Day 63

     Today...hmm...what to say about today.  I kept calling Katie, Cozy.  Conner choked on his lunch and I had to do the child heimlich maneuver on him, as I am yelling for Scott's mom to call 911.  Thankfully, whatever I did, worked before she dialed.  Also, the freezer we got, less than a month ago, stopped working.  Never mind that I have spent the past two weeks, double cooking meals, so I could freeze one each time - because I knew the next two months are going to be hard and I wanted to have meals ready to go.  They went alright! - All in one day.  Yah...what to say about today....
    AND, what to say about tomorrow...Katie starts her Interim Maintenance I phase.  Starting tomorrow, she will go in every 10 days or so, for a double dose of chemo, getting higher doses each time, until her body just can't take it anymore.  The common side effects we are to expect during the next two months are: mouth sores, nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, constipation, stomach ache, hair loss (the few hairs she has left), irritation of nerves - numbness, tingling of fingers and toes, muscle weakness (meaning she won't be able to walk again) and abnormal liver functions.  The less common side effects are: kidney damage, headache, drowsiness, blurred vision, double vision, low blood counts, skin sensitivity, drooping eyelids, jaw pain and seizures.  Yah...what to say about tomorrow...
     Elder D. Todd Christofferson tells a story in this month's Ensign about his mother.  He starts by saying,
"Sometimes all we can handle is one day - or even just part of one day - at a time.  In the 1950s my mother survived radical cancer surgery, which was followed by dozens of painful radiation treatments.  She recalls that her mother taught her something during that time that has helped her ever since: 'I was so sick and weak, and I said to her one day, 'Oh, Mother, I can't stand having 16 more of those treatments.'  'She said, 'Can you go today?' 'Yes.' 'Well, honey, that's all you have to do today.'  "It has helped me many times when I remember to take one day or one thing at a time.  The Spirit can guide us when to look ahead and when we should deal just with this one day, with this one moment."
     Scott is out getting us another freezer, and right now, I am dealing with this one moment, because I am tired of dealing with everything else.  Tomorrow I will deal with tomorrow. One treatment at a time. 
     Today I am glad we took Katie to the park.  No one was there, we put her mask on, didn't let her play in the sand, and sanitized her when it was over - but she had fun!  I wanted her to have fun, on the last day we know she will feel good.  It worked.  She and Conner had a blast!