Mom needs to Eat!

Mom and I are headed back to Virginia on Saturday.  We've seen such improvement here at Hippocrates.  Mom hasn't taken any anti nausea medication in about two week, has drastically decreased her pain dosage from 3 pills every three hours to 1 or two pills every 5-7 hours, and improved her attitudes about herself, her health and her spiritual condition. Also, Mom and I have enjoyed the unexpected yet pleasant surprise of talking about and healing our own Mother/Daughter relationship.  Mom has started eating solid foods, but only in bird like portions.  When she does eat she is keeping down small amounts of veggies.  I talked to the doctor about an hour ago and he is going to review Mom's blood work again.  However,  Mom has been having some major memory, weakness and stability problems since Saturday/Sunday.  As most of you know, Mom had 10 rounds of radiation on her brain during April.  Although the doctor mentioned that Mom's short term memory may be affected, we had seen little of this until the past several days.  Mom is forgetting many basic things, which is difficult for me to grasp or understand.  At this point we (the doctor and I) are unsure if this is due to the radiation, part of her healing or advancement of the cancer.  The doctor is very concerned about the little amounts of food that Mom is ingesting and seems to thing lack of food may be the culprit in Mom's recent memory loss and general confusion.  I would have to say that I agree with the doctor.  After all, I have read several times along this journey that approximately 80% of cancer patients don't pass away from cancer but malnutrition stemming from not being able to eat and/or losing their appetite.  I'm really taking this eating thing to heart.  I had a talk with Mom this morning about needing to eat as the alternative is not what anybody wants.  She is sitting next to me right now eating some grain type cereal.  However,  she really needs to keep down the nut juice that I'm going to get her in about 1/2 hr.  Did you know that nuts are the hardest item for our bodies to digest?  Because of this nuts are juiced and then water is added so it looks and tastes sort of like a latte.  In the past few weeks Mom has tried to keep the nut juice down three times and has thrown it up three times.  Please pray about this.  Mom REALLY needs the calories.  I'm also getting Mom some Manna bread and avocado in about an hour.  It would be very nice to see a miracle occur in the Mom eating department.  Mom has lost 10 lbs so far since we have been here and is down to about 145 lbs. We need to keep her weight up, I think we all know what happens if she cannot eat and loses much more weight.  

Last night Mom decided to get out of bed to plump her own pillows while I was sleeping (totally disregarding my dictator like directions) and fell.  This is the second time that I have somehow mustered up enough strength to lift her.  She was unharmed, except for her pride which has been been severely bruised by her physical instability and extreme embarrassment at knowing she is forgetting things,  like how to tell time, what year I was born and other mundane information.

On a brighter note there was a major thunder and lightning storm for most of the afternoon and evening yesterday.  I ran to the local grocery store and rented a few movies and Mom and I holed up in our room all night having a mini slumber party.  She really enjoyed the movies and it completely distracted her from trying to remember things she was having trouble remembering. 

Once again I kindly ask for your prayers that Mom will be able to eat, eat, eat.  She needs the strength not just for day to day tasks but for the plane ride home.  If you think of it please pray for my strength to help Mom. Also, believe it or not I'm taking an online course while I'm here and have some course work due.  It's confusing how I have to post everything for my online course and the professor is very hands off so if I mess up and don't post in the right place I lose points.  Please pray that this goes smoothly for me.  It's my last college "class".  No pass= bad news for me.  

Much Love, 

Michelle