September 23: Almost done with chemotherapy... two more days to go!

Today was the fourth day of chemotherapy and the effects of the medication are beginning to tell a little bit. Sujata’s blood counts went down pretty rapidly, as expected,  so she had to be given a couple of blood transfusions to get her hemoglobin back to a safe level. But, as you can see above, she still looks great and her spirits remain indomitable. She was chatting up a storm with her visitors today until fairly late in the evening and then her energy ran out and she fell asleep.

If you are wondering why she looks a littel puffy, it is becuase the medication has caused her to gain a lot of weight,  about 2 pounds a day!  The doctors seem to be quite happy about it.

What Next?

Two more days of chemotherapy, which will take us to Tuesday and then a day of well deserved rest before the transplant process begins, most likely on Thursday. I will, of course, write a short description of the process when the time comes

Never a dull moment

In one of the pictures I have in the album (see link on the left: Pictures - Sept 21,22,23), you will notice that the doctors are pumping quite a cocktail of medicines into Sujata, in various multi-colored bags hanging from the IV unit. The day before yesterday, in the middle of the night, at 3:00 am to be precise, Sujata woke up and decided that she had had enough to “drink” for the day, so to speak. Half asleep, she neatly unhooked some of the IV lines coming into her catheter and went back to sleep. Well, not so fast!!  The alarms went off and the nurses came running to her room, cleaned up the mess and hooked her back to the the medication. Clearly, the nurses at Mount Sinai have dealt with errant patients before and are well prepared to seal off  such creative escape routes.

Visiting Tips

Today was a popular day for visitors. Many of our close friends dropped by to hold Sujata’s hand and give her a hug… from a distance. I have been adding pictures of friends in the visitors’ gallery, so you can take a look and perhaps find someone you have not seen in a while. But, next week will be a little tougher and the nurses will be stricter about allowing more than one person at a time. I will keep you posted as the rules change. For now, as a reminder, no flowers, plants or food, please.

There is a nice little waiting room on the Oncology floor, so, if several people carpool (a good idea since parking is scarce), and come up to the 11 th. floor together, they can wait in this area while taking turns to visit Sujata’s room..