Unexpectedly long day...

Monday is my chemo day and Greg and I went to the Cancer Center at 9:30 this morning. The first thing that always happens is they draw blood from my port and it goes to the lab and the lab does several tests. I've never really understood the significance of those tests until today. Because today I flunked the tests. Now I know that all my blood levels need to be at a certain level in order for me to receive chemo. Sometimes chemo is so hard on our bodies that it makes those levels go down. Anyway, this morning my hemoglobin, red blood cells, white blood cells, and my platelets were less than half the level they are supposed to be. So no chemo today. The nurse told me I was a quart low on blood. I still don't understand where that blood went but instead of chemo, I had to have a blood transfusion. They gave me two units of blood and each unit takes more than two hours. You can watch the precious stuff drip by drip going through a long tube. It wasn't really bad. It was just like chemo except what was going into me was blood instead of the chemo drugs. I am so grateful to people who give blood! Thank you! I also have to get some shots that will help with my white blood cells. We didn't get home till almost 6:00 p.m. A very long day of sitting in the same chair. (Not one of the cool chairs, I might add). I was the very last patient on the entire floor. My nurse was wonderful. She was very kind and she explained everything so well. She said that it was a good sign that the chemo was so hard on my good cells because that means it's really doing a number on the dumb cancer cells. I'll probably find out tomorrow when my chemo will be rescheduled. What an adventure.

This morning before we left I was reading some verses in Lamentations that I can't read without singing. These verses really got me through the day:

"Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning, great is Your faithfulness." Lamentations 3:22-23

We had a great time at Matthew's party yesterday afternoon. But Emily just called me tonight and told me Matthew is sick and she feels just terrible about how weakened my system was and she is so worried that I might get sick. I told her all we can do is pray. I hope you will pray about this. Thank you so much for caring for Greg and me. Love, Julie