Days -4 and -3: Line Problems

Last night, we discovered that Ezra's central line was leaking. It also started bleeding heavily again. The doctors decided to take out the line for fear that it could become infected. Because Sloan uses "temporary" central lines, the line can be removed without surgery. So at 10:30 last night, they removed his line bedside. Thankfully, Ezra still has his mediport (we had fought to keep it in) and they were able to finish his chemo and run the meds through the port. However, Ezra still needs a central line for transplant. So back to surgery on Thursday. It's too hard to explain just how traumatic the experience was for Ezra. Suffice to say it was awful. And now we have to get him through another line surgery. 

Ezra is not feeling well at all. Nausea, vomiting, dry heaves, diarrhea. We are trying to figure out the best schedule for his anti-nausea meds to see if we can help with the discomfort. He is having worse side effects sooner than he did with the first transplant. It is upsetting, but we are trying to keep in mind that so far all signs point to the chemo doing its job, unlike last time.

So far, he has done ok with the latest conditioning drug. He got dizzy at one point today, so they stopped it at that time. His symptoms resolved and they were able to re-start. He is also starting to rage from the steroids that they give him as pre-meds. One more day of this drug. Hard to believe that things will get worse before they get better. Despite how tortuous everything has been for Ezra, he is still a trooper, doing the best he can to keep down his oral meds and to do all that is asked of him.