Ruth Upate, May 15, 2008
Dear Friends, Relatives, and Prayer Partners,
I am doing this a bit backwards this time, and publishing the update on the blog first. The thing is, my "Prayer Partners" e-mail list only exists on our home computer, which lives in the basement of our house, and we had a lot of rain earlier this week. Paul is working to dry it out, but I am trying to avoid the place. When I get home, I will publish this the regular way.
The thing is, I have been feeling poorly, with a cough that I blame partially on the mold and mildew in the basement. I went to my primary care clinic yesterday, and the physician I saw ordered blood work, a throat culture, and a set of chest x-rays. She also consulted with my oncologist by phone. I was having some other side-effect symptoms that you don't want to know about. I was given an Albuterol inhaler for when the cough is really bad (not that I notice much help), and a nasal spray. I was also told to stop taking my Xeloda for forty-eight hours. There's a good news/bad news scenario. Xeloda is actual chemotherapy, so when I am not taking it, it is not fighting the cancer, but when I am taking it, I can get some pretty scary side effects. One of which is a low white blood cell count. My oncology triage nurse called this morning and told me to lay off the Xeloda until Monday, and get another blood test. My counts are so low that she actually recommended I go home from work. I think I am safer at work than at home with the mold, as long as the preschool children don't come visit me. And I wash my hands a lot. And I don't hug too many people. I am also not supposed to eat any raw foods. Well, dang.
I ask for your prayers that I would be protected from germs during this time, and that my white cell count would bounce back quickly. Also that my chemotherapy would work in spite of having to take some time off of it.
In other news, Matt will definitely need a "day job." His pay for his work in "Red Noses" is actually a "stipend," that may cover his transportation costs getting to and from the theater. The good news is that it is an easy drive, and also Metro-accessible. He has been driving to the Metro the last couple of days, as he has not practiced driving the route, and for this kind of thing, we like to give him a supervised dry run. Yes, yes, he is nineteen years old. Maybe we are being overly cautious, but we are driving in the DC metro area, here, and he needs to drive on two busy interstate highways to get there. Luckily, he will be driving "against" traffic, and will not have to contend with too much rush hour congestion. In spite of the low pay, this is still a great opportunity for him and will look really good on his resume.
Get your mammograms. Do your self-exams.
Love,
Ruth
I am doing this a bit backwards this time, and publishing the update on the blog first. The thing is, my "Prayer Partners" e-mail list only exists on our home computer, which lives in the basement of our house, and we had a lot of rain earlier this week. Paul is working to dry it out, but I am trying to avoid the place. When I get home, I will publish this the regular way.
The thing is, I have been feeling poorly, with a cough that I blame partially on the mold and mildew in the basement. I went to my primary care clinic yesterday, and the physician I saw ordered blood work, a throat culture, and a set of chest x-rays. She also consulted with my oncologist by phone. I was having some other side-effect symptoms that you don't want to know about. I was given an Albuterol inhaler for when the cough is really bad (not that I notice much help), and a nasal spray. I was also told to stop taking my Xeloda for forty-eight hours. There's a good news/bad news scenario. Xeloda is actual chemotherapy, so when I am not taking it, it is not fighting the cancer, but when I am taking it, I can get some pretty scary side effects. One of which is a low white blood cell count. My oncology triage nurse called this morning and told me to lay off the Xeloda until Monday, and get another blood test. My counts are so low that she actually recommended I go home from work. I think I am safer at work than at home with the mold, as long as the preschool children don't come visit me. And I wash my hands a lot. And I don't hug too many people. I am also not supposed to eat any raw foods. Well, dang.
I ask for your prayers that I would be protected from germs during this time, and that my white cell count would bounce back quickly. Also that my chemotherapy would work in spite of having to take some time off of it.
In other news, Matt will definitely need a "day job." His pay for his work in "Red Noses" is actually a "stipend," that may cover his transportation costs getting to and from the theater. The good news is that it is an easy drive, and also Metro-accessible. He has been driving to the Metro the last couple of days, as he has not practiced driving the route, and for this kind of thing, we like to give him a supervised dry run. Yes, yes, he is nineteen years old. Maybe we are being overly cautious, but we are driving in the DC metro area, here, and he needs to drive on two busy interstate highways to get there. Luckily, he will be driving "against" traffic, and will not have to contend with too much rush hour congestion. In spite of the low pay, this is still a great opportunity for him and will look really good on his resume.
Get your mammograms. Do your self-exams.
Love,
Ruth
posted by datatech57 @ 7:23 AM
1 Comments:
At 11:05 AM,
Matt said…
I would like to clarify that it's not the two interstates that might cause a problem. I'm perfetly capable of handling interstates. I have a not to good sense of direction so if I'm going somewhere new it's a good idea to have someone acting as navigator.
my driving skills in and of themselves are pretty good.
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