won't go into the parts where I want to scream...we will leave that for a future rant session). He gave his "prepared" speech on how/why we should stay in Salt Lake...blah, blah, blah. Obviously nothing screamed out at us that we should stay. So he finished, and Jeremie said thanks, but I'm going home. And our oncologist smiled, and said "Ok". Then we started in on how this plan was going to work out. We are going to Salt Lake every other Monday, seeing Dr. Lemon in St. George on the Monday's we are not in Salt Lake. And then living our lives to its fullest.
This has been the scariest ride I have ever been on. I've never seen so much pain and experienced so much heartache in my life. I've mentally and honestly, physically prepared myself for my husbands death. I have prayed along side him that it would end, and end now. I have pleaded to please let him stay. I have prayed and hoped that something, anything would get rid of this cancer. I have been angry and frustrated that we never seem to have anything easy. That finally we had reached this period in our life that should have been relatively smooth sailing. Ha! Joke was on me! I have learned that I'm stronger than I ever thought possible. That energy I never even knew existed in my body, was there. I have felt and learned of the love I'm surrounded by.
I usually don't share my spiritual beliefs (I believe they are sacred and private), but here I go. I have such a strong belief in God, and Jesus. I truly understand what it is to "feel comforted". And obviously I have seen and experienced Miracles. I don't believe that God gives us disease or cancer. I do believe being mortal and part of earth and its imperfections makes us all susceptible to earthy laws and rules (i.e. bad genes, environment etc.). I believe we get to act in Gods stead. We are to serve each other and love each other as we are loved by him. That is the blessing. I guess I'm sharing that because I have felt strangers love, gifts, prayers, good thoughts, good vibes, good energy and I feel that we are all gifts to each other. I know this is why I have this blessed extra time with Jeremie. I love not knowing our future. I feel so grateful for all the wonderful people in our lives. I wish I could name you all. But at the risk of offending someone I forgot (cause I'm not perfect). Please, please know how much I appreciate your fasts, your prayers, your love, your good thoughts, your positive energy and your support. I know I will never be alone.
And leukemia sucks.
I'm so excited for our future. We are dreaming of how we are going to be putting our backyard together. We are dreaming about my future when I'm finished with school (praying I can marry it into what I'm doing now...Jeremie helped me think of some awesome stuff!). Dreaming about when we have grand-kids and how our house will probably be finished just in time for them. We haven't done this for a year. It felt SO GOOD! I missed him, he is the other half of my soul. I'm literally not complete without him. Thank you God for letting me have him for a little while more :-)
Again, Thank you...to all of you who love us and believe in us,
Cori
We were a bit sneaky and brought Jeremie home this weekend. Kind of a dry run, see where we were at. It was a wonderful weekend. I had not been home on a weekend for 9 weeks. It was absolutely wonderful. It felt so good to be normal. So it was so difficult to take him back last night.
We had our appointment with LDS Hospital at 10:00 am this morning. We were sort of nervous how it would go. But ultimately this is Jeremie's ride. He gets to decide how this is going to go. Like usual we needed to take what information they gave us. Wrap it into our family, our goals and how we hope to live this out. So our oncologist came in (I won't go into the parts where I want to scream...we will leave that for a future rant session). He gave his "prepared" speech on how/why we should stay in Salt Lake...blah, blah, blah. Obviously nothing screamed out at us that we should stay. So he finished, and Jeremie said thanks, but I'm going home. And our oncologist smiled, and said "Ok". Then we started in on how this plan was going to work out. We are going to Salt Lake every other Monday, seeing Dr. Lemon in St. George on the Monday's we are not in Salt Lake. And then living our lives to its fullest.
This has been the scariest ride I have ever been on. I've never seen so much pain and experienced so much heartache in my life. I've mentally and honestly, physically prepared myself for my husbands death. I have prayed along side him that it would end, and end now. I have pleaded to please let him stay. I have prayed and hoped that something, anything would get rid of this cancer. I have been angry and frustrated that we never seem to have anything easy. That finally we had reached this period in our life that should have been relatively smooth sailing. Ha! Joke was on me! I have learned that I'm stronger than I ever thought possible. That energy I never even knew existed in my body, was there. I have felt and learned of the love I'm surrounded by.
I usually don't share my spiritual beliefs (I believe they are sacred and private), but here I go. I have such a strong belief in God, and Jesus. I truly understand what it is to "feel comforted". And obviously I have seen and experienced Miracles. I don't believe that God gives us disease or cancer. I do believe being mortal and part of earth and its imperfections makes us all susceptible to earthy laws and rules (i.e. bad genes, environment etc.). I believe we get to act in Gods stead. We are to serve each other and love each other as we are loved by him. That is the blessing. I guess I'm sharing that because I have felt strangers love, gifts, prayers, good thoughts, good vibes, good energy and I feel that we are all gifts to each other. I know this is why I have this blessed extra time with Jeremie. I love not knowing our future. I feel so grateful for all the wonderful people in our lives. I wish I could name you all. But at the risk of offending someone I forgot (cause I'm not perfect). Please, please know how much I appreciate your fasts, your prayers, your love, your good thoughts, your positive energy and your support. I know I will never be alone.
And leukemia sucks.
I'm so excited for our future. We are dreaming of how we are going to be putting our backyard together. We are dreaming about my future when I'm finished with school (praying I can marry it into what I'm doing now...Jeremie helped me think of some awesome stuff!). Dreaming about when we have grand-kids and how our house will probably be finished just in time for them. We haven't done this for a year. It felt SO GOOD! I missed him, he is the other half of my soul. I'm literally not complete without him. Thank you God for letting me have him for a little while more :-)
Again, Thank you...to all of you who love us and believe in us,
Cori
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
04/06/2011
I'm so pooped. Just walking upstairs to update the blog is a chore lately. Man I miss my Jeremie! He is a great help to me. I left Alex in Salt Lake last weekend to hang with his dad and hopefully help out my parents a bit. That is like cutting off my left arm! Seriously, I miss that kid! He is such a help. He is my errand runner, my car fixer and kid picker-up-er. So shout out to you Alex...you rock and your mother misses you!
On Monday Jeremie started growing his very own platelets..WOO HOO!!! That is incredible news! Yee Haw! He continues on the right track. He is being decreased on his pain patch by 50 mcg every 3 days, and is eating better and better (without medication). It is like my husband has been awakened. Not sure if that is a good thing some days ;-) Ha Ha Ha.
He is still incredibly weak. I mean Hello! He just went through a major life changing procedure and brought him to the brink of death...feeling weak and tired makes a lot of sense. On average it takes a bone-marrow transplant patient 2 years to get back to full-time work. This is a big deal on the body. And I think one I'm going to have to keep reminding him of. I'm also scared he is going to be realizing this on his own. It is one thing to hear that cancer changes your life, but another to experience how profound that change is on your physical body and your psyche. He will never quite be the person he was. I keep telling him I hope he isn't! I didn't appreciate leukemia! This is a great change!
We have had a couple of challenges the week he was released. It was a chaotic start, and not on our end! Which was quite frustrating. I was kind of hoping that LDS hospital would be the bomb outpatient, and was very disappointed they were not...grrrr! So in the middle of that mess I talked to our oncologist here in St. George who was updated with Jeremie's case the week before he was discharged. With that information and what information I gave him he said he would be very happy to take care of Jeremie now in St. George. I was so ecstatic! But was quickly disappointed when I called LDS to start this transition of care. They didn't want him to go home yet. They thought it was too soon. I explained my problems about the chaotic week we had, and they promised to change that and apologized for the mess. So Jeremie was in Salt Lake for another week.
It is hard, I know we have a great routine at home. I feel so comfortable with him in St. George, and what his care will entail. Although Mom, you rock you have done amazing! I'm just pooped and want him home. 8 weekends in a row in Salt Lake is starting to take a toll on my house! Plus I feel we have a good sense of what this disease entails. We have lived it for 9 months. And I'm frustrated that they would send us home to die, but they won't send him home to live. There is a lot more, but I'm tired of thinking about it, to be honest. Right now it is up to Jeremie on how hard he wants to push this. Ultimately he is responsible for his care and how he wants to live out his life. No one can offer us guarantees. We have to sort out all of the choices and make the best decisions for our family.
Well my sweet darling continues to improve, doing well each day. My momma is helping us out in Salt Lake and is taking great care of him. I really appreciate all everyone in my life has done for us. I stand amazed at the people I get to call friends and family. Thank you so much!
Love to all!
Cori
On Monday Jeremie started growing his very own platelets..WOO HOO!!! That is incredible news! Yee Haw! He continues on the right track. He is being decreased on his pain patch by 50 mcg every 3 days, and is eating better and better (without medication). It is like my husband has been awakened. Not sure if that is a good thing some days ;-) Ha Ha Ha.
He is still incredibly weak. I mean Hello! He just went through a major life changing procedure and brought him to the brink of death...feeling weak and tired makes a lot of sense. On average it takes a bone-marrow transplant patient 2 years to get back to full-time work. This is a big deal on the body. And I think one I'm going to have to keep reminding him of. I'm also scared he is going to be realizing this on his own. It is one thing to hear that cancer changes your life, but another to experience how profound that change is on your physical body and your psyche. He will never quite be the person he was. I keep telling him I hope he isn't! I didn't appreciate leukemia! This is a great change!
We have had a couple of challenges the week he was released. It was a chaotic start, and not on our end! Which was quite frustrating. I was kind of hoping that LDS hospital would be the bomb outpatient, and was very disappointed they were not...grrrr! So in the middle of that mess I talked to our oncologist here in St. George who was updated with Jeremie's case the week before he was discharged. With that information and what information I gave him he said he would be very happy to take care of Jeremie now in St. George. I was so ecstatic! But was quickly disappointed when I called LDS to start this transition of care. They didn't want him to go home yet. They thought it was too soon. I explained my problems about the chaotic week we had, and they promised to change that and apologized for the mess. So Jeremie was in Salt Lake for another week.
It is hard, I know we have a great routine at home. I feel so comfortable with him in St. George, and what his care will entail. Although Mom, you rock you have done amazing! I'm just pooped and want him home. 8 weekends in a row in Salt Lake is starting to take a toll on my house! Plus I feel we have a good sense of what this disease entails. We have lived it for 9 months. And I'm frustrated that they would send us home to die, but they won't send him home to live. There is a lot more, but I'm tired of thinking about it, to be honest. Right now it is up to Jeremie on how hard he wants to push this. Ultimately he is responsible for his care and how he wants to live out his life. No one can offer us guarantees. We have to sort out all of the choices and make the best decisions for our family.
Well my sweet darling continues to improve, doing well each day. My momma is helping us out in Salt Lake and is taking great care of him. I really appreciate all everyone in my life has done for us. I stand amazed at the people I get to call friends and family. Thank you so much!
Love to all!
Cori
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)