Goals of the day!

There is a dry erase board in Woody's room...but there wasn't a dry erase marker. The other day I mentioned to the nurse that at Vanderbilt they wrote the name of the nurse for the shift and the day and date to help keep the patient oriented. Woody has pretty much had no idea what day it is...and why should he...he has been here for three weeks...he sometimes sleeps during the day and sometimes stays awake during the night...he says that he thinks that he has jet lag! We had been told that they used to use the dry erase board on this floor but had stopped. Yesterday, Nurse Joan suggested that I go to the desk and ask for a dry erase marker...so I did and we have started to write down the day of the week, the month, the date, and the nurse's name each shift. Today, Nurse Joan said that Woody needed to add goals to this list. Tonight's picture shows his goals for today...they definitely got a laugh out of Nurse Joan! And, I think that he met his goals for the day...he still has his hair (though thinning rapidly) and Nurse Joan laughed every time she came in.

Woody's counts continue to rise (a good thing). His neutrophil count today was such that, if it is that for two more days, he will no longer be considered neutropenic. Now...at another time I was told that if the numbers were high enough tomorrow...that might make him no longer neutropenic. Guess we will find out tomorrow! Nurse Joan started gathering supplies for us to take home. Woody will have to wear two medic alert bracelets...one says that he is to be given no steroids except for an emergency...the other says that if he needs blood that it needs to have been irradiated. And, he has to carry a card in his wallet that says to contact NIH before any type of treatments. This card has needed phone numbers on it. So it looks like things are in the process for him to be released. We will see what the docs say when they make their rounds tomorrow. Woody still wonders if he is really ready to go home. He did feel better today than he did yesterday...his energy level is still very low. We did walk five "laps" around the unit today. As soon as he isn't neutropenic, we can go for a walk outside the unit...he might feel better if he could get some fresh air. He still has no appetite...only eats because he must! Today he had to take magnesium and potassium supplements. They took him off the new antibiotics that he started yesterday. His temperature has stayed down today. So all in all things are looking up (I think)!