Today went very smoothly. Maggie breezed through her morning appointments and got a room by 11:45pm. She has learned to ‘work’ the MD Anderson system. She made it through a full day without losing a meal due to her level of pain killer. Tomorrow early AM, she’ll go for the first round of chemo…this is the one where they run a tube up her thigh to her liver. From what we can tell, treatment will probably go through Friday, and may be even into Saturday. Maggie’s pain level has been significant, but if she lies still, doesn’t lie on her side or take a deep breath it is tolerable. Then there are those pesky nurses and doctors who wanted to practice with a stethoscope, so repeatedly asked her to take a deep breath. In trying to comply, her pain level spiked. So no more deep breathing exercises this week. She asked for a pain consult, but that person has not yet shown up. The results of the morning sampling were that her liver functions were normal, EKG was very good, and all other standard vitals were very normal.

Some friends dropped by through the evening to chat with Maggie. She holds court wherever she goes.

The MD Anderson building is a real maze. In order to get from Maggie’s room on the 12th floor to the café and parking lot on the 3rd floor, I rode down the elevator ‘E’, had to get off at the 2nd floor, walk down the corridor around about 10 corners to the next elevator ‘C’, go up to the 3rd floor and then onto the café and later in the afternoon out to the parking garage. Why, do you wonder, did I have to do all of that? Because, sometime in the early afternoon, workmen blocked off the corridor just outside the 3rd floor ‘E’ elevators that would have been the typical route to walk to these destinations. So, there were hundreds of people all afternoon taking these alternate routes. It meant lots of extra walking, so I really got my exercise today.

I’ll send another update tomorrow.

All our Love…. Mary and Maggie