Well the plan is for me to go home tomorrow and then come back to the hospital on Sunday for a blood check. I will be allowed to stay at home as long as I am not neutropenic, but as soon as I am I will be re-admitted. Without going into a lengthy explanation, neutropenia is when your neutrophils (the immune-fighting part of your white blood cell count) drop below 1,000. Right now mine are at 5,000. I should be fine through the weekend but because of my liver infection, they will want to re-admit me to keep an eye on the fevers and get me onto antibiotics to try to assure that I don’t pick up any other infections while I am waiting for counts to recover. So why go home for such a short visit? To see the kids and Brian and to see Ty’s very first soccer game on Saturday. Once I come back to the hospital I could be in for another week or two. The doctors don’t want to keep me here for no reason and I wouldn’t mind having a day or two to organize their things for school since I might not be there when they start.

I’m feeling pretty good. My energy is starting to lag, but that’s to be expected. With lots of meds we’re keeping my nausea under control and I’ve been able to eat a lot more. I’m trying to stay as healthy as possible this time. I’m still able to do my laps around the hospital – I’m just a little slower and not doing quite as many steps at one time.

I’m actually really excited to be in this spot. I’ve officially finished 2 out of my 3 my chemo treatments and I am just a couple of weeks away from starting the bone marrow transplant and finishing my treatment. I know it won’t all be smooth sailing – trust me, if anyone knows that it’s me! But I’m hoping that the strength I feel inside will carry me through the next few weeks with relatively few (if any) complications.

My current goal is to have my counts back to normal on or before Labor Day. It’s cutting it very close because it takes a certain number of days, typically, for your blood counts to recover. But Kieran starts his first day of school the day after Labor Day and I am determined to be there. I will be disappointed if I don’t make it but I won’t let it break me. I’ve just been fortunate enough so far to be home for everyone’s birthdays and lots of firsts, like Ty’s soccer game this Saturday. These things may not mean much to most people, but to a mother they mean everything.