Chemo done and HOME~!

Hello everyone,

I know many of you must be worried over the lack of updates. My sincere apologies. We admitted on Tuesday to start Charmaine's #4 cycle of Chemo - Irinotecan and Temodar. Finally completed the 5 days chemo on Saturday yesterday.

As the chemo takes about 2hours each day, we were allowed home leave daily. Boy, it was so tiring but all worth it!

The first day was slightly more exhuasting. We arrived at KKH before 9am and because we had to wait for blood tests which took more than 1.5hr before we could start the chemo, we only completed everything about 5pm!

We hurriedly left for home as we had left Jase with our neighbour who helped to babysit as my mom had her own medical checkup at TTSH. And because of all the delays at KKH, we couldnt make it back in time to pick him from school.

When we got to our neighbour's, the 3 kiddos spent another hour playing while I finally could take a breather. After dinner, we made our way back to KKH about 10pm and that was basically our routine daily.

Charmaine would announce to everyone who called that she was on "HOME LEAVE"! HAHA. Some days, she got a little tired from the chemo and would fall asleep the moment we got into the cab but without fail, she would at least get a couple of hours each day with her kor kor and that made her the happiest little bundle of joy! On days she didnt fall asleep, the moment we got off the cab, she would literally bounce and skip and dance her way up to our flat and kept calling for :"Jase Jase, we are home!"

It sounded pretty much like a daily outpatient treatment but gheez, I would be so exhausted by the time we return to the hospital and would immediately doze off after putting Charmaine to bed. Over the last few days, also had to prepare the scan reports and CDs to be sent over to NYC. Thankfully to Angela, who would make her way down to KKH way past 10pm for so many nights just to help me burn those CDs! Thank you babe!

In short, that was our life for the past 5/6 days and I'm honestly just very glad to be able to home and not having to rush down to KKH daily.

This morning when Charmaine woke up, she was SO HAPPY. Went to brush her teeth with her kor kor and changed out of their pjs themselves while I continue to laze in bed. :-) Barely an hour later, Char became very quiet. I asked if she was not feeling well. She said no. And 15mins later, she started crying of abdominal pains. Ran to her bed and curled her body and just kept crying... I immediately checked her temp and gave her some paracetemol. Told her to try and get some sleep but it was difficult as she had just woke up barely 2hrs ago! Hence, she spent the next 45mins having pains intermittenly. Reminded me of a mother going through contractual pains...

The pain finally stopped. And she continued playing with Jase after he came back from lessons. 2hrs later, she suddenly cried of pain again. No paracetemol allowed since she just had. She tolerated the pains but just couldnt fall asleep...

Got better again and one moment she would laughing her trademark laughters and the next moment she would suddenly burst out crying...

This is pretty much our routine today...

Gotta run as she is now crying of pains again.

With love,
Cyn