Sept. 30

"Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord from the heavens, praise him in the heights above. Praise him, all his angels, praise him, all his heavenly hosts. Praise him, sun and moon, praise him all you shining stars. Praise him, you highest heavens and you waters above the skies. Let them praise the name of the Lord." Psalm 148:1-5a

We are praising the Lord tonight that Becky has had a good day with no fever, nausea, or vomiting. She is still weak but is gaining her strength back some. She has been up since about 9 this morning and has eaten well today. Rachel and the children came by this afternoon and spent a little time with her and that made her feel better. Becca had learned to ride her bike and gotten her ears pierced since Becky was gone and it was a thrill for Becky to see her and Becca and Allen to show off on the bikes for MeMe. It was pretty this afternoon so Becky sat out on the porch for a little bit with her mask on.

Becky was saddened to hear of the death of Norm Herren, a good friend from church, and also the mother of Jan Ellison, a friend from Nixa. We send our thoughts and prayers to both families during this time.

Thanks to all of you for your continued thoughts, prayers, cards and calls. You don't know how much they mean to her. She has a Pentamidine treatment tomorrow at St. John's hospital to prevent pneumonia.

Love,
Becky and Barb

Sept. 29 Day +75

Psalm 62:5-8 says, " Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from Him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; He is my fortress, I will not be shaken. My salvation and my honor depend on God; He is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust in Him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts to Him, for God is our refuge."

Becky had a more restful night last night with the fever finally gone. She also had finally gotten the diarrhea under better control with some Imodium. She had a little this morning but is doing a lot better this afternoon. It was evidently caused by the Augmentin which was stopped yesterday. We saw Dr. Hoos this afternoon and he said things seemed to be going well. He said she "looked good" but to me she looks worse than she did last week but he didn't see her then. Hopefully things are turning around and she will begin to get stronger now. Her counts had dropped again from Friday but with 3 days of being sick that's not unusual.

When we got home she ate some "Jigglers" and proceeded to throw them up within 10 minutes, so was given a half a Phenergan and then 15 minutes later ate a baked potato and bacon and has felt fine since. She's still really weak since she hasn't eaten much in the last 3 days. She also ate a grilled cheese sandwich for supper. We'll see how things set this evening now.

We pray that the fever will stay gone and she will be able to gain her strength back in the next few days. She says, "I'm really tired of being sick, but I guess it could be a lot worse!"

Love,
Becky and Barb

Sept. 28

Just another quick update. I called Dr. Hoos' office this afternoon and talked to his nurse and she relayed a message to and from him. Becky has gotten more exercise today than she wanted going back and forth to the bathroom. One of the "benefits" of Augmentin. Dr. Hoos stopped the antibiotic and said to give her Imodium and he will see her tomorrow afternoon. She has not had a fever since 10:00 this morning so that's a good thing. The preliminary blood culture reports are negative so another good thing. She is getting so weak from not eating and things going right through her if she does eat. She is trying to keep drinking liquids so she doesn't dehydrate with all the diarrhea. Hopefully we'll have more news tomorrow evening.

Continue to pray for her strength and patience.

Love,
Barb and Becky

Sept. 27

I know it's late but thought I'd do a quick update before trying to get a few hours sleep. Becky has continued to run fever off and on during the day. It will go down with the Tylenol but goes back up in 4-6 hours. I am going to try and call Dr. Hoos' in the morning and see if we can get her in there tomorrow instead of Tuesday. She is now having some nausea, vomiting and diarrhea but she says that Augmentin does that to her anyway and is attributing it all to the antibiotic of course these are also symptoms of GVHD also. Hopefully she will be seen tomorrow and we'll get some answers about the fever and from the blood cultures done on Friday.

Please keep praying. Thanks.

Barb

Sept. 26 Day +72

Philippians 4:4-7 says, "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

We had a long night with orders to take temperature every 2 hours but she is feeling some better this afternoon. Yesterday she didn't want to be up at all, spent most of the day in bed and didn't want to eat anything but did take fluids, but today she is up in the recliner and has had a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast and a bowl of potato soup for lunch. They told me yesterday that I could only give Tylenol for 24 hours so I called again today to see if we could extend that since she was better and the "fellow" on call said it would be OK but not too much. She has still had some fever but has only had 4 doses of Tylenol in 24 hours so is doing OK with that.

The children had planned a welcome home supper tonight but that had to be postponed and she had planned on going to church tomorrow but that's not going to happen either. We will do our own church service here again tomorrow morning and hopefully she'll feel better by next Sunday.

She has an appointment with Dr. Hoos here on Tuesday so we are praying she can improve enough that we won't need to see anyone before that time. Continue to pray that the antibiotic will do it's job and she'll see more improvement.

Love,
Barb

Update of 9/25

Becky has had a rough day. She went back to bed after breakfast this morning and slept 2 1/2 hours and when she got up she had a fever of 101.3. They had told us in St. Louis that any temp over 101, we should call immediately which I did. I had to call again and talked to a receptionist that went and got a nurse on the line. She told me to give her some Tylenol ( they had told us earlier NOT to give it) and to call the local oncologist and see if they would evaluate her. Dr. Hoos was out but she was able to get in to see the Nurse Practitioner at 4:00 and they did blood and drew blood cultures as suggested by St. Louis. The labs showed that there was some changes from Monday's lab and it indicated, according to the NP, that there was an infection in her body. She examined her thoroughly and faxed a RX for Augmentin to Wal Mart Pharmacy and said if she wasn't better in 24 hours to call the doctor on call and would probably be admitted. When we got home I made a call to St. Louis and the "Fellow" on call said to watch her closely and call him if she did not improve and they would have her transferred to St. Louis.

Please pray that the antibiotic will do it's job and get rid of the infection and the fever will stay down. It is now 98.9 with Tylenol in her. I will try and keep you posted.

Barb

Sept. 25 Day +71

Sorry I didn't get around to blogging yesterday but was busy with things here. Becky didn't feel well all day yesterday. Achy and a slight headache and spent most of the day on the couch and in the recliner. She felt warm about 2:30 with a temp of 99.8 and then it went to 100.8 about 5:15. We are suppose to call St. Louis if it goes over 101 so we kept a close watch on her last evening. She had one Tylenol at 5:15 and her temp was 99.4 at 7 pm and stayed down the rest of the evening. We're not sure what caused the fever but it is definitely something that we'll keep a close eye on. She was fine this morning with a temp of 98.9 but has gone back to bed after breakfast for a little while. I think she may have overdone it with the trip home and wanting to get back in her routine here. Being home makes her feel better but she needs to realize she's definitely not well just because she's here. She's been working on my patience and now I'm going to have to work on hers! We'll keep you posted.

Psalm 103:8-13 "The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he revoved our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him".

Thanks for your continued prayers.

Love,
Becky, Barb and BJ