Don: Karen is doing much better today. It is 6:30pm Shands time and she has been sleeping most all afternoon. She woke up and ate a little dinner and promptly went back to sleep. We were up very late last night though and there is not much to do when you are stuck in a room in the hospital so I am not concerned about the long nap. She has not needed much medicine througout the day today. Now let’s just see how the night goes.

They did finally about an hour ago that the CT scan of the sinuses was was negative. The chest did show a little something but it did not appear to be anything to be worried about at this point. With her counts being 846 (we like to reach at least 500) up from 220 yesterday, the plan is to just wait and see how the night and day goes tomorrow. If she has fevers again they will call in some pulmanary doctors to examine her. If she does OK then I get the impression that they believe her body will take care of what was minor on the scan.

The nurse just came in and told me that Karen’s plateletts stayed at 63 today and that her white cells went from 1.8 this morning to 2.9 this afternoon. Both reports are what we needed to hear. You get blessings when you need them.

Don: Karen is a real trooper. This is day 4 of fevers and day 10 in the hospital when she should have been out relaxing at the camper and back in Panama City. She knows that this is the best place to be for her safety. This morning she had a temp of about 103.6 and feels a little congested. They will be coming to take her for a CT of both the chest and sinuses soon. The fever is completely gone now. It is 11:00am on Tuesday.

Don (rambles): We have had all types of nurses in our 5 months at Shands. Men ones, lady ones, big ones and small ones. Wait that sounds like something Dr. Suess would say. They do certainly come in a wide variety when it comes to their phyical descriptions but that isn’t really what I meant.

We have been blessed with mostly high quality and caring nurses. Today’s nurse is one of the top ones we have encountered. Karen woke up with a 39.7c temp today. That is higher than you want to have. It is about 103.6f. Normal is 37.0c/98.6f. This is the second highest temp she has had in the last 4 days of fevers.

When Karen woke with that temp today it was while they had just done a shift change. We called for our nurse, requesting medication, but the word did not get passed to her. When she made her first visit to our room and was told how Karen felt and what her temp was, the nurse really listened and started making things happen. Let me assure you that is not always the reaction patients get from their nurse. It is two hours later and Karen is resting. We thank God for the blessing of this nurse being our nurse today and pray that all nurses know how much they are depended on to give 100% of themselves in these situations.

Don: I am sorry that we have kept you in suspense for so long. A week ago yesterday Karen was admitted to Shands again at an unscheduled time. Turned out that she had blood clots around her picc line. Like many other things that don’t seem to go our way, this can be seen as one more blessing. This set up a chain of events that include Karen deciding that I needed to take a leave of absence from work and her still being in the hospital after more than a week.

How are those blessings? I was able to give 4 days notice of needing the leave. She has had fevers since late Friday afternoon, all day Saturday and resting peacefully now on Sunday night. The highest fever was today @ 104. We don’t think the fevers are over yet but will know for sure by tomorrow morning. If she does have a fever in the morning she will have to get a bunch of cat scans. I would have had to take leave starting now because of this weekend’s run of fever but it would have been with no notice.

Karen’s blood counts are taking forever to return to normal. If she had not been in the hospital already there is no telling what kind of bug she might have picked up and then we would have been in here by now anyway but battling who knows what. The fever she has now has not had any source bug associated with it. There has not been anything identified in any of the blood cultures they have done and they have done them often. It appears to be something that can just happen from having such low counts for so long. Like she has said all week, “At least I am not out there being exposed to the germs.” Her counts seem to be on the rise today.

I feel compelled to ask for a specific prayer tonight. “Dear God, please help Karen’s counts rise by morning so that the fever will stay gone. If things are not improved by tomorrow she would need to have a new picc line placed and that is what caused the trouble to begin with this time. Karen needs the next 4 weeks as time to build her strength before the bone marrow transplant. Please Lord let that healing begin now so that she can be as strong as possible before May 1st. Continue to watch over her and heal her during that time. Amen”

Don: I am with my Valentine and hope you all are also. It is a good thing that I came down here Friday because they decided to keep Karen through Monday. This gives her more time on the antibodics through IV. They are still trying to decide if she will be needing anything through IV when they let her go home. We are hoping for only stuff she can take by mouth, since they took out the central line last Wednesday. This was one of the hardest weeks we have had because we were supposed to have been at home all week. On the bright side they are talking about her getting a little longe time at home before coming back for consolidation #4. Karen’s counts have come up again today so we really think that we will head home tomorrow. We hope everyone has a great day with their special someone.

Don: You have to read the title to the message to the tune of “Dashing through the snow, on a one horse…”. Good now I am not the only one with that stuck in my head. I really just meant that I wonder if I will be driving through any snow tonight on I-10. Since Karen didn’t get to come home on Monday (or Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday or Friday) I am not willing to risk not seeing her while we hope she will come home Saturday. I am about to get off and hit the highway. Madeline will get to have the night off from staying with Karen at the hospital and I will get to see Karen! If she comes home tomorrow she can ride with me. Whether she comes home tomorrow, Sunday or Monday at least we will have had the time together some where. I promise to drive safe!

Don: We had a message on the home answer machine last night. Even though it was late (and I would be calling eastern time zone so it is even later there) I decided to dial the number. I figured I would get some answering machine and could at least confirm the phone number. Well, we have a new ally in our efforts to move forward in getting Karen’s needed treatment. Her name is Kathy. She is a nurse case manager for AWAC, which is a company often referred to as a third party administrator (TPA). Their function as a company is to help move things forward. It may not always be the direction someone would like but it is movement. We have been feeling like we were stuck in the normal red tape this type of situation can bring.

It is too early to tell you much because that was just first contact last night. We hope to have more news as quickly as the end of the day. Kathy’s job is multi leveled in that she is to help determine if a procedure is medically necessary and then help the patient get it if it is really needed. While doing so she negotiates between the insurance company and the hospital. It also sounded like she has knowledge of grants and other methods of help/support if there is still a shortage of funds for a needed procedure.

Prayers are answered every day. This was another one. Please continue to pray for Karen’s health and our future together as a family.

Don: Who would have ever guessed that time could move so slow? But it’s Thursday morning and Jacob, Dylan and I will be on the road Friday night for our great weekend with you! I can’t wait for them to see you and our great setup at Sportsman’s Cove. They can get in some long board and ripstick time in on those hilly roads! They are going to have a great time. Grandma and Grandpa better look out this time because we won’t be letting them win at Bananagram and I am bringing a dictionary!! 😎

All of our friends, please pray for a safe and FUN trip for the family.

Don: Jake and Dylan’s dad, Dennis, has been really helpful and supportive of Karen and the boys since this all began. Just want to send out a huge THANKS!

Karen left this morning, as planned, for consolidation #3. In the past, I have been able to be with her those 6 days in the hospital. This time we just couldn’t work it out. Her parents are with her though and I will see her on the weekend. I can’t wait! I already miss her and she is just pulling into Gainesville. In fact I will be down there each of the next three weekends and then she will come home on about Monday, Feb 8. As an added bonus, since I will be going there anyway, Jake and Dylan can go with me the second weekend.

One thing that hasn’t changed is how so many people have offered to help with anything that we need. We have great nieghbors, Jim and Chong, that are feeding our cats, inside and out. We have about 7 total, though only the first cat was picked out by us. The rest have just picked us out. The staff of the Lazy C Ranch (www.LazyCRanch.us) has been feeding and haying 4 of our 5 horses twice a day. It works out great becuase the Lazy C is my brother Gene’s place, it’s right next door, and my Dad also has property next door so he gets to make sure Gene and one of the grandsons (Jordan) don’t forget to do my chores. It is also Dad who usually finds when one of our horses has figured a way to get out of the fence. Plus they get to do all kinds of little things that need done when you have horses. Mostly that means repairing stuff the horses break! Johnny Dukes has Karen’s show horse, Elvis, at his place. Elvis was really starting to come into his own when we got side tracked and started spending so much time in Gainesville. Johnny is getting a little ride time in on him so that he doesn’t forget what he had learned.

There are others who have helped, sent up prayers and just kept in touch. In case we have forgotten to thank any of you for all that you have done, “Thank You!!” Lunch time is over. Got to head back to work!

Don: Two great things happened at the same time. Within an hour of my last message Karen convinced Shands not to make her stay in Gainesville and my new boss, Rosanne, insisted I take today and tomorrow off so I could “clean the house and make Karen a nice dinner!” Thanks Rosanne. That means a lot to both Karen and me.

Randy will be coming over for some personal time with his Mom before he heads back to Harding College tomorrow. Everything happens in God’s time. This time the timing works out well for us too. Dylan and Jake will be here tomorrow after school for even more family time. I think Karen’s next round of treatment starts on Jan 18. Again for those who try to keep up, she has had one induction treatment and two consolidation rounds. The treatment on Jan 18 will start consolidation #3.