Infection

Well unfortunately I don't have good news to report. Mom has an infection in her PICC line. For those that don't know, it is an intravenous line that runs from your inner arm to your heart through a vein. They use this to both draw blood samples and deliver chemo, blood and other IV products so they don't have to "stick" her every time. This has been a concern of ours since the minute she left OHSU. We have no way of knowing how the infection started but the end result is that the line was removed this morning. Joyce, Dad, Rheanna and I were all there when Dr. Lee came in to talk about what was going on...basically all treatment is on hold until the infection is cleared up, hopefully will only take a few weeks but they are waiting for the final blood work to come back to know for sure what we are looking at...possibly E Coli but not sure yet. We do know that it is not a yeast infection which is a very good thing as it takes a year before treatment can be restarted...and we don't have a year to wait. Dr. Lee was very good to Mom today, rubbing her hair and reassuring her that she will be fine, that she will make it through this. Most likely she will remain on antibiotics for the next several weeks(hopefully she will at least be able to come home tomorrow or Monday but unsure right now), and then she will have a port or portacath(a small medical appliance that is installed under the skin with a catheter that connects the port to a vein and is used for the same reasons as a PICC line.) installed and treatment can resume next month sometime. According to Dr. Lee ports are less likely to get infected and do not have to be flushed and cleaned as often as a PICC line.

Needless to say, Mom was pretty upset. First because she is stuck in the hospital again, second because she was doing so well a few days ago and third because well, it just sucks! And it's scary and depressing and all those other things...we just don't know what is going to happen now. The whole "routine" is thrown out the window until this is taken care of. We don't know for sure she'll be able to continue to receive the chemo and if she can, when...

So, I'm home for a little while now but gotta go get ready for the big party tonight. She wants to be sure that everyone knows she's thinking of them, she loves them and is so overwhelmed by all the love and support she has received. She's sorry she can't come tonight, she really wanted to be there...but we'll go and we'll have fun and take lots of pictures and maybe even raise a little money to help them out. But for me, its so much more important that she knows how much everyone cares, just how much everyone is pulling and praying for her to come through this. And that's why I want this night to be successful.