Days 51 & 52

Kennedy has not been 100% and we’ve been reminded again about how fragile this treatment makes her.  Her mouth sores have subsided but the last few mornings she’s been pretty nauseated and it takes a lot of coaxing to even get the anti-nausea medication down.   The nausea returns several times a day.

Medicine has also been a pain.  We went from 2 weeks of only 6MP and weekend Bactrin, back to 3-5 meds twice daily.  We added the dex (steroid), along with the ranitidine (it helps her stomach when she’s on the steroid), add that to the weekend doses of bactrim, 6MP and the anti-nausea meds, it’s amazing we can keep it all straight.  This round of steroids really seems to change her personality which complicates things even more when it comes time to convince her to take all of the above.  Thank goodness the steroids end on Wednesday – we’re half way there.

This was my pic for K to prove
I really did get a pokey

I finally got my pokey and made Kennedy happy.  After TRX class today I donated blood at the Y with Life Source.  Although they aren’t my favorite company, the cause was great so I went for it.  This was the first time I donated blood because I have always been a big chicken about needles.  As I went through the process of having my finger poked and giving blood, I thought about all the times Kennedy has been poked and it it made me want to cry.  Thankfully it also made me much stronger about donating.  As I’ve said before, my strength comes from K.

Also showed K that Nicole,
Maya's Mom also got a pokey.

 Kennedy used to take a dance class with a little girl named Maya. Her mom Nicole, who takes TRX with me, also donated for the first time.  I knew it wasn't her thing, especially since she is planning on running an 8k tomorrow and she had both of her little ones with her, but she did it anyway.   I didn't ask but I knew she did it for K.

Lastly, I resolved my BCBS issue on Friday.  After the Thursday call with the insurance company, I contacted the supervisor of the girl I spoke with and asked to have a caseworker assigned to me that has children so she could be more sensitive to my situation.  Lucky me, the same girl called me back to apologize and then asked a ton of questions about K's height and weight, type of meds she was taking, etc.  She told me her purpose was to help me through the process.  When she was done asking me questions, I asked her where I was at in meeting my deductible for out of pocket expenses and she had no clue but said we could call customer service together.  Back to the beginning, what is the purpose of this again?

The insurance liaison from Loyola also called on Friday later in the day after Megan (the Child Life Specialist) read my blog and told her about my situation.  She told me I do not have to talk to the BCBS case worker and that she handles all pre-approval insurance matters and will help me with my insurance needs if any arise.  What a relief.  Now I can avoid those crazy calls and worry about more important things, like K.