Home from the Hospital

Yemma got to go home from the hospital at about 4:00 yesterday afternoon. Unfortunately, her stomach got very upset and she vomited before she left, but she told me she felt a lot better after that. (I don't plan on detailing everything like that, by the way.) She also has the beginnings of the infamous metallic taste in her mouth. This is common with chemo. I know that it could be so much worse and am grateful that things HAVEN'T been worse so far and that she is still in high spirits, but I ache with concern for her. I think it's because I feel powerless being so far away. (Yes, I could be a lot farther than six hours, but that is a long distance when your mommy is sick.)

I know I'm speaking too soon as one "round" of chemo is apparently defined by the time it takes to infuse the drugs AND go through the cycle of rescue drugs, but I'm praising the Lord that one round of the chemo actually being infused is OVER. Five to go. I'm not sure if we can expect her reaction to the drugs to get better or worse from here on out. Will her body be more used to the drugs the fourth, fifth, sixth times around? Or will each round weaken her more and more so that the chemo takes progressively more of a toll? I do wonder these things, but I need to remind myself that God is in control and that my job is to pray for and love my Yemma the best I can.

As I said in the last post, Yemma was told to expect to feel the full effects of the chemo about 5-7 days after it was infused. Right now she's very uncomfortable because there are two liters of fluid just kind of sloshing around in her abdomen. I guess after the Cisplatin is infused, it takes a few days to soak in. My grandma said that early this morning, she was having to turn from side to side every fifteen minutes in order to let the chemo bathe the whole area. Hopefully she will sleep more soundly now that she is at home with her kitty cats. (Random shout-out to cats - all you haters take for granted how easy they are to take care of and how much their calming presence can mean. Haha, I know that's out of the blue, but I know WAY too many people who have quite uneducated hatred toward cats!)

Today is the "head-shaving party." Josey and my sister's two best friends, Tracey and Kristina, will be there. I'm admittedly torn between happiness that she'll have her surrogate daughters there and jealousy that they can experience this with her and her own daughters can't. Just being frank. However, I am SO grateful - as always - to everyone who has been supporting Yemma. EVERYTHING means something. So thank you very much for even reading this.