We put green food coloring in some of the pancakes.  That was fun.  That was about the only fun thing about this St. Patrick’s Day.  Yesterday afternoon Allistaire had diarrhea in her diaper during her nap.  Then at dinner time, after asking her to put one last bite of cheese in her mouth, she threw up for the first time in this whole process.  This morning at 6am I was awakened to the sound of painful crying.  Another diarrhea diaper.  Another at 8:30am and at 10am.  I called the HemOnc Fellow on-call.  Another diaper and another call by 10:37am.  I was told to bring her into the ER to be assessed for dehydration and that they would go ahead and do a CBC so that we wouldn’t have to come in tomorrow morning as had been planned.  Three and a half hours at the ER accomplished merely 30 minutes of IV fluids and a CBC and yes, a few diarrhea diapers.  fortunately, even though she was given fluids this was just because she has a line and it’s easy to do so, not because they had any concern that she was dehydrated.  They also took a diaper for a stool sample.  Her CBC showed that her platelets had dropped from 45 to 35 and that her hematocrit was down from 34 to 28.  Her ANC is still zero.  So, no platelets today.  The on site HemOnc Fellow wanted to admit her – why I really don’t understand.  The concession with the ER doctor was for me to come back in tomorrow as originally planned for another CBC and the scheduled infusion.  Apparently, the HemOnc Fellow thought it possible that her platelets could drop to zero in just a day and doesn’t want to wait until Monday.  So, tomorrow we’re back again and then again on Monday.

We praise the Lord that Allistaire has, and miraculously continues to be fever free.  But please, please pray about this diarrhea.  It seems it is somehow quite painful for her.  Her bottom is holding up quite well as we slather incredible quantities of cream on after every diaper.  It is only barely pink in a few spots.  This is a big, big deal in Allistaire’s baby cancer world.  Keeping that bottom skin in good condition is crucial to her health and of course crucial to us being able to stay at home.  Sten and I are wondering if she has sores in her GI-tract.  Mouth sores are very common with chemo and sometimes they show up at different parts of the body like the esophagus and so on.  I’ll be asking about this tomorrow along with when we can expect results from the stool test.  The doctor did say that diarrhea can be a symptom of one of the two viruses she has.  Also, please pray that somehow Allistaire will be willing to eat.  Today her total intake was about 10 Cheerios and a few sippy cups of milk.  She lost .3 kg since I took her in on Thursday.

As you can imagine, this is all a bit stressful.  There is the ever-present possibility that time at home will end at any time.  There is the ever-present hope to avoid the feeding tube.  There is the ever-present fear of something being really wrong.  Please pray.  I’ve changed probably 5 poopy diapers this evening.  None of them are large quantities but even a little seems to really hurt her.  I just changed one 15 minutes ago and Sten has just gone upstairs to change another.  I don’t know what our night will hold.  Please pray for all of us.