Hospital, hospital. When can I go home, Doc?

I've been at Stanford hospital since Wednesday (9/5). I came here because of a fever. Once admitted, we found out that I am neutropenic; my neutraphil count was 200 (borderline is 1500), so I basically had nothing left in me to fight any germs/infections. The hospital put me in isolation until my counts came up to above 1000.

While in the ER, the ER nurses asked me if she can access my mediport and I say yes.  I ask her if she knows how to do it and she confidently says 'yes'. The next 5 minutes were hell. She goes into access and stabs me in the wrong location, then tries again and is shoving the needle down where it obviously wasn't supposed to go. Then she asks if she can try again and I stupidly said yes. She gets another kit ready and stabs me again; third times the charm? Nope third time was the worst. It was like she was taking a knife and stabbing me in the chest over and over again; my legs were kicking out from the pain. What I really wanted to do is bitch-slap the nurse who said she knew what she was doing and obviously did not. Lesson learned: do not have an ER nurse access the port. As a cancer patient, try to go the ITA (if it's open and not the ER); in my case ER was my only option.

There was no isolation rooms on the Onc/Hemo floor so I was kept in the ER for the first 24 hours+. When they were finally able to move me down to Onc/Hemo, my counts had come up to 800 which they felt was high enough for me to share a room with another cancer patient, Phyllis. She was a lovely older woman who had just relapsed from leukemia and was here getting her chemo treatments and leaving the next day.

My criteria for leaving are the following: no fever for 24 hours and neutraphil counts have to be 'normal'. I got the second one taken care of - my white blood cell counts are actually through the roof (probably due in large part to the Neulasta shot I got last Saturday that stimulates the bone marrow to made more while blood cells). The problem is this, even though my count is up the new white blood cells are immature like "2 year olds" per my Oncologist and they dont quiet know what they're doing. These cells need to mature and start working the way they're meant to work.

In general, I feel good. My appetite is back for the most part. But I am beyond frustrated as to why they can't figure out why I keep spiking 100-102+ fevers. They've run every test imagineable and nothing is coming back positive, but I still spike a fever at least twice a day. The last time I had a fever today was 1PM, so I'm praying and praying that I don't a fever between now and 1PM tomorrow and I should get the green light to go home. Usually my second fever strikes between 8pm and 10pm, but so far so good.

Every time the nurse comes in for vitals check and says any number over 37.8 I start to cry. This has been such an emotional roller coaster. I haven't seen my kids since Wednesdays (they think I'm at a spa getting massages and eating fancy meals) and both of our families have rallied to support us with the kids, meals, and everything else. I cannot be more thankful for all the support. I love you all.

So...wish me luck. No fever for the next 12 hours and I can go home and see my kids when they come home from a weekend away with their cousins and aunt and uncle in Pacific Grove. :)