Taking Walks

Ryan got his last dose of chemotherapy for this hospital stay today. He also got platelets. His platelet count was 7 this morning and so they infused platelets around 10:00. His platelet count this afternoon was 22. We pray that it will come up on its own a little tomorrow, his hemoglobin as well. The doctors are planning to allow Ryan to come home tomorrow as long as everything looks fine in the morning.

We had quite a few nurses in the room this evening because when they came to check vitals his blood pressure was 75 over 64. The PCA was checking that and she went to get the nurse and they paged the doctor, she came back in and checked it twice more, once Dustin (a friend of ours) and I got scolded for talking because she couldn't hear. Dustin and Alicia were here for a visit and Ryan slept through most of the time Alicia was in here, but they came to do vitals about the same time Dustin came in, so he got to be in on all the excitement. They are now giving Ryan some extra fluids to be sure that his blood pressure is ok tomorrow when he really wants to get out of here.

Ryan's white count was down to 1.8 today and I expect that it will drop a little more tomorrow since he got chemo today. Although the chemo makes him tired, he did much better today than Thursday. We went on a walk around lunchtime today where they unhooked him from his IV pole and turned the heart monitor off, we ate lunch in the cafeteria before he had to be back in the room for his pre-meds for chemo. Then around supper time, he got them talked into unhooking him again and we walked outside for a little bit over to another food place for supper. Ryan was wanting spaghetti and you can't get that in the room or the cafeteria. He slept about 3 hours while he was getting his chemo and afterwards and fell asleep around 7:30. He walked to the waiting room to say hi to Dustin and Alicia's kids, but then came back and laid down. We tried to call Aubrey to tell her goodnight, but PaPaw, Grandma, and she must be having too much fun because they didn't even answer the phone. Ryan might not be telling her goodnight tonight because he's asleep before her :)

I pray that Ryan's platelets and hemoglobin counts will begin to recover a bit so that when he's home he doesn't have to spend days in the hospital getting blood and platelets and he can at least be at home with us.

We are thankful that God is carrying us through this again and also for the friends and family we have surrounding us with prayer.

-A