Week's End

Just a quick note to round off the week.  It's Saturday morning and the boys have been up for a few hours.  Karen is still asleep thanks to her new friend morphine.  After yesterdays appointment, Dr Gowda has increased her night time dosage and hence the increased drowsiness.  Apart from significantly reducing the pain, it does appear the swelling around her lips has reduced a little bit.  The sun burn on the skin has increased though, with a very definite line of burn.

Eating continues to be the issue though.  She has not had anything solid since Monday.  So she has been surviving on sustagen infused smoothies and 4 tins a day of Ensure Plus, a complete liquid meal.

We were given the bottom line from the doctor yesterday as well.  If she loses any more than 3.5kgs he will insist on a nasal feeding tube for the duration of the therapy.  Reason being the body uses all the energy just trying to repair the radiotherapy site and it has been proven that weight loss at the same time reduces the effectiveness of the body to do this.  So we are praying specifically that Karen will be able to maintain her current weight.  It really is the "Bizarreo World", where the dietitian tells her to eat as much junk food as she can and don't worry about fruit and vegetables, the dentist said don't worry about brushing your teeth anymore and the doctor says don't lose any weight.