Temperature down, chemo up finally at 8pm last night running in alongside the seemingly permanent lines of anti biotics. Since this week's is a particularly nasty chemo drug for sickness they always write Rose up for a very strong anti-sickness drug which knocks her out like a light - it's like watching someone in a decompression chamber having their oxygen reduced and performing cognitive function tests! Within a matter of minutes she can't put one finger in front of another on the keyboard/DS/whatever she is trying to do and her speech becomes slow and slurred and then she's gone. Fifteen hours later this time she opened her eyes and even the registrar thought perhaps he'd overdone it - lower dose tonight! However on the plus side no sickness today so on the risk/benefit ratio it's definitely worth it...
Not much can be done in the way of physio as a result of being turned into zombie child for a few days so it's a case of marking time until it finishes and Rose gradually starts to reappear from her drug haze - then with no white blood cells we sit and wait for another infection. And this I guess is how the next few months are going to go for Rose - other children, possibly older and more robust, that we know on this same protocol for osteosarcoma are dealing with their chemo better and not falling victim to infection. It is definitely turning something that has always been mind-blowingly scary into even more of a journey of fear - this time for Rose too as she picks up on a lot of the conversations held in front of her and became very anxious about her leg again. Doctors often assume that she won't be following what they are telling us but she is six going on sixteen now and she totally gets the language - striking a balance between calm reassurance without giving any guarantees or promises is hard.
So - back to the business of chemo up, chemo down with as many distractions for her as possible. More visitors today and tomorrow and Felix back tomorrow night which she is really excited about so we can drag him straight to the hospital from the airport poor boy - back to reality with a thump!
