THE DEATH WATCH-TWENTY-EIGHT

It’s Monday and I’m sitting in the Chemo Lab waiting for my test drugs to arrive. I thought I was prepared but I guess I should have brought some reading material since I can’t seem to connect to the internet from this office. The first thing they did was draw some blood and I was told that there would have to be a follow up in 24 hours after the infusion, which is a new wrinkle to my schedule. Katie gave me a shot of KLH, whatever that is, which is part of the study. Apparently the infusion takes about 90 minutes and then they watch me for an hour so I think I’ll be able to get home before the kid’s bus gets there at 2:45.today.
What I thought was going to be a long day has turned into a very very long day. They started the infusion at 11:45AM and it lasted an hour during which time they took my vitals every 15 minutes. What I didn’t know was that they had to take the vitals for five hours after the infusion. The last word is that I won’t be done until 6:45PM. It is now 1:45PM and I will call Sue at 2:00PM. She is supposed to work tonight and is sleeping now.
I have an IV just inside the bend of my right arm and the blood pressure cuff on my left arm so my arms are stiff and even if I had some reading material it would be difficult to turn pages.
I suggested to Sue that she could possibly report late and I would be home as soon as I could. She suggested that I could pick The Kid up at the hospital but to keep my cell phone on and she would call me. I finally realized that the strange music I was hearing was the ringtone on my new phone so I finally answered it and the plan now is that I come home as soon as I can. It’s now 4:00PM and I plugged myself in for dinner. I may not get to the water part until I get home.
I got my dinner and water done by the time the last blood was drawn at 6:45PM and I wobbled out of the building, and drove out of the parking garage, into a steady rain, at 7:00PM. By 5:00PM I was the only one left in what had been a very crowded room with Chemo patients and six nurses. I drove into our garage at 7:20PM so in reality Sue was exactly one hour late getting to work. I feel really badly about inconveniencing her in this way.
It has been a very very very long day.

I tried to get a better handle on the time schedule for the rest of the week and I came up with the following;
I need to be back at the clinic at 12:30PM Tuesday for the 24 hour follow-up blood draw.
On Wednesday I need to be in the office by 9:15AM and the day should only last about four hours.
On Friday, however, it looks like another long day so I was told to be there at 8:00AM so that they could start earlier and then I would stay until the five hour blood draw was taken. I hope to be better prepared for Friday.
My travel kit worked out very well but from now on I will substitute a book for the laptop which should make the back-pack lighter and a little more useful. If I hadn’t been able to void during the day nor been able to take some pain meds, I doubt that I could have driven home on my own.