Fuel for the Fight

We just arrived home this morning after a quiet night at the hospital. Brian went in as an outpatient overnight to get his blood transfusion. He basically slept through the whole thing, and it was uneventful.

Yesterday afternoon when I let Rachel know she was staying at her dad's overnight so we could go the hospital, she asked...what type of blood does Brian have. I said A. She said...that is my type, can I donate? Cute. Speaking of types of blood, Brian received O neg because when they cross typed him, his blood was showing A neg on the front typing, and AB neg on the back typing. I said, so...his blood type is changing? Apparently, babies and older people can have trouble getting an accurate blood type because their titers are either not built up or are fluctuating. The same often happens with someone doing chemo. They will still send his blood to the blood bank for verification, but since he needed the blood last night, the pathologist had him take the universal blood.

I was hoping for him to get IV fluids, but they decided to have him wait on that because he just took in the 2 units of blood. Hopefully that is something we can take care of tomorrow.

Please continue to pray for Brian. He is basically not eating. In the last 5 days, he only broke 1000 calories once, and yesterday was barely 300. I have a ton of things to give him, lots of advice on ways to get in more calories...but it is almost like he has an aversion to food or something. He gets all stressed out about eating and just keeps saying he doesn't think he can do it. We'll be addressing this issue tomorrow.

He has also decided to see a counselor, which is long overdue, in my opinion. He has a lot of things he is feeling, and he needs someone to talk to that doesn't have any stake in the situation besides the part he is telling them. We share so much, and he's talked with his parents a lot too. But we are all devastated by this as well, and it makes it hard to know the right thing to say. I find it hard to let him be upset or say negative things, and he needs to be able to really share his fears. I am really hoping the appetite returns, the blood boost helps, and the counselor helps too, because he almost seems like he is giving up. I don't blame him at all for being worn out, or for feeling down. It is just that usually that is a one day thing and he has his ups and downs. He's been down for quite a while and we need a turnaround on this. We agreed a long time ago that I would keep pushing him and trust him to tell me if and when he wanted to stop fighting. It is very difficult to uphold that end of the bargain. He says he isn't done fighting, and he wants to give this drug a chance to work; so the fight goes on, no matter how hard.

We are hoping to get rested up today for the busy day tomorrow.

Peace,
Jenni