Don't Do It, Don't Do It, Oh, Lord

It Hurts, It Hurts So Bad.  .  .

3:44 a.m.

I walked in the door last night at just before 10 to find Jenny in a ball on the floor--between the giant ottoman and sectional--agonizing pain in her hip. I had ridden to acting with the student driver.  But, let's back up.

Jenny had chemo yesterday.  Her friend Jennifer took her.  It was uneventful and she received chemo.  I, as always, prepared the house for her arrival to make sure she wanted for nothing and would be comfortable as she endures the aftermath of all that poison.  Sometime before she came home, she texted, saying the doctor suggested she try Aleve for her hip pain.  Aleve.   She asked me to pick some up for her while Abby was at acting.  

During the text exchange I realized she would be alone after Abby and I left for acting.  Leiney was elsewhere and had therapy at 5 and kickboxing later, and her sister Moni had bailed on chemo because she had so much to do (With both kids out of the house, an occasional yoga class to teach, one ponders how this business came upon her).  I asked Jenny who would be with her, and she said she'd reach out to Moni.  I assumed Moni would come.  

Jenny came home, zonked on olanzapine, an anti-psychotic with off-label use for nausea.  She had told me in our text exchange she was starving, so I had jello waiting by the couch on her arrival and had prepared rice and chicken.  She gobbled it all down, and fell back  into the olanzapine sleep that lasts hours after you take it.  She has it before each session, and it has eliminated the vomiting agony of yore.

As Abby and I were leaving for acting, around 5, I woke Jenny to ask when Moni would arrive.  She said Moni wasn't coming.  We had to leave to get Abby to Mercer island for the last rehearsal before the big show, so we left.  I was very worried because she was so out of it and because of possible nausea that has arisen in the past.  Plus, it sucks to be alone when so out of it.

Jenny has had terrible nausea in the past and vomited uncontrollably for hours at times.  Granted, not with this flavor of chemo did it get so bad, I mean she had vomited before on gemcitabine-abraxane, but not as violently or for as long as when getting Folfiri.  So, as I rode in the car with Leadfooted Abby, I started to get increasingly reticent about leaving Jenny alone.  

I texted her sisters to let them know my concerns (Chris is on a road trip to San Francisco) and reached out to Amy, Jenny's best friend.  Amy was essentially putting her shoes on to come over after getting my text, and Moni responded by text. She said was just leaving yoga and could come over and was hyper-focused on Leiney's availability.  Whatever.  She did come around 615.  Leiney arrived soon thereafter and when Moni learned from her that kickboxing wasn't until 7:30, left again until then.  At 8 she texts me, saying Jenny is awake and fine and she is leaving.  

This of course meant that Leiney would be and was responsible for Jenny when she got home.  Abby and I went to get Aleve on the way home.  As we were almost parking at home, around 10,  Leiney called and plaintively asked when we would be home.  I told her we were there.  We walk in the door to fins Jenny in the position described above. She is moaning, Leiney looks incredibly distressed--and can I just say right here, FUCK her sisters-- and also indescribably grateful we were home.

Jenny begins telling me she just took 2 oxy and they weren't working and that we'd likely have to go to hospital.  I give her her Aleve and suggest we wait for the oxy to kick in.  I convince her to soak in the tub, run the bath and get her in it.  After the bath, she resumes her place on the couch, in pain but much more relaxed. She promptly announced that she had taken her nighttime meds, which included another dose of olanzapine and, she said, 40 mg. of THC. Double the usual amount she said, so she would sleep.

I was exhausted, when she finally went to bed at 11:16.  Fell asleep hard and quick, so quick I didn't put covers on.

When I woke up sometime after 3 a.m., I found this text waiting:

That is what they call in medical parlance, a shit ton of drugs.  And while my one syllable response may have reflected calm, I shot to her room like a 54 year old arrow, worried.  She was awake, and in pain, but mellow, very mellow.