Oof.

November 6, 2013

Oof. Through four (and a half) treatments of adriamycin and cytoxin so far, and hopefully that is the end of that cycle. All of my respect to those folks who have chemo as part of their weekly routine for years at a time—it feels like hanging out in a paint factory for a few days and then fighting your way out from the bottom of a well to get fresh air into your body. On the other hand, I’m so grateful that this powerful medicine exists to kill the bad guys. We’re not sure what the next three months of treatments will entail. It depends on which chemotherapy drugs I’m allergic to and how well the protocol is working. In theory the next round won’t be quite so hard on my immune system and Isaac and I can come out of hiding more often. Hair is gone, it fell out for a while and then I got sick of pulling it out of Isaac’s fists so Matt shaved it off for me. Not traumatic, maybe just compared to dealing with the other cancer crap, and cosmetics have never been one of my strengths.  

Isaac is getting more and more social every day and learning how to use his heartbreaker smile and pout. He’s quickly becoming more interested in people than skylight friend. Isaac is also a kickass sleeper for a two-month-old. He gets in a great mood at night and grins up at us as we put him to bed, then usually hangs out planning a takeover of the Costco formula production line while mom and dad sleep. I assume he goes to sleep at some point, and then I wake up again at four or five in the morning and he’s snorting, wide-eyed, checking out the ceiling fan. I ask if he wants some food and he says, “Meh, sure” and we go warm up a bottle and get him a dry diaper. When he actually sees the bottle, he gets supper excited and wiggles every part of his body including his tongue. After the bottle and some digestion time, we both crash again until mid-morning. What a good baby. Watch, I’m writing this now and he’ll change it up again and start waking us every hour.

Maybe Isaac knows mom and dad need sleep right now. Matt has been busy nights and weekends looking for a new job. We felt a little smote after he was laid off , and maybe more than a little pissed off that his employer wasn't more compassionate about our situation and need for health insurance. But we’re over it and busy focusing on finding him a new job and other good stuff: meeting new baby friends at PEPS, posing our kid inside a carved pumpkin, family hikes, family naps, Matt explaining to Isaac all the rules of baseball as we watched the World Series, and visits from Gramma and aunties and uncles.