Dear friends and family,
The word of the hour is sapped. Today marked the end of day -4 (minus four). On day -5 (yesterday) the drugs were ramped up a bit adding two additional drugs to the study drug pill Abba is already taking once per day. The first of these two new drugs helps prevent graft rejection while the second clears room in his marrow for the donation. One of the two new drugs is a 30 minute, once per day, IV delivery and the other is a three hour, twice per day, IV delivery. The added drugs are causing Abba to feel fuzzy and low energy—which is precisely what was expected. He is also feeling bloated and uncomfortable, but that too is expected given that they have been pumping him full of fluids. Should he turn blue he will be rolled down to the juicing room (“Violet! You’re turning violet, Violet!” That is a Violet Beuregarde reference from the original Willy Wonka movie staring Gene Wilder, of blessed memory.) Day -3 will be the last day with all three drugs, then -2 he just has the two IV drugs, -1 no drugs, just rest, and finally, on the zero day, Friday, he will get his donation.
Abba has also been having some leg pain. This isn’t new—it started some time ago and well before arriving in Boston—but having no place to go to walk it off has exacerbated the issue. The pod and the rooms in the pod are quite small. How hip to be taking a vacation in a tiny home. They replaced his bed with one of those magical beds with the automatic inflating and deflating portions designed to prevent bed sores. He reportedly got more than five straight hours of sleep last night which is more than he has been getting for some time. That and the oxy seem to be helping though the magic bed doesn’t cause constipation.
Abba has also discovered that the food in the hospital is, for lack of a better term, hospital food. The eternal problem solver and out-of-box-thinker, he has learned how to work that system. He has discovered that cooked food sucks so he sticks to sandwiches like peanut butter and jelly, tuna salad and egg salad. He also learned that the rice crispy treats and the apple pie aren’t bad. (In case you’re wondering, weight loss is a threat when one goes through this and so there is a constant effort to pack on the calories to counteract that issue. Not the easiest thing to do, however, since the drugs leave him nearly tasteless. One interesting side note is that they said he cannot have pepper. We have yet to learn why that might be. The closest I’ve found is that the drugs are known to cause irritation in the throat and so avoiding anything that could also irritate is wise.
All that said, Abba is doing fairly well. He has found ways to cope with the cramped quarters such as studying his neighbors and speculating about why one neighbor always has his drapes open (despite bright light) and always has his door open; Abba believes that neighbor must be claustrophobic.
Eama has been looping back and forth to the hospital to hang out in the tiny room. Part of the looping is necessity regarding things like eating—when she is in the room she is masked and gloved so eating isn’t possible. She has also continued getting the apartment ready for Abba’s homecoming (likely to occur either Saturday or Sunday). The latest addition is the elliptical which took a team of four movers to get it placed. It’s really big. Eama refers to it as the tank.
Eama seems to be keeping it together though her energy is a bit sapped too given how little she has been sleeping with all that is going on. She did have a bit of a freight today when one of Abba’s neighbors in the pod was given an experimental drug for some study he is in and the drug immediately put that neighbor into anaphylactic shock. The nurses in the pod reported that this is the first time they’ve ever had that occur. They were shaken by it which was not easy to watch; difficult in that moment to avoid imagining doomsday scenarios. Eama happened to be sitting in the waiting room when the code came through and the flood of respondents poured into the area. She immediately texted Abba to confirm he was not in distress, not the source of the code. Abba, a bit fuzzy, missed the alert so he didn’t respond which raised Eama’s blood pressure momentarily. Eama quickly got gloved and masked and got back to Abba only to learn he was unimpacted by all that had occurred with his neighbor (who survived, though is now in intensive care).
In other news, my parents have decided to revise the contact policy. They are ok with you emailing them directly. Just know that it may take a longer than normal amount of time for you to get a response and there is a good possibility you won’t get a response at all. Additionally, if you’d like to talk on the phone, you could email them with your availability and if they are feeling up to it they will call you. That said, if there is a message that requires more urgent attention, please send that to me and I will address it with them. All the other restrictions remain in place.
That’ll do it for this slightly shorter update. More to come later in the week. Thank you all for the continued support both for Eama and Abba and for me and Nadav. It truly helps!
Ariel
PS
If you haven’t already, don’t forget that tomorrow is election day. Vote!