Tomorrow Might Really Be Tomorrow

Day 86 of Megan’s journey towards a full recovery from stage 4 alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma cancer found Megan still in the hospital.  On Thursday night, Megan was admitted because she had a 101.6 fever and severe mouth and throat sores.  She has been in the hospital ever since.  Throughout the past three days, Megan has been bravely dealing with extreme pain, high fevers, and an inability to eat or drink.  Although she is still far from pain free, we actually believe there were some breakthroughs today.  Hopefully, that means that tomorrow might really be “the” tomorrow we have been waiting for.

As I correctly predicted at the end of yesterday’s post, Megan only slept about 45 minutes before she woke up due to the pain in her mouth.  The sores in her throat seemed to be getting better last night.  Megan was actually able to take a couple sips from a water bottle, which was a big breakthrough for her.  However, she was still experiencing severe pain from the sore on the left side of her tongue.  She has to try and keep her tongue still because if it touches her teeth, the pain becomes excruciating for her.  Throughout this journey, Megan has proven herself to be a very tough young lady, so when she complains of pain, it is very real.

Her fever also spiked up to 102.3 last night, which caused her nurse to call Dr. Salvi.  He immediately ordered another blood culture and a chest x-ray.  Thankfully, both came back okay.  However, he did decide to up her dosage of Dilaudid to try and better manage her pain.  They also kept her on Tylenol every six hours to manage her fever and headaches.  The higher dosage of pain medication seemed to work because Megan said she slept better.  She still never gets any extended sleep because she wakes up every two hours when the nurse comes to give her her pain medication.  They were also closely monitoring her vitals all night because of the increased dosage of Dilaudid.  So, even though she slept better, it is still not the type of sleep a healthy person is used to getting.  Therefore, she is always very tired.

Throughout the morning, Megan seemed a little better.  Although the pain on her tongue still would, at times, relegate her to tears, her fever seemed to stay in check, and she just seemed to generally feel a little better.  She can’t talk much because that causes her tongue to touch her teeth, which causes her sores to burn.  However, as long as she remained relatively still, she seemed more comfortable.

Dr. Salvi came in at around 10:30 a.m.  He let me look in her mouth with the light, and showed me how the thrush seems to be almost gone.  Yesterday, her tongue was almost completely white with sores, but today, it was much better.  The sore on the left side of her tongue is still nasty, but she seems to be improving.  I expressed my concern that she had not eaten anything since Thursday night.  He said that he thought that by tomorrow or Tuesday morning, she would be able to eat.  He also said that she would not be ready for her next chemo cycle which was scheduled to start on March 31.  That way, she will have a week to get her weight back up and let her body recover.  When you consider that she hasn’t had any nutrition since Thursday night, I continue to be amazed how little Megan complains about not being able to eat.  However, she did tell the doctor today that when her sores clear up, she wants a nacho supreme from La Cocina.  He thought she might want to start with something a little softer 🙂

When Dr. Salvi told Megan that he was moving back her next chemo cycle, I thought her response was very telling about Megan’s attitude towards this journey.  When Dr. Salvi left, Megan said,

So that means I won’t be cured by January 16th…Right?

I had no idea that Megan knew the exact date that her treatments were going to be over.  I think it shows that she has a goal and is motivated to reach it.  Even though she feels absolutely terrible, she almost seemed upset that she could not continue with her chemo cycles on schedule.  I think if she were given a choice, she would just stay in the hospital and get her treatments on schedule.  However, there is no way her body could handle that right now, so I am thankful she is going to get a break.

At about 1:00 p.m. today, Megan got a nice surprise.  Deb brought up Mackenzie, Makenna Emerson and Abby Washburn for a visit.  Although Megan’s sores don’t allow her to smile, she did manage a small grin when she saw them.  They all did a great job entertaining her for about four hours.  They played music, shared some YouTube videos and played some games.  It was a lot of fun, and I know it was nice for Megan not to think about her pain for a few hours.  Since Megan didn’t want to take a picture where she souldn’t smile, all of the girls decided to hold Megan’s stuffed animals in front of their mouths so no one could smile.  Megan got a kick out of that.  It was so nice of Abby and Makenna to take time out of their weekend to come and visit Megan.  I know she really appreciated it.

Some of you may know that I am an avid runner.  Although lately, I have not been able to run as much as I usually do, I still try to get out as much as possible.  Today was the Shamrock Shuffle 8k race in Chicago.  Although I was not able to run it, we did have some friends who braved the cold weather and sleet and ran today’s race.  They sent us some pictures to let us know that they were all running for “Team Megan” today.  Thanks to Kortni Emerson, Chris and Toni Spencer, Rob and Kristi Hausman, and Dan Hutchings for running for Megan today.  I showed Megan the pictures and she thought it was really nice of all of them.  Here are the pictures they sent me from the today’s race.  Congratulations to all of them for finishing!!!

I left the hospital at 5:00 p.m. and brought all of the girls home.  Deb is staying with Megan tonight at the hospital.  She recently sent me a message that Megan seems much calmer tonight, which is truly a blessing.  Hopefully, Megan is past the ridiculous pain she has been enduring since Thursday night.  As I said in yesterday’s post, we have been waiting for “tomorrow” since Thursday night.  We are holding out hope that the elusive “tomorrow” we are seeking will actually be tomorrow.  We just want to bring our little girl home.

As readers of this blog know, Megan is a huge fan of musicals.  I can’t help but think of this song lyric from “Annie”.

The sun will come out tomorrow
So you got to hang on ’til tomorrow, come what may!
Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love you tomorrow
You’re only a day away

They won’t release Megan from the hospital until she is able to eat.  We sure hope that happens tomorrow, because if it does, the tomorrow we have been waiting for really is “only a day away.”  Hopefully Day 87 finds Megan at home and our family back together again.