The Sleepover Club

Mairead here! Thank you to my guest bloggers for doing a great job as always. Now, I don't know if anyone remembers an era of books called 'The Sleepover Club' - they were the same genre as Sweetvalley High and the like.. I remember LOVING these books and many an afternoon would be spent going to the library trying to get a new one. Back in the day, sleepovers were always so much fun. At Primary School I think every birthday party was a sleepover and everyone got so excited about them. Everyone, except me.. I was a total wimp and got the nickname of 'The Fader' as I would always be the first person to fall asleep and then ultimately the 'trick' would be played on me! I once remember waking up with my face covered in Vaseline and being very confused - that was not one of the funnest parties. Luckily, I grew out of this 'fading' malarky and managed to have more fun at sleepovers. It was always SUCH a huge deal to stay up the whole night though - I've never quite understood this. Everyone would turn up at school on Monday to compare and compete over who stayed up the longest. This was never me but I most likely exaggerated. In the ward last week, my sleep was dire and as I was so weak Mum had to stay in with me. This is definitely a different sleepover experience! One night I didn't get a single hours sleep and felt dreadful.. Not good. As mentioned previously, I do not cope well with sleep deprivation! Last week wasn't nice at all. I hate feeling so weak, and even though I am not aware when I fainted, it was pretty scary. It's not nice waking up to see a lot of scared faces surrounding me! I really don't like feeling so out of it - we seem to think it's one of the anti sickness meds I take called Nozinam so I've been very reluctant to take it since then.

Last week went past very slowly, I wasn't sleeping well and the mouth ulcers started to kick in. Rona, Teenie and Grace came on Thursday night which was good. They kept me entertained on Friday but I can't say I was much chat as I was so tired! On Friday night I was given platelets as my count went down to 9 (which is pretty low). I was also on an antibiotics for an infection and a patch on my arm for pain. We noticed around 9pm that I was burning up, my whole body had gone red (similar to when I had vancomycin, my other allergy) and I was itching everywhere. We called in the nurse who gave me piriton to try and stop it but didn't really do anything. She then gave me Hydrocortisone again calm it down and gave me my evening tablets. Teenie decided to stay with me that night, however, by 12am the itching still hadn't died down. We called a doctor who decided we should take off the patches for pain in case I was having a reaction to them (up until this point we had assumed it had been the platelets causing the reaction). By now, as I had taken so many different types of medication I was so drowsy and couldn't keep awake. Teenie got pretty worried as my breathing had slowed down (due to the amount of medication) and ended up staying up all night watching me! Bless her, she got such a fright. I tried to keep myself awake but literally couldn't. Mum came over first thing in the morning so Teenie could get a rest but it was a really horrible night and I'm now very paranoid about taking too many 'woozy' tablets at once. It really was a horrible evening and I'm so thankful Teenie was there to look after me.

We didn't do much the rest of the weekend, just blethered and watched a couple of films. I was feeling generally OK until the pain hit in again on Sunday night... I had had very severe stomach pain the previous week which is why I was given the patches. They normally take 12-24 hours to wear off so Sunday night wasn't fun. The stomach pain, combined with awful mouth ulcers, did not make a happy Mairead! I was given quite a lot of pain killers on Monday morning which take a while to kick in and I've also been given the patch again. It has definitely helped the stomach pain but made me pretty drowsy too. Rona, Teenie and Grace left yesterday and I was sad to see them go! It's been good having them here to give Mum some time off and I've missed seeing them! It is pretty isolating down here and I'm getting incredibly fed up. When I get a sudden burst of energy it is very frustrating as I can't do anything with it!

When Ruth was down she did a great job of brightening my room up a bit.. Here's some snaps of it at the moment (including the balloon from Mary & Co, the lovely flowers were made by Stef and some nice cards too).

One request I had for Teenie and Grace was a trip to Westfield - they didn't mind too much - to bring me some Krispy Kremes! I managed to eat one which was cut down into tiny bits so I didn't have to chew. Sooooo good!

Auntie Dianne visited on Monday and brought a poster Claire had made for me - thanks Claire, I love it!

I also received an AMAZING delivery of balloons from the Forster's! Thank you so much guys, it was such a surprise! The Sister came into my room and was so intrigued what was in the box. Here is a lovely snap of them. Thanks guys :)

So that is pretty much a guided tour of my room! I am sick of it now, cannot wait to get out. I have also written a long list of food that I want when I get out. I am still having waves of sickness but it is generally under control. As of this, I am hungry due to the steroids but the painful mouth makes it very hard to eat anything.

The Ward is very different this time. My last time at this hospital wasn't great and I think I was so apprehensive about this round of high dose in case it would be similar. However, this time around the nurses have not been as stressed or as understaffed. As I was in over Christmas the last time, they were definitely struggling with fewer staff and I felt like I was a constant annoyance. However, on Weston Ward most of the nurses have been incredibly attentive, will chat away to us all and have been very helpful. I feel it has really helped my mood being in a much more positive atmosphere and I am very thankful that it has gone reasonably well so far!

My white count is still at '0' so who knows when I'll be out. They say it takes 10-14 days after Stem Cell Transplant and my transplant was last Wednesday.. I'm saying to myself it'll probably be next Wednesday that I'll get out. Fingers crossed it's sooner though! Wishful thinking... If anyone has any ideas on how to keep myself entertained please let me know - I HATE daytime television and I'm finding it hard to concentrate on anything. Also, the tinglyness on my hands and fingers has come back FULL FORCE so apologies if it takes a while for me to text back (hand cramp ya see). Anywho, I now realise this has been an incredibly long blog so I best be off. Happy Wednesday!