This is a test...

Yesterday Steven had his second bone marrow test.  Thankfully, he didn’t dread it because the first one wasn’t too painful.  The doctor had prescribed morphine and an anxiety drug to help calm him.  Steven didn’t want the morphine and the nurse said she was fairly certain he didn’t need the anxiety meds either.  After another call to the doctor, the nurse came back and offered him dilaudid.  Steven started to worry about whether or not the first successful bone marrow test was a fluke, and second guessed his decision to go without pain meds, since the doctor seemed to be so adamant for him to have it.

 

He finally consented to the dilaudid, but before the nurse was back in with the meds, the bone marrow team was in his room and ready to go.  Fully dressed, only needing enough of his hip showing for the test, Steven laid on his side. 

 

I told him this time I would stay with him. He told me that he worried that he would look like “a puss”.  I told him after 22 years, I was certain that he was anything but.

 

I held his hand and focused on his face, looking for any sign of pain.  The nurse started to administer the pain meds as the bone marrow team prepped the site.  Steven only winced once, when the second shot to numb the area reached the bone, but even then, I only knew of the pain because he pressed his eyes tightly shut. 

 

When the pain meds started to enter his body through his port, Steven said, “I don’t like the way this feels.  It’s making me hot.”  The bone marrow team commented he wouldn’t make a good addict.  Although Steven was completely fine, I found myself having the telltale ringing in my ears, coupled with a dimness in the room.  My mind revolted at what was happening and I internally scolded myself.  “THIS IS STUPID!  HE ISN’T IN PAIN.  HE IS FINE.  You can’t even see anything!  How embarrassing!  You MUST stay upright and not give yourself away!”

 

Knowing we were less than a minute away from the completion of the test, I demanded that my body not betray me.  However, when the drill started, even though Steven didn’t make any sign to show discomfort, the room grew increasingly dim and the voices sounded miles away.  Thoroughly embarrassed, but knowing that it would be more embarrassing to have to be picked up off the floor, I immediately sat down.  Steven caught my eyes.  “Were you going to pass out?”

 

I explained that for no apparent reason, I probably would have, had I not sat down.

 

He then said, “Looks like you were the puss”, and smiled.  I agreed that in comparison, I was most definitely the bigger of the two of us, but that my “swooning” was merely a result of staring at his face so long. 

 

After all, he is soooo handsome.  The nurses agreed.

 

After the procedure, Steven apparently started to feel the effects of the meds, albeit a little belatedly.  The nurse asked if he would like to go ahead and lie flat and Steven asked if he had to.  He was pretty comfortable where he was.

 

She told him he did have to.

 

So he flopped to his back.  Because he was almost positioned diagonally across the bed, with his head wedged in between two pillows, the nurse then asked if she could raise his bed or if he would like to reposition.

 

He said he felt really good where he was.

 

I’m certain that if he would have been lying on the cold tile floor he would have felt equally as good.

 

About 30 minutes later another nurse came in.  Steven and I had been lying together on the bed and she was going to check his vitals.  She asked how he felt.  He said, in a completely relaxed tone, “I’m chilling.”

 

Having had no idea that he was chilling, I immediately jumped up and grabbed the blankets to cover his legs.  He stopped me and looked back at the nurse and, in the same mellow, low voice, with his eyes only slits, said, “I’m chilling…..I’m relaxing……..I’m chillaxin.”

I think that he might be a better addict than we originally thought.

 *****

 

The doctor informed Steven this morning that the test should be back tomorrow.  He is hoping to find the bone marrow looking like a “blank slate” with nothing in it.  Hopefully, the next test, in about two weeks, should show the growth of healthy cells.  

 

For those of you that are praying, please continue to do so.  Pray that he is ultimately cured.  Pray that we remain of strong faith. Pray that the kids continue to adjust well. And, please pray that tomorrow the bone marrow test reveals that the treatment that Steven has already received has done its job.