I call him Pukey Leukie. Poor kid.
How quickly I have forgotten how loud the hospital is, the constant beeping of machines, doors opening and closing, laughing nurses (who the hell has the energy to find anything funny this late?) the Hubs, louder than usual snores, good God man roll over!! And the beds oy! How could I have forgotten about those? Either too hard or too soft but never just right to fall asleep before midnight.
Oh and if you haven’t already guessed, yes we are back in the hospital, for I don’t know how many more days anymore.
I just know this time it seems so much harder to be here. I have never cried in front of the pediatric nurses here(please don’t let there be a post saying I have, because at this moment I’m having a hard time remembering crying on the fourth floor, third floor yes, fourth floor no) but when the doctor told me Gage may have pancreatitis, and that it is a very scary thing and I brought him in at a good time; they are almost certain it is caused by his chemo vincristine. Which is rare but known to happen, all the nurses say Gage doesn’t know how to follow the leukemia handbook and at this point I couldn’t take it. The doctor gave me more information, and told me what would be going on in the next couple of days and left me to google everything he said. All I can say is damn you google with your easy access and cute google home page having to be different daily; you taunt me daily to see your changes. So when one of the nurses asked if I was OK and needed a hug, I said “no, I’m fine” but I promptly went I to our room called the Hubs and begged him to get down to the hospital I needed him, and sat there and cried with Gage on my lap. I never let Gage see me cry, in fact I try not to cry because I’m afraid I won’t stop.
Now add to my list of stuff to listen to I am straining to hear Gage to make sure he doesn’t start dry heaving or puking up bile. Poor baby, it is so sad. He doesn’t cry, or moan and groan he is such a strong, brave little boy and I cannot wait to see what type of man he is going to become.
****sorry for any of the misspellings or grammatical errors, I typed this on my iPhone.***
Ok so Cali would have sounded better, but since we are already in that state, and we are headed to the hospital I had to work with what I got. Sue me. Yup, Gage woke up super ass early 6:00am and would not go back down, so I bribed him with another bottle of almond milk, which worked for like five minutes, before he was screaming his head off for me to come and get him. Dammit. Ok so we were up for the day, no biggie, we had an appointment at Toyota of Escondido to get maintenance done on my car; a four hour appointment. Shoot me now. Gage intervened though and threw up again, in front of the service guy which had him totally grossed out, and promising two guys to work on my car and he’d have it ready in an hour. Score, Gage can puke all he likes if this is the kind of service we get, next stop DMV!! but anywho, I tried to give Gagers a rice cake maybe get something bland in his tummy, no go; more puke this time dry heaving as I rush to get him over a sink. Nobody should have to clean that shit up. So I called his oncologist, who told us since his ANC was so low this week bring him into the hospital, so here we are. Fun times, I will keep you posted.
Dear Leukemia,
My toddler size 5 foot just called, and he said he’s gonna kick your ass.
XOXO Gage
kkkjk.gnb63wenhutyhm,mj
XOXO Gage
I am thankful for so much this year, but today I am most thankful for these two.
I hope you have a fantastic day filled with yummy food and are surrounded by your loved ones.
XOXO
Our first full day in the hospital, was so hectic there were twelve people including us in our tiny room, I think the nurses would have kicked out some of our visitors if not for the fact my sister bought two of those party packs from Rubios. OMG so good. Everybody wanted to be there for us, my sister got to the hospital at seven that morning after driving three hours from her house, my other Bestie drove two hours. I am so happy my twin sister was already in California, because my mom was having part of her thyroid removed in four days, so she was able to be with us; she even extended her stay by another week to be with Gage.
Those first few days are still such a blur to me, I think it was on our second day in the hospital Gage was scheduled for a bone marrow retrieval. Because of Gage’s platelet count was so low (normal is 125,000-300,000 Gage was 8, yes, I mean 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 no more) they could only numb the area they were going to take the marrow from, no pain medication or putting him under. I can still hear him screaming from the treatment room, which was on the other side of the pediatric unit, with the door closed. I don’t know how the Hubs was able to be in the room holding him down. I guess one of the attending nurses had to leave the room, it’s hard watching a baby go through all that, even for the professionals.
Those first days were oddly normal, other then the fact Gage was walking around with an IV sticking out of his arm, we played in the playroom, walked laps around the pediatric unit Gage riding along in a wagon, or driving the Little Tykes cars (he loved that) it wasn’t long before the nurses fell in love with him
We spent those days waiting, waiting for news from the doctors, waiting for lab results, waiting to wake up from the nightmare we found ourselves in. Finally on Friday we were going to have surgery to have a portacath implanted on the right side of Gages body under his on kind of on his ribs. The pre-op people came and took Gage down to the pre-op (obviously) waiting room, we sat there for an hour with Gage, talking to him holding him, petting his head and giving him kisses; I must have told him I loved him a hundred times in that hour. Finally when they took him, I could not hold back my tears and I quietly cried as they wheeled him to the operating room with all of his stuffed animals to watch over him and make sure everything goes alright. After about two hours the doctors came out looking all happy to say everything went perfect and we could see Gage now.
playing in the playroom before surgery
Gage after the first port surgery
This was the day before our world started to fall apart, we didn’t know in the coming months we’d be fighting for his life. It was an awesome day.
So after my mild panic attack at the clinic, we arrived at the hospital fourth floor, room 4111. I don’t think I will ever forget that room number.
After getting admitted, it was nice they came to us, no pesky waiting. It was all kind of surreal, they brought the Bestie, Gage and I food, and it was good! I don’t know what was more surprising the food being good or the fact we were at the hospital; for some unknown reason.
Finally after what felt like hours, but in hind sight was probably only thirty minutes, a pretty young doctor came in, we’ll call her Doctor B, she sat down and my world fell apart.
“Well, just from looking at the blood samples, I can tell you that it looks like leukemia-” at this point I have to interrupted the good Doctor B by asking the Bestie “Please remember everything she says, I maybe nodding, but as soon as she says anything I panic attack it right out of my brain; oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck this cannot be happening.
I’m going to interrupt myself here by saying that day my Bestie was my rock, my anchor to hold on to, if I’d have been by myself I don’t know what I would have done. I will forever be thankful she was there with me; I already loved her but this sealed the deal for eternal gratitude and love.
Ok back to Doctor B, “from what I can see, Gage has leukemia, but with more blood work will be able to determine which type and how advanced; we should have all that information on Friday.” as I dumbly sat there and just nodded, and saying stupid shit like “ok, Friday, ok” the Bestie asked relevant questions that I’m sure the Hubs and the rest of the family would want answers to. I don’t remember what she asked all I know, is I relied on her to answer any questions the family had, and she did; thank God for her.
As soon as the Doctor left I was on the phone with the Hubs, “Gage has leukemia, OMG OMG OMG Gage has leukemia!” me sobbing uncontrollably into the phone, with the help if the Bestie I was able to answer as many questions he had.
Why the fuck is it when you have the biggest news in the world to tell me people they never answer their Goddamn phone?? I just discovered my kid has leukemia where the hell are you people and why can’t you pick up?! This is why cell phones were created!!
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