Ooh! 200mls! The luxury...

I can't start to imagine how thirsty Ciara must be. The VOD has her whacked at the moment and she's sleeping a lot, but when she's awake, all she talks about is drinking. The other day I found her listing drinks and ticking them off with her fingers, whispering to herself: "orange juice, hot chocolate, milk, strawberry juice (!), water..." I think she wanted them all at once. Later while walking past the nurses desk, she noticed a cup and paused mid-step. "Excuse me," she asked, "but what's in that cup?". "Oh, erm, nothing", the nurse stammered diplomatically. The only time she comments about something on TV is when someone has a drink in their hand. I know that I for one have never been as thirsty as Ciara is now.

Her abdomen had been going slowly down over the last couple days and so on Monday she was allowed 200mls of fluids orally over a 24hr period, up from 100. Unfortunately this didn't last and her abdomen started creeping up again. So today she's back down to 100mls. A temperature spike had the doctor round last night, and Ciara complained of a sore throat, but this didn't seem to go anywhere and the throat could have been thirst related. Today she had an abdominal xray and ultrasound, primarily to determine the progress of the VOD but also to see if there where any signs of fungal or viral infections that could be causing the spikes. Nothing obvious apart from the large fluid build up and engorged liver. Her liver functions are remaining pretty normal at this point though. I don't know if this is a good or a bad thing. Perversly, good liver functions could be a bad thing as it may indicate something else causing the problem. This is my own speculation though and probably baseless. Dr Capra seems happy enough with her progress though, so we will go by that.

Later in the day, Ciara received a visit from Infectious Diseases, on the request of her consultant. Ciara was asleep at the time but all credit to the doctor, he got her sat up and was able to carry out a full examination without a major tantrum [from Ciara]. I was very impressed! He went off to chat with Dr Capra about how to proceed and I guess we'll find out tomorrow the outcome of those discussions.

We were talking with Ciara today about her cat, Coffee, who is on holiday with Auntie Annie. She said: "When my holiday is over, I can see her [Coffee] again." I told Ciara that she wasn't on holiday, that holidays are much more fun. "Yes, I don't like this holiday, it's horrible". Well said.