I had to go to hospital really early today to start the 1st of 4 intravenous Methotrexate (MTX) chemo cycles. The MTX chemo runs for 24 hours but each cycle lasts between 4-7 days depending on how fast your body can flush out the MTX. The slower you flush it out, the longer you stay in hospital, because high levels of MTX can damage your organs.
I had to fast because I had to have a bone marrow biopsy, and a chemo injection into the spine. They're both painful so Dr Lin puts me to sleep, that's why I need to fast. Dr Lin told me to fast from 4am. You should normally fast about 4 hours before being put to sleep. Mum also put the numbing Emla cream on my chemoport so it wouldn't hurt so much when they put the needle in.
Dr Lin came in quite late today though, at around 1.30pm so I was starving by the time he came. The nurses said next time I should fast from 7am.
Dr Lin normally gives me enough ketamine (sleep drug) for my body weight. But I hate going to sleep and I normally fight the drug. This time I really didn't want to sleep and I tried so hard to keep my eyes open. I woke up before Dr Lin was done. Mum said the whole world could hear me screaming. The nurses had to run and get more ketamine to top up. Mum said next time she'll ask Dr Lin to give me a bit more than the recommended dose for my body weight since I'm so strong and hate to sleep so much.
I was supposed to lie on my back for at least 2 hours after, to stop the wounds from bleeding, but I hate lying down. I got up after less than half an hour. But I couldn't go home yet. I was doing the 24 hour MTX and needed to be warded for a few days.
I also vomited quite a lot after waking up. They forgot to give me the anti-nausea medicine. It's called Kytril. So mum asked the nurses to give me some after I was sick. So I stopped vomiting after that.
My hospital room wasn't ready until much later though so I had to wait in chemo daycare for a while. Dad came at night. He had bought me a new toy, a Portable Sony Playstation. It's just like the one my friend Matthew has. He is 7 years old and is also doing chemo at SDMC, he has AML (Acute Myeloid Leukaemia).
Matthew and I swapped my Nintendo and his Playstation last Thursday at Dr Lin's clinic when I had to do a blood test. We had fun that day. Although we both hate having our blood tests done.
Blood count:
Haemoglobin 14.5 (13.0-18.0)
WBC 4.3 (4.0-11.0)
Platelets 508 (150-4000
Neutrophils 38 (40-74)
Weight: 18.8 kg
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