Day Zero Plus Twenty-seven – Eggs and Onions; What Next, Coconut?

We had to get up early today because the nurse was scheduled to come and draw blood before Jeff could take his Tacrolimus.  Apparently, Tac needs to be given on a pretty strict schedule.  Nurse Catarina and Nurse Charlene (in training) spent quite a bit of time here performing all the duties required:  drawing blood, coaching me through flushing one of Jeff’s lines, discussing nutrition and offering good tips for snacks and meals, asking about Jeff’s pain and offering suggestions for managing the pain.  The tubes of blood were placed in a bright green paper lunch bag in our refrigerator.  Within an hour or so it was picked up to be taken to Penn.  

Between rain showers we went for a walk around the block.  Jeff ate a little bit several times during the day, pretty much ignoring the traditional three-meals-a-day format.  His nausea seemed better.  He ate an egg for the first time since his transplant and it stayed with him.  A peanut butter and jelly sandwich seemed to be too much food at once.  He enjoyed dinner: a home-made steak sandwich with sautéed onions and canned green beans.  After dinner, Jeff was up for another walk, this time we went around two blocks! 

I vacuumed the whole house today.  Besides keeping it clean on doctor’s orders, I feel some pressure to maintain the wonderful cleaning job that our allo team did in preparing the house for Jeff’s return home.  Nancy checked to make sure I hit the couple of things the team never finished (I did) and Kerry nearly sneered at me when I put some books back on shelves, “Did you clean those first?”  I had.  Also between raindrops, I mowed the front lawn.

Paul came to visit and I took the opportunity to dash to the grocery store.  Paul brought some Tastykakes and Popsicle treats to tempt Jeff.  One variety was coconut, a flavor the former Jeff had not been too fond of.  However, just this morning Nurse Catarina advised trying foods Jeff didn’t like before because his tastes may have changed as a result of his treatment.  We’ll see…