Another 8 hours in the ER

This weekend was pretty similar to many others.  With my parents in town to help out, we kept Logan home from school on Friday.  His blood count were on the low side before he got his infusion Thursday, so I felt better about him staying out of the germ factory of daycare.  With kids in daycare, it's inevitable that they will get sick, but with a weak immune system, it can be dangerous.  Friday afternoon, Logan began with a low grade fever.  I assumed it would happen, as it seems to be the pattern.  Chemo on Thursday, Fever on Friday.  This week he was even more likely to get a fever as he also got the flu shot.  After an hour of low grade fever, topping out at 100.9, I gave the fever line a call.  I thought, MAYBE since he got the flu shot, which is likely the cause of the fever, we won't have to go in. MAYBE they would tell us to monitor it at home. WRONG. I know it's the right thing to do, following the doctor's orders, but part of me wants to just ignore it and give the kid a break for once. How bad could it possibly be?! With my mom at home to pick up Parker, I headed in with my dad for our, now too familiar, ER visit. 

Everything was pretty much as expected.  One advantage to being a chemo kid, is we get taken right back to a room and don't have to wait in the waiting room forever.  Of course, if he wasn't a chemo kid, we wouldn't even be there in the first place.  Logan got accessed, antibiotics and IV fluid.  Counts came back ok and we were cleared to go home and return Saturday for Round 2. Besides the nurse thinking my dad was my husband, it was a relatively non-traumatic trip. Ryan returned with Logan for Round 2 on Saturday.  This was the first I took off from one of Logan's hospital/ER visits and I have to say, I rather enjoyed the break.  Although, I was wondering the whole time how they were doing.  It's hard to turn that off.

Besides the inconvenience of two more trips to the ER, two more port accesses, and 8 more hours sitting in the hospital, Logan missed out on some fun times over the weekend.  A friend's birthday party on Saturday and a play-date on Monday.  We've been told to try to keep our lives as normal as possible through chemo treatment, but that proves to not always be possible.  In the short time that we have been doing this, Logan has missed out on more activities and events than I would like.  He has missed days at school with his friends, trips to see family, days at the zoo, parties.  I can't help but feel bad for him, but he handles it all with such maturity.  Maybe he doesn't understand, or doesn't realize that he is missing out.  Or maybe he knows and understands why.  Whatever the situation, this is just another way that Logan shines.