5/19

A new day today. Ethan and I headed off to the lab for some weekly bloodwork, got halfway there, realized I had forgotten the requisition form and had to turn around and go BACK home. For a moment I got super pissed and said words that a mother shouldn’t speak in front of her child. I then decided to reframe it. This is something a guy I saw briefly in NYC recommended. It is quite useful. This man was on his psychology rotation. He said some very helpful words. “ when you get frustrated, upset or angry....go through your feelings briefly, then pause and reframe it.”. It’s looking on the bright side. 

After my unfortunate slew of trucker pottymouth terms, I paused.

“Well, at least we were only halfway there.”

I paused.

“What a big damn waste of time.” (Then I decided I needed to work a little harder at reframing it after that comment.

“We are going to make sure neither one of us has to go through forgetting this again. We are going to keep the requisition in the car.” Ok that was better. We are not swearing AND solving the problem AT THE SAME TIME. That’s progress.

Forgetting a requisition is no big deal, unless......you leave the house at 7:45, forget your requisition and have to turn around and go get it, and when you timed to be there at 8:00 and home by 8:45 so your kid can join his zoom class and you can meet with your financial planner at 9:00, it really throws the entire schedule off and you miss those target times.

I sent a note to the teacher to let her know Ethan would be late. I sent a note to Avery letting her know the financial planner would be arriving at 9:00 and now she, the introvert, was going to have to lock up the dogs and answer the door. What a cascade of effects from one tiny mistake.

We pulled into the driveway at 9:00. We beat the financial guy. By a few minutes. Ethan’s class had been cancelled. The morning I thought I had botched was turning out pretty ok.

Then I thought.....hey wait a minute. I have had WAY worse days than this. This isn’t that bad.

Ethan’s tongue was a slight bit better today. This no immune system thing is hard to wrap your head around. Mouths typically heal pretty fast, if you have a normal immune system. This is NOT the case when you are immuno-suppressed.

I realized at dialysis on Tuesday that since we had switched to training to home dialysis Ethan wasn’t getting his medication to boost his red blood cell production or his iron infusions. So he is on day 10 of missing those elements. He has been so tired. I hadn’t put two and two together. I inquired about it Tuesday at dialysis and it seems it was an oversight. Poor Ethan has been struggling with lethargy for several days.

Tomorrow he should start getting those infusions again. Again, another thing I feel bad I didn’t catch right off the bat. At least we caught it and are going to deal with it. I could stay mad about it but it isn’t going to help anything. So I am thankful the problem has been identified and we are going to continue moving forward.