ferrousland.com - diary archives
Tuesday, October 14, 2003
britt update - 02:46 PM
i haven't posted any information about britt for a while since i mentioned her leukaemia & how she celebrated her fourth birthday in hospital.
a number of weeks ago, monica & britt managed to go home for a weekend, which they were hoping would be a permanent move home, but britt developed an infection behind her knee & they had to go back. mon & greg were very disappointed.
gladly, though, they're now back home again & monica has been taking britt to the hospital as a day patient. i imagine that's a whole lot of work in itself as opposed to being there every day & night, but kelsey is glad to have her mummy home again.
my mum went to stay with mon & greg for about a week to help out, to ease the pressure on greg. she found it very hard. some days kelsey would be quite upset about not having monica at home. one day she was banging on the door behind greg & crying when he left to visit mon & britt by himself. mum said it was heartbreaking.
another day she decided she was going to make her own way to the hospital to visit her mummy when she'd made her a present. mum let her leave the house that time & followed behind her as she walked to the front gate, then out of the yard, then past the neighbours house, looking back with each step to see if mum was going to stop her. i don't think she had any idea of where she was going, but she really missed her mum & wanted to go to her. eventually mum coaxed her back into the house. poor kelsey. it's been really hard on her. it's been hard on the whole family.
i hesitate to say that britt is doing well, because the medication she has to take to kill the leukaemia cells makes her really sick. instead, i say that her body is responding as it's meant to. so despite being really ill from the chemotherapy, she is going as well as anyone can hope. it's a shame that this is the only way we know to cure such a horrible disease, by poisoning the whole body in the hope of killing the leukaemia as well. 
mum said that britt seems to be taking the nausea & side-effects in her stride & is coping well in her own head, if not in her body. poor little britt. it's horrible that she has to go through this.
i'd like to visit mon & greg & the girls as soon as possible. since riley's breastfeeding, i can't just up & go, not to mention that with the costs of a new house & a new baby we're trying to budget a little more than usual. mon & greg were going to visit brisbane this month before britt fell ill, so they would have been able to meet little riley. they won't be going anywhere now for at least two years, so i want to make sure i take riley to see them before he grows too much older. i'm hoping that we can visit them (& maybe go to see my dad in melbourne at the same time since while we're travelling south anyway) earlyish next year, after the peak season air travel prices go down.
it'll be nice to see them all again, since i haven't been to visit since much earlier this year. i think bringing riley along to meet them all will give them a nice bright spot amongst all this seriousness & sadness. babies always seem to be very popular with the young kids, so i hope the girls will also enjoy meeting him. 
I hope you guys do manage to get down there. It sounds like Britt is a strong wee lass. Poor Kelsey too, it must be so hard for her.
Gad...I know just what your family is going through and will seen good thoughts your way for Britt and Kelsey, too...Maybe you guys could video conference to cheer up Britt since travel is a bit out of the question now...
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I think a visit from Riley (and you and Shroom, of course!) would cheer them up immensely