We've had a couple of nervy days knowing that mum would have a chest x-ray this morning before seeing her oncologist, Dr Mehta. Mum hadn't said anything about being worried but I was aware that she was and I had very little sleep last night worrying about what would be said today.
We got to the hospital at 8.15am for mums x-ray and were, then, an hour early for mums oncology appointment but went along anyway preparing to watch GMTV until her given time. It turned out Dr Mehta was already there at 8.45am and saw mum straight away. He asked mum how she was and then gave her a good going over, testing the strength of her legs, looking at her mouth, sounding her chest etc and then announce the x-ray was still clear and that mum had done so much better that we could ever have hoped for! I watched mum visibly relax before she thanked him and turned to me to say 'that's great isn't it, it's still clear!', bless her.
Mum has had a couple of issues as you know. Dr mehta can't understand the problem with her gums and doesn't believe it's related to any of her treatment, so we'll see what the maxillo facial consultant says on Tuesday. He says the weakness in her legs is down to the steroids so we have now to reduce from 2mg to none, reducing by 500 micrograms at a time, over a period of 30 days. Of course her appetite has really improved since she started the steroids and she is not nearly so tired and he has pointed out that stopping the steroids could see a recurrence of these issues but he is sure by reducing gradually this won't be an issue, so here's hoping! He has encouraged her to keep walking and thinks her legs will improve when she is off the steroids. He doesn't think physio would be beneficial. It seems to be a bit of a trade off, no nausea/weak legs or nausea/strong legs. We'll just have to trust him as he's done a great job of keeping mum well so far!
I would have loved to jump on a plane back to Spain at the weekend but as mum has an appointment about her mouth on Tuesday this won't be possible so we're aiming to go at half term. Her next appointment with Dr mehta is on November 4th assuming everything is ok until then. That will be one day short of a year since diagnosis. This has been another good day!
