It was a fantastic trip, full of adventure, green beer, Leprechauns, castles, and Irish-folk. It was a fairly last minute decision to go, too, but we take our opportunities as they come. But this website is dedicated first and foremost to keeping everyone up-to-date with how Maggie is doing. So, here’s the latest twist.

Maggie is at the emergency room at Seton right now with concerns of pneumonia. She has a number of symptoms that are complicating things. First, she’s got the cold that we eventually all came down with on the trip (Maggie and I were last.) But unlike my cold, with a tickle in my throat that is causing my cough, hers has moved into her lungs. Second, the tumors in her chest around her breastplate have badly irritated the nerves making it very painful to inhale, kind of like you’d do if you were coughing. No breath to cough with makes it hard to get the phlegm out of your lungs. Third, the coughing is irritating all the current tumor pain sites (neck, side, back and chest) and thus she’s been unable to get her pain under control with the little pain pack.

Last night was a long night. She’s trying not to cough, for obvious reasons, but that causes other issues. She was wheezing pitifully throughout the night through extremely shallow breaths. She said she got a little sleep but she’s definitely not feeling well.

This morning we were going to head to The Spa for a look over by trained eye. However, since I, too, am sick we definitely don’t want me down there coughing germs around other immunocompromised people. So we called Nurse Jolie to the rescue. We are so extremely lucky to have that option. We both felt bad about asking her early on a Saturday morning but she was quick to help.

On the way to The Spa, Maggie explained more of her symptoms – shortness of breath, increased and uncontrolled pain in the chest, phlegm in her lungs, cough, etc. Jolie called a play and headed directly to the Seton ER where Maggie is currently being examined.

She just called me to tell me that they’d taken X-Rays and were waiting for those results. They had also given her a private room so I’m headed up despite my cough. I can’t possibly stay away.

Ah, fun.