5 days of out-patient chemo under our belt and I feel victorious! We have regained some control. Lots, actually. Each day began by checking in at the clinic around 9am. Faith would get weighed, have her vitals taken and then be pre-medicated, which usually took about an hour. Then then chemo could begin. The 5 day round consisted of 2 different medications, or poisons...I like to call an ace an ace, really! They each lasted about an hour, so we would be done and free to leave around noon, with exception of the first day. The first day was a doozy! We finished at 2pm and then waited until after 4 for the home health care lady to come and explain to me how to be a junior nurse. I was feeling confident before she got there. No problem! I went to college! I have a 4 year degree...I got this! Weeeeellll, with each step I felt my shoulders sag a little and my bravado deflate some. There was so much stuff. I liken it again to a baby. When you leave the hospital with a new baby you have all of this stuff that you don't know what to do with. It turns out, all you really needed were some wet wipes, a diaper and an extra onesie. So, the home health nurse is showing me a palm sized pump, 2 different infusion sets for "just in case", blue heparin, yellow heparin (heparin is an anti clotting drug to be injected into the port to keep it from clotting), about 25 pre-filled saline syringes, lots of tubing, sterile gloves, a brick of 9 volt batteries and those itty bitty little alcohol wipes. Oh, and bags, big bags of fluid.
Once the chemo has finished running, our job is to switch the bag. It's actually really easy. You just pull the "spike" out of one bag and stick it into the other bag...in the middle of the night *yawn* and reset the pump. Got it. Oh, and you have to change the battery at least once a day and the tubing too. Not to worry, they usually do that at the clinic for you, so long as your nice nurse is there. That, too, is not very hard once you do it by yourself for the first time. It's also not a big deal to change the battery unless you are on the freeway and the damn thing starts beeping at you! So continuous flow fluids are the same as drinking a soda every hour, 24 hours a day, meaning Faith has to pee every 2 hours, approximately. Makes sleeping a lot more like napping, but it's still way better at home than at the hospital. Keep in mind, each trip to the bathroom, or anywhere, at anytime requires an 11 year old to put on a pseudo-backpack and use either crutches or the wheelchair to get from point A to point B. This also generally requires the help of another human (we are working on training Saki!).
Day 5 arrives! Our last day! Only 1 more night of changing bags, multiple potty trips, beeping batteries and weird backpacks. Chandler is out of town at the Cape Girardeau Golf Tournament and I am at work when the magical 9:30 Saturday morning cease fire is scheduled. Grandma and Aunt Kelly graciously bring Faith to my office so that I can expertly disconnect her and deactivate her port by removing the needle from her chest. They arrive. I wash my hands, put my shoulders back, say a quick prayer, and present my patient with a confident air! Hell, she doesn't need to know that I am scared shitless! Ok, I go back over the steps in my mind. First, turn off the pump - logical, check. Disconnect her port tube from the pump tube - not as easy as the nurse makes it look, but check. Got it. Wipe connector with teeny tiny alcohol wipe for 30 seconds. Check. Flush port tube with 1 of the many saline syringes. Ok, I am doing this. Wait. Shit. The last push of saline had a big air bubble in it! Oh hell! I forgot to get the air out. Every sweat glad activates. I hold my breath and wait for her to keel over or something, but, seconds later she seems to have been unaffected. Whew! Lesson learned, thank you God! Ok! I am still looking confident. I reach for the 1 and only, very important, syringe of anti-port clotting, yellow heparin and remember to bleed the air out. I remove the cap and I push, but nothing comes out. I push harder, a little harder and POP! 2/3rds of the heparin is now on the sealing! What! Are you frickin' kidding me! Holy Hell, that was the ONLY one they gave me. I ask, ok, I TELL my sister to go get my cell phone from the front desk and I push the only 2 remaining mililiter's of yellow heparin into my baby girls port. DE-FLATE-ED. I call the emergency line, explain my situation to the answering service and leave my phone with Grandma and Auntie while I tend to the orthodontic patient I am supposed to be working on. I finally return to the room where Faith is and look at my sister with my breath held. She is smiling! It's ok. 2ml's is enough. Last step to freedom...remove the needle in her chest and deactivate Faith's port. That is surprisingly easy. It comes right out and, viola, we are done! I am Victorious! I am a junior nurse and I can do this! I did this! Time to celebrate, but I gotta get back to work 1st!
Once the chemo has finished running, our job is to switch the bag. It's actually really easy. You just pull the "spike" out of one bag and stick it into the other bag...in the middle of the night *yawn* and reset the pump. Got it. Oh, and you have to change the battery at least once a day and the tubing too. Not to worry, they usually do that at the clinic for you, so long as your nice nurse is there. That, too, is not very hard once you do it by yourself for the first time. It's also not a big deal to change the battery unless you are on the freeway and the damn thing starts beeping at you! So continuous flow fluids are the same as drinking a soda every hour, 24 hours a day, meaning Faith has to pee every 2 hours, approximately. Makes sleeping a lot more like napping, but it's still way better at home than at the hospital. Keep in mind, each trip to the bathroom, or anywhere, at anytime requires an 11 year old to put on a pseudo-backpack and use either crutches or the wheelchair to get from point A to point B. This also generally requires the help of another human (we are working on training Saki!).
Day 5 arrives! Our last day! Only 1 more night of changing bags, multiple potty trips, beeping batteries and weird backpacks. Chandler is out of town at the Cape Girardeau Golf Tournament and I am at work when the magical 9:30 Saturday morning cease fire is scheduled. Grandma and Aunt Kelly graciously bring Faith to my office so that I can expertly disconnect her and deactivate her port by removing the needle from her chest. They arrive. I wash my hands, put my shoulders back, say a quick prayer, and present my patient with a confident air! Hell, she doesn't need to know that I am scared shitless! Ok, I go back over the steps in my mind. First, turn off the pump - logical, check. Disconnect her port tube from the pump tube - not as easy as the nurse makes it look, but check. Got it. Wipe connector with teeny tiny alcohol wipe for 30 seconds. Check. Flush port tube with 1 of the many saline syringes. Ok, I am doing this. Wait. Shit. The last push of saline had a big air bubble in it! Oh hell! I forgot to get the air out. Every sweat glad activates. I hold my breath and wait for her to keel over or something, but, seconds later she seems to have been unaffected. Whew! Lesson learned, thank you God! Ok! I am still looking confident. I reach for the 1 and only, very important, syringe of anti-port clotting, yellow heparin and remember to bleed the air out. I remove the cap and I push, but nothing comes out. I push harder, a little harder and POP! 2/3rds of the heparin is now on the sealing! What! Are you frickin' kidding me! Holy Hell, that was the ONLY one they gave me. I ask, ok, I TELL my sister to go get my cell phone from the front desk and I push the only 2 remaining mililiter's of yellow heparin into my baby girls port. DE-FLATE-ED. I call the emergency line, explain my situation to the answering service and leave my phone with Grandma and Auntie while I tend to the orthodontic patient I am supposed to be working on. I finally return to the room where Faith is and look at my sister with my breath held. She is smiling! It's ok. 2ml's is enough. Last step to freedom...remove the needle in her chest and deactivate Faith's port. That is surprisingly easy. It comes right out and, viola, we are done! I am Victorious! I am a junior nurse and I can do this! I did this! Time to celebrate, but I gotta get back to work 1st!