Another piece of my heart is broken

Friday, our son had his 9th infusion of the year. The first one was a NIGHTMARE last November. But then we made some changes, won the "great insurance debacle of 2010" and got into a pretty good groove. We knew which infusion specialist could start the IV on the first try. We knew what order the pre-meds should come in, how long to wait until starting the serum, how many kilos per gram per hour it flowed, thus being able to guess what time he'd get done...we were becoming champs.

And then Friday came. They gave the pre-meds in a different order. They waited too long to start the serum because they were busy. They triend to give the steroid at the same time as the serum, until we stopped them and said they had to give it ahead of time, 30 minutes. An hour later, they came back to start the drip. It was a different brand - the brand that made him sick in November. It was a different dose - 5 g. more than he's been getting. My husband and I looked at each other with inward anxiety, trying to keep our son from seeing our panic.

He had a fever when we left, which was not usual. Friday night, he was nauseous. Saturday, he had a headache, but was in good spirits. Sunday, he wanted to sleep, sleep, sleep. He slept at church, slept in the car, slept at home. Then the vomiting started. The headache worsened.

Off to ER. I was terrified - ER on a holiday = GERM CITY. We walked in the doors, into triage, into a room. No wait. WHEW. 7 hours, 6 failed IV starts and one very angry mama later, I insisted on a plan B. "Can't we do oral anti-nausea and a pain shot or something?" I begged.

Oh, as a matter of fact they can. A few vomit bags later, they finally stopped the nausea and he drifted off to sleep. I awakened him to see if the headache was better, or if he wanted the shot. He wanted it (ok, when an 8 year old asks for a pain shot, it's BAD). Since the child has about 2 % body fat, the shot HURT and bruised badly. But I carried him to the car and put him safely into bed.

And then I cried.

It's bad enough that this poor, amazing, brave child has to have this treatment every month - 8+ hours of serum flowing into his tiny veins - but to have them mess with the plan, create issues and more pain and suffering for him breaks another piece of my heart. His tears burned a whole right through me. And when I laid him in bed, he said "I love you, mommy." His sister cried herself to sleep knowing that her big brother was sick and at the hospital. Daddy held and rocked her to comfort her. Another piece gone.

This blog is named with much thought and relevance to my life: "We rejoice in our suffering, because we know that suffering produces perserverance; perserverance, character; and character, hope." Romans 5:3