[stanford_status] Still sleeping

[John R Larsen]

Hello Everyone,

Everyone in our house is still asleep right now, exhausted and 
drained.  I'm up after giving Stanford his latest dose of oxycontin 
at 8:05.  He is supposed to have 20 mg every 8 hours.  It should 
have been at 6:00 AM but I didn't wake up and neither did he.  He 
was up at 1:45 AM in a lot of pain.  At that time I gave hime 10 mg 
of oxycodone to deal with the break through pain and he was able to 
get back to sleep.  He told me that he was also up at 6:45 AM but 
was able to go back to sleep.

Our Thanksgiving plans are to share it with the Wilson family who 
live very close to us.  The Wilson and Larsen families are very dear 
friends.  We are so grateful for their help the last two days.  They 
dropped everything and their whole family stayed with us up in 
Lebanon, NH the whole time we were at DHMC.  Phillip and Julia 
stayed with them Tuesday night in a motel up there.

Words can't express how much we appreciate the tremendous outpouring 
of love and support from all of you.  Let's keep praying and hoping.  
We need Stanford to get stronger and the bleeding to stop.  I 
haven't talked with Stanford yet about continuing chemo treatments 
and starting the gemcitabine.  The doctors don't want to give him 
chemo while he is "ill" because it will make him sicker.  However, 
if we don't try chemo then Stanford will inevitably die.  The 
doctors hold very little hope that the gemcitabine will be effective 
at all.  I'm pretty sure that Stanford will want to try even though 
it could make him feel sick and could shorten his remaining time.  
Stanford has never been a quitter.  His courage amazes me.

I'm so sorry that all this is happening at a time that should be of 
joy and happiness with family and friends.  I begin to ramble again.  
May you all have an enjoyable Thanksgiving with your families and 
friends.  Treasure the time.

John

_______________________________________________________
John R Larsen <john at larsen-family.us>
http://larsen-family.us