2:00 a.m. in the Urgent Care

Well, things change pretty quickly sometimes...

We left the "Day Hospital" this evening after Ellie's day of chemo and a visit with the radiation oncologist. She had a mask made today that will allow her to get radiation to her head next week. All in all it was an o.k. day. Ellie's appetite is gone, but not vomitting. Tonight once we were back "home", John noticed that Ellie felt warm and we discovered that she had a fever. After calling the hospital, we were told to bring her to the Urgent Care. We hailed a cab and went to the entrance on the hospital nearest Urgent Care, only to find that particular door locked - after the cab had pulled away. We trudged through the 3 inches of snow, around the corner to another entrance. John was carrying Ellie in a blanket with her backpack of fluids on his back. We made it to a room, where we found Ellie's temperature to be NORMAL! Ugh. The nurse took blood cultures and the on call doctor came to see us. Ellie will be admitted to the hospital for one or two days at least. She will be started on an antibiotic (along with the one she's already taking for a urniary tract infection) just in case there is an infection, but the blood cultures will not be readable for 24 hours. If nothing shows up on the cultures, then we should be able to go home. We are still in Urgent Care right now, but in another hour or so we will move up to the Pediatric Oncology floor. So much for this night's sleep. Ellie will be able to finish her chemo tomorrow. I'm not all that bothered by this whole thing other than I'm not thrilled about another antibiotic (but I do understand the need to be safe rather than sorry). I actually think that Ellie might be able to rest and recover a bit from the chemo easier when she stays in one place. All of the back and forth and getting up at a certain time to be at appointments can be time-consuming and exhausting. (Although this may be more exhausting for me than for Ellie...) It's a new part of the experience here in New York anyway.

I am so thankful that John is still here for all of this. By the time he goes home on Wednesday, he should be able to leave me with a roadmap of what to do and where to go. I'm trying not to think about how soon he will be leaving. I have had many opportunities to appreciate John's ability to adapt and thrive in a new environment. Together we make a very good team - our skills and strengths are so completely different that we make halves of a complete whole. I've always known this, but the situation we now find ourselves in reminds me afresh that God truly brought me my perfect counterpart. When John leaves, I will have help here - my mom will take the first "shift" (and I'm looking forward to having her here) - but without him I will feel like half a person... I wish every day that he could just stop working and stay here. Oh well. I am glad that he can go and lavish some attention on Ethan. For now I will focus on the fact that he's still here, and I will enjoy every moment.

I will update when I know more. We are moving up to the floor now.