Back from the Hospital

After 4 days and 4 nights, Catherine and I finally came home from the hospital. As it turns out, her blood cultures were all negative for a bacterial infection - what she had was a virus. To be discharged Catherine had to be fever free (below 100.4) for at least 24 hours. With that as my parameter, I thought we'd be out of there on Thursday, but at 10:30 Wednesday night, Catherine started throwing up. She couldn't even keep water down. To make matters worse, her fever went back up to 102. The next day, Dr. Joe ordered her second transfusion to help her along (on Tuesday morning, Catherine received a blood transfusion as her hemoglobin levels fell well below normal levels, common when anyone is fighting an infection, but more pronounced for someone on chemotherapy treatment). This transfusion was something new to us - IVIg, or Intravenous Infusion of Immunoglobulins. Immunoglobins are the part of our white blood cells that help fight infections, they are also the direct target of Catherine's chemotherapy protocol, so this transfusion helped her fight off whatever virus was making its way through her system.
On a side note, this hospital visit was much different from our first. Happily, we were in the same wing as last time, so the nurses faces were all familiar ones for Catherine. And, since her ANC count was so high, we were able to leave our room and head off to storytime and Arts & Crafts in the West wing of the pediatric unit. Catherine also had a blast in the playroom that was located right next to our room. Once the IV was de-accessed from her port-a-cath, Catherine was truly free to roam the halls without me trailing behind. The nurses got a kick out of the real Catherine whom they had not met two months ago. As a matter of fact, Catherine kept Dave and Alex waiting downstairs because she wanted to finish her art project with one of the hospital volunteers. After we got in the car, Catherine thanked me for taking her because she had fun at their "school" (storytime) and she enjoyed all their toys. I'm glad it was a positive experience for her, but I hope we aren't back there anytime soon!