Posted 1:43 PM by Alfred

It’s been (is) hard to get myself to write. Everytime I think about it, it’s like, nah, read about the nfl, or some other of the million other balderdash things you can do on the innernet, or do (shudder) something actually productive. (which this could of course be someday, but I have time to have a regimented writing schedule these days like pookie has resistance to the wiles of a crack rock, ne say paw). I always fear that if I dabble into the scenario of the leukemia slash chemo slash hospital slash everything dealio, it’ll come out like whining, which I don’t want, and don’t even tell me (keith, don't be silly, you're not whining, you & your family are going through so much, you have a right, nay, a need, to vent these thoughts, to ponder the wherewithalls of these real and life affecting issues going on in your life!). I know. I know it’s a ridiculous thing to think, but what among the millions of thoughts that we ponder on the daily aren’t ridiculous? Probably a surprisingly small minority, but then again, I speak only for myself, obvious police notwithstanding.

Brylee’s chemotherapy regimen is actually going really well. She’s in the hospital as I type, most of the way through her third of four twenty-four hour double sets of bags full of viciously wonderful medicine, designed to destroy and thereby push the body to rebuild. The side effects are minor during the administration of the drugs (nausea, fatigue, both of which she’s managed well), it’s about a week after, when the blood counts dip to zero and the immune system is temporarily non existent, that the scary stuff really transpires (relatively), when any little anything can become the ravager, but all we can do is hope for the best, keep the germs at bay as well as we’re able, stay away from crowds, etcetera etcetera.

Work, hospital, home, work, hospital, home. I’ll try to mix some Monday night football in tonight (raiders broncos) but we’ll see. Sigh. Glancing it over, I don’t think I like this here scribbling. Well, erm, maybe a little. The point being, all roads lead to rome, and all thoughts lead to my daughter lying in a hospital bed, but I was just there yesterday, my wife’s there today, she’s going to be OK, she is OK, but it’s hard, it ain’t easy, nope, difficult. And there you have it of why writing this da kine is like, not really happening that much of late. Not an apology, just an explanation, to myself as much as to anyone else.

There are amazing moments in my life, ones I wouldn’t trade with anyone. Yesterday at the hospital, my brave little one kept wanting to give me kisses, even when I would get upset with her for rolling and stomping all over her bed and getting her myriad web of lines tangled up and giving me a pseudo heart attack. She has a port coming out of her chest, with two lines coming out of it, and each line can be adapted to have two lines going into there, so right now she has two kinds of chemotherapy as well as intravenous fluids going into her, and every few hours an antibiotic, and every 24 an anti-nausea, and the associated flushes obviously, and anyway, she could care less to be bothered with worrying about making sure it doesn’t get tangled and accidentally terrifyingly yanked out (they already had to remove one & reinstall on the other side via surgery, but this one’s in good, already scarred over the entry site). Someone asked me in the playroom one time, watching how she walks around and plays and goes here & there, “she just has no idea that’s hooked up to her, does she,” and my response was “oh, she knows it’s there, she just doesn’t care. As far as she’s concerned, that’s our problem.” Which, if you’re a 2 year old going through something like this, is as it should be. She and her younger sister are in all honesty the sweetest little humans I ever encountered. Amazing how they can provide me with such exasperation as well. Such is parenthood, unprecedented in its highs lows and medium ranges, no lie, aloha patrol. Take care.

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