My 24-hour MTX drip ended today. I will be given 3 doses of intravenous Folinic Acid after that, the 1st dose being 48 hours after the MTX, with the 2nd dose 6 hours after, and the 3rd another 6 hours after that.
The folinic acid is to "rescue" my body from the toxicity of the MTX. If the levels of MTX in my body remains high 48 hours after, it could damage my organs and cause ulcers.
They will also do a blood test tomorrow to see if I have flushed out the MTX. If I haven't, then they need to keep me for longer.
Dr Lin said my bone marrow biopsy yesterday showed that I am still considered Standard Risk ALL. He said this was really good news. He had had one patient who was initially standard risk but later became Intermediate Risk. But he added that maybe the first result might have been a mistake.
Because I am standard risk ALL, I only need 2gm of MTX/m2. Intermediate and high risk patients need 5gm/m2. Since I had quite a low dose, I didn't really have any side effects from the MTX, except that it made me feel very very very cold, and I shivered a bit today. Mum had to turn off the airconditioning and Dr Lin said my room was very warm. But Dr Lin said the shivering was ok as long as I didn't have a fever.
Later I had some blood stains on my robe after I went to the toilet. Mum thought maybe it was old blood stains from yesterday's BM and spine injection.
I have to keep my urine everytime I go to the toilet because the nurses have to check that the PH level is normal and that I am flushing out enough amounts of water. I have to pee in a bedpan and mum pours it into a measuring jug because the nurses need to see how much urine I've produced.
My urine is bright yellow, the same colour as the MTX drip. Mum lets me wee in my diapers at night because I am attached to the drip all day and all night long, so it's too much hassle to unplug it and drag it around with me to the toilet and plug it back in. One time when I went to the toilet with the drip, a bottle of saline fell on the floor and broke. The nurses had to change the bottle. So if I wee in my diapers, the nurses just have to weigh my diapers. Mum says I have to go through too much anyway without having to be bothered about going to the toilet everytime I need to wee. She says it's not a bit deal at all. When I'm on the MTX, I need to wee very frequently, about once an hour.
Later on, there was a huge blood stain on my bedsheets. It turns out my BM wound is still actively bleeding. So the nurses changed the bandages for me. I wasn't very happy at all. It hurts when they take the bandages off.
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