A Difficult Day - Radiation Takes Its Toll

This morning came early with having to be at Rebekah's room at 5:45am to get her over to radiation. Grandma A spent the night with Rebekah and they did not get much sleep with Rebekah crying in pain much of the night. They did give some Tylenol which the nurses said helped a bit but Grandma did not seem to think too much.

We were able to disconnect Rebekah's chemo and fluids so we did not have to take an IV pole across the parking lot which is great - sort of. When we got back Rebekah's IV pole (a brand new great rolling one) and been "stolen" by someone else. Fighting for the best equipment is a very small but very real thing around hospitals. Kind of like fighting for the best office supplies when someone leaves their cubicle!

Rebekah's face is totally red, like she has a serious sunburn on one side. The unfortunate thing is that the burn is also on the inside. Her mouth and throat are very very sore and she has not had much more than fluids for a few days. She also cannot speak. It is like she has the worst case of laryngitis that you can imagine. There is nothing more heart wrenching than having her lay on your lap and grab on to you so hard as if she is trying to crawl inside you and then whisper in a very hoarse voice "I love you." It just makes you want to cry SO bad.

When things are bad the little things that people have done to help seem even better. It seems really stupid but daddy was crying today as he was cooking a burrito for lunch. Just thinking about all of the hard work and effort that went into hand making this meal for us. It was so very touching and we are very thankful; thank you Jessica Deboer!!!! Yes, a lot of little things make us cry every day but I guess that is par for the course.

We are so happy, so fearful, so ???? all at the same time. Sometimes we just don't know how we will make it through the day but we always do. We might be exhausted when we get there but we will make it. It brings a new meaning to "one day at a time."

Please pray for the side effects of radiation and chemo to be taken away from Rebekah. Please pray for the pain to be taken away. And please pray for mommy, daddy and Sarah too.