Water, water everywhere

Another quickie from me... big thanks to those who've sent links to photos and video from the concert. I'll be sharing those this weekend, I promise. Amy, if you read this before you shop, Whole Foods has the BEST apples and carrots. I love their produce! But it's time to get to work.

Good grief, what a busy day! Got to the clinic for our appt. at 9 am, and met for a long time with the nutritionist. I wasn't surprised to find out that we have to do some serious cleanup work on our diet. Sahara has to have a low-sodium diet while on the treatment, and must make sure to get more potassium. She gave us several lists of do's and don'ts. It's kind of intimidating, and it's not going to be possible to change everything overnight, but we are getting started. (Who knew that tap water is full of sodium...I sure didn't.) No more of Sahara's beloved mozzarella cheese sticks. She has to trade them in for carrot sticks. LOL. Tomorrow we're going to go to the Whole Foods Market if we have time, and start picking up the new things we will need.

The MRI's of her spine that were taken yesterday came back clear. They just wanted to be sure there was nothing else to deal with before we began the treatment. I appreciate their thoroughness.

So, at 12:05 today, she was hooked up to her new best friend, the pump that will infuse the medicines into her body 24 hours a day. The pump is much smaller than I anticipated, but you must also carry an entire set of supplies with you at all times. The case she was given looks exactly like a black soft-sided lunchbox. I even had my first experience with caring for the iv, and I was shown how to flush the lines with saline. (Sahara says that I did a good job. WHEW!) I don't have to deal with the needle, thank God, so I think I will be okay. Beginning tomorrow, I will take classes for roughly the next two weeks, learning everything there is to know about administering this treatment, programming the pump, calculating and adjusting medication dosages, maintaining the lines, etc. Funny, I've been considering going back to school over the last year, but I never expected it to be THIS kind of an education. LOL.

We didn't get out of the clinic until about 2:30. We were starving, so we had a late lunch at Chili's, which we love. :) They have some healthy choices on their menu, and the food is always good. After that, we went to Target (oh, no, not again...LOL). Had to get her some stylish new backpacks, because the shoulder bag just doesn't work well because of her balance issues.

We go back in at 9:30 in the morning, and she'll get the first bag change on the iv. I'm trying to pay close attention to everything, because I want to be a good student. :) I've been given a binder full of information that is so far up to 2 inches thick. Yikes.

Extra special thanks to KM - you've already made this trip a lot easier. :)

We're on our way...just have to pray even harder that this new treatment will attack and destroy that tumor.

With love,
Amy