Must Keep Walking

Aug 25 2009

After only a week since we left Addenbrooke’s from the last dose of Chemotherapy, Camille is now back on the ward tucked up into bed with the third dose going through her Hickman Line. It has been an interesting week for us all; Lucia, after a week at Nanny and Granddad’s house was able to spend some real time with us. She’s probably struggling more now with staying away from home than ever before, and she really does need some one on one attention to make her feel better.

Camille on the other hand is flying; why, we have no idea, but she is now constantly wanting to be on her feet walking around the house. This is great for our confidence to see her go from a little girl who just slouched on the sofa looking pale and weak, to now the busy bee we see before us. The only problem with her new found active lifestyle is that she requires a helping hand to walk, meaning that while Camille is walking around the house eight hours a day, Hayley or I are also walking around the house eight hours a day.

We obviously won’t grumble, it’s great to see and pretty much every medical contact that has seen her in recent weeks, seem to be upbeat and pleased with her progress. We of course don’t know what is going on inside her head, whether it is the steroids having eased the swelling or maybe the Chemotherapy is doing its job and attacking the tumour. Until we have the scan in a few weeks, we will be none the wiser.

We are now pushing hard to get the Camille’s Appeal charity up and running. Plans for fundraising events are now being put into practice after our first meeting on Sunday, and new ideas seem to be popping up daily. It has an amazing therapeutic affect on Hayley, now being able to focus on some real positives from this situation we find ourselves in. Hayley’s been working hard with a contact of hers who runs a web design company. We are hoping that by the end of week we will have a live website.

I finally feel we are in some sort of rhythm now that the Hickman Line is in again, and taking the second dose of Chemotherapy. This morning was a slightly different story when I phoned Addenbrookes first thing to ensure that they had a bed for Camille. We basically had to wait by the phone until 14:00pm before the call came to give us the go ahead. By 16:00pm we were in the Paediatric Day Unit waiting for our next action. Nothing seems to be easy.