Chemotherapy and side effects

I didn't post anything last week because, truthfully, I just wasn't sure what to say. Chemotherapy is hard. Last week, was hard. The side effects are pretty overwhelming. Clara Jean is exhausted and irritable. She is having a hard time controlling her emotions. Things that aren't really a big deal, are. She gets all bent out of shape and cries, yells, runs and hides. She is starving and eats and eats, then has no appetite.

The steroid is a real pain. It is a tablet that she can't swallow. It dissolves too quickly. After much trial and error we have figured out the best way to get her to take it. I take a medicine cup, you know, the kind that you would give a child a dose of Tylenol in. I put the tablet in it, smash it up with the end of a chop stick and then add a few teaspoons of apple juice. I stir and stir, then let it sit for a few minutes, then stir some more. Once it is all dissolved, I call for Clara. She comes in the room, then realizes why she is there and starts telling me how good she feels and how she doesn't need any medicine. Sometimes she argues with me, sometimes she runs out of the room. CJ ends up holding her drink in one hand and her nose with the other. I pour the medicine in her mouth. We do this twice a day.

That was last week. That was after one treatment. This week has been even more eventful. CJ has been harder to deal with. Her behavior and her emotions have been all over the place. One morning this week she got upset and ended up in my lap crying and yelling the same phrase over and over. I couldn't calm her down. I had to just hold her close and let her get it out. This wasn't the only time that she was this upset. I could tell you story after story. But I think you get the idea.

CJ is also very clingy. She wants me all the time. Yesterday was her follow-up appointment with Dr. Pearson. (He said her incision is healing beautifully.) Tom met us there and then CJ rode home with him. I beat them home by only a few minutes, but when Clara came in she ran into my arms and started crying saying that she missed me so much. I said, "honey, I was just with you at the hospital." And her reply was that that was a long time ago and that she never wanted me to be away from her for that long for the rest of her life!