24 Long Hours

Hi there. Me again. My beautiful hubby blogged yesterday and so made me giggle. Glad he was willing to keep the blog going!!

The last 24 hours have been physically grueling. I've been managing pain and nausea since I woke up from surgery and think I just finally got it to where I can tolerate it. 

Unfortunately, we have not had the greatest of care here this go around. The staff was very inattentive either not showing up or disappearing for 30 minutes at a time. It was strange and not typical NS practice. That said, we got our angel last night. Brittany was amazing and knew her stuff. We planned pain management and got the nausea under control. Off most IV meds and just taking pills at this point. I can't wait to see what this does to my system. Not sure I've ever used that much pain reliever in one day. Not even with the mastectomy!! 

Yesterday Dr May came in and was all sunshine. I know she is scared. I see it in here eyes. I told her what Dr N said and she smiled. When I asked her how many of these she had done, she said she used to do them all the time at Emory. I think my mouth might have hit the floor. All week I was wondering if we needed to go back to Emory and the timing just was not there. So when she said this, after JUST praying for reassurance, we felt in perfect hands. 

It was the easiest part of my day. As you all may have figured out at this point I have severe sensory issues so when I start HEARING the spinal fluid flow out of my brain I start blurring out the Smurfs theme song. For whatever reason it was the first thing that popped in my head. We all got some good giggles. Unfortunately as I type I can hear it doing something all up in there… So. Not. Cool!!! Lol. 

After the infusion was over. Less than 3 minutes, (just sayin this was the bom diggidy to not have another spinal tap! Keep that port flowing Lord!) Kelly left with a hug and was on her way. How uneventful was that!! Amazing!!

I went into a deep prayer after that. Skip and I lay there and I whispered with God in a way I had not before. In the end I felt his all encompassing agape love and felt I was able to return the love. I can't explain it, but I had never loved God in this way and the amount of peace and joy that fell over me was beautiful. In the moment of sensory overload and pain crisis he stepped out of heaven so I could tell him how much I loved him. 

We also prayed hard because yet again it was a red chemo drug, the blood of the lamb. Prayed that the cells would be obliterated! Gone! Die cancer cells die!!!! We are expecting a miracle. As Jim Namnoun says, it will work. His sweet nurse sent me a note saying for the rest of the day he repeated that over and over. I can't tell you how much that moved me. We are holding onto the fight with all we have, the biggest #teamnadine army I could ever imagine and we all feel so blessed to have you alongside us.

The verse of the day says: Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” (John 7:38 NIV) we are picturing this to be true in my body right now. So healing. 

My eyes are super sensitive to light so this is getting hard to write. We have a WHISPER note on the door because sounds are amplified and just so all know we won't be having any visitors of the next several days. I'm already a little nervous as we do have the loudest child on the planet (super cute but true!) and maybe the most annoying dog when he can't tell between a door knock and someone stubbing a toe. Lol. 

Off I go. Just got a good 5 hours of sleep and hoping for some liquid diet breakfast here soon. You know you're jealous!!! Buhaha. All I've had were 6 graham crackers and OH the BEST meal of my life, Cambells Chicken Noodle Soup. So not my thing but it was glorious. I think I sang after every bite. Lol. Because even though I feel good most of the time, food still has its moments where nothing sounds good. But that… Mmmmm. Time to rake out the cabinet and stock it with sodium soup! (As my grandfather would always call it)

Ok. I've rambled enough. The last thing I want to share is the love I have for Skip. Every marriage has bumps and bruises but God brought us back to the start of where we were 20 years ago. He lay by my side in the itty bitty bed and I can't tell you how warm and safe it was to be held. He has been amazing. I saw my reflection for the first time and kinda freaked. Looks like I'm growing a unicorn horn off the the side of my head and it freaked me out a little. But you know, he wasn't moved and made me feel so pretty anyway. That's love people. I'm head over heels madly in love with the man whose been by my side for twenty years in a way I never loved him before. I hope you all find your love because truly, it shouldn't take this to make us find what should've been there all along. 

My favorite nurse is back! Time for good stuff!!!!