When you are hungry it probably tastes the same as crackers, but I digress…
At 11:30am, Jesse’s 7th radiation treatment occurred. Of course, she had not eaten anything since 8pm the night before, and the verset and ketamine are now starting to wear off as we are arriving in the door of the PACU. I didn’t even have to go wait in surgery waiting today as I normally do because she was calling for me as the doctor was parking the gurney.
Once Jesse established that I was there, she began asking for crackers. I’m glad that she wants to eat, but at that point… it’s not a good idea. Bless her heart she was so hungry when she saw the nurse’s clipboard, she sat up and started leaning for it, mouth open. We realized a second before she chomped down that she thought it was a cracker. I stopped her be holding her at the shoulders and the nurse move the clipboard out of chomping range. Jesse looked at the nurse asked for crackers and left her mouth open like a little bird. It’s an expression that is hard to describe… her eyes are bopping because of the ketamine and her body is waving around because her balance is still way off. The nurse and I laughed, what else can you do.
After 15 minutes, Jesse was moved to the step down room. There we hang out until she is a little more awake to head home. For some reason today, it worked out where we hung out longer than normal. The nurses were very apologetic, and while it was frustrating, I wasn’t upset with them or the doctor. The doctor wrote the order for Jesse’s heprin in the old format that is no longer accepted by the pharmacy ( a policy that just changed). It was an episode of trying to mean well and it didn’t work out.
Overall the doctors are very impressed with how Jesse is handling radiation. We saw her radiation oncologist yesterday. He was very surprised she wasn’t nauseous and that she had gained weight. When we began Jesse weighed 11.2kg. Tuesday she weighed 11.7kg. Zofran is a wonderful drug in helping with this. Everyday that we leave radiation, she is begging to eat. Most mornings are very frustrating for her when I tell her we have to wait to eat until after her “picture”.
“Picture” is what Jesse calls radiation, and sometimes they do take Xrays to make sure they are in the right place. In the room with the huge radiation machine is a table that moves and a picture of a mountain and lake. Everyday Jesse goes in the room happily lays on the table and calmly hangs out while they adjust her under the machine. She and I talk about when kind of fish are in the lake, where we will pitch our tent, if it is warm or cold, and so on. The anesthesiologist is usually giving her the ketamine and verset at this time too, which doesn’t take too long to knock her out.
The technicians, nurse, doctor, and myself step out of the room. The doctor and technicians head to a monitoring room next door. The nurse and I wait in the hall. The huge (and I mean huge… makes me think cold war era survival bunker type door) swings shut. If it wasn’t for the door shutting, the radiation machine rotating around, and being in the room by herself; she wouldn’t need sedation. If only right?
Once the treatment is done, we go in load her on the stretcher and back to PACU. Today is the first day that she really woke up right at the door of PACU. And that was great because I got to stay with her 🙂
Our stay in PACU can very from 1 hour to 2 hours. All of this makes for a long exhausting day for me, but Jesse comes home and plays with Chris as if nothing has happened to her.