That Was Hard

I should start by saying how blessed my husband and I feel that Malina has done so well through her treatments. She often has a smile on her face and she does so much better at warming up to people around her. Our Malina lights up a room and lets us know that everything will be ok.

A couple of Saturdays ago Malina was very constipated. She is on several different laxatives plus a home remedy. Daddy gave her the medications Saturday night and I gave them to her Sunday morning. About mid morning she finally started pooping. She didn't stop though. She was on thee toilet every 5 minutes going. Malina would scream that her bottom hurt and ask to go to the toilet. While on the toilet she would still cry about it. On Monday morning she had an appointment to check her counts and we chatted with the nurse and doctor about the weekend. We all figured that her body was still clearing out the laxatives and that she would be fine. Monday night was worse! Tuesday morning Malina was having scans done. She was scheduled for a CT and MRI but her doctors added an x-ray since she was having such a hard time. While we waited for her to get out of her scans we ran into her doctor and told her that we were really concerned. We knew something wasn't right but didn't know what was going on. Tuesday was hard again. I really wanted to call in but my husband encouraged me to wait so that the right people could look at all her scans before they talked to us.

We got a call mid morning on Wednesday and were told that Malina's scans were clean!!! They could not see anything were the tumor had been and no new tumors. Such great news!! However, we were then told that Malina had a "healing fracture" in her sacral ala (part of her sacrum bone). So that is probably where all of her pain was coming from. We were told her give her pain medicine and wait it out. Her oncology team was contacting her orthopedic surgeon for his input too. By Wednesday night her pain medicine wasn't working anymore. It maybe lasted an hour. Again, another bad night.

Thursday morning Malina had an appointment in clinic to check her blood counts. As soon as we walked in everyone could tell that she wasn't doing well. She wasn't herself at all. I myself was emotional by this point. I didn't know what was going on with my daughter but I knew something was wrong and I couldn't fix it. Worst feeling ever! Once we got to our room I was able to chat with her nurse for a minute and tell her how the week had gone. She left to get a hold of our team and gather supplies. When she came back she told me that there was a good chance Malina would be admitted. For a second I was scared because I didn't know why, but then my very next thought was that Malina needed the help of these nurses and doctors and she was in the right place. Malina needed to be in the hospital.

I had both girls with me that day at the hospital and thankfully Jenna is so well loved and social that she was happy hanging out with Miss Elizabeth (child life) or any of the nurses. Once our doctors came in to see Malina they immediately noticed that she was drooling. We had noticed it earlier in the week but didn't think too much of it. Her doctors told us that it is a sign of mucositis. They asked me how I felt about having her admitted. I let them know that I was ok with it, that she needed to be here. From that point everything happened fast. They were able to get us up to a room and settled and get her started on pain meds.

That was the worst I have ever seen Malina. I hated not being able to make it all go away. As mom I hate not being able to fix it. But as mom I can hold my baby and comfort her. I can love her and let her know that she will be ok.

Malina finally started perking up Friday afternoon and was released the next Tuesday. She is doing much better and goes in Monday to be admitted for six days of chemo.