Friday, September 14th, was my 2nd 1/2 half dose of Ocrevus. My husband and I left our home at 6:30 am, to drive to Columbus, Ohio to the Ohio State Neurology for the infusion. We arrived promptly 9:45 am. My husband, Ryan, went to get gas while I checked myself in, since I knew where I was going.
I use a scooter so I headed right in the building, up the elevator to the 3rd floor thru the double doors into the infusion department. I was so proud of myself to do this on my own. Once I arrived, a nurse, said “oh you forgot to get your bracelet downstairs.” With little disappointment I went back downstairs to get my bracelet. I had to wait for it about five minutes, so not so bad. Go back upstairs to the Infusion department, they promptly place me in space 2.
The stiff black leather reclining chair with brown arm rests and a tray attached seemed newer than the one I had last time. It still wasn’t the most comfortable chair, but it will have to do. The space was decent size, being I had my scooter to deal with. I had a Samung 32 in tv and an extra hard offwhite chair for Ryan to sit in.
The nurse came over promptly with my iv saline solution, gave me two tylenol and two benadryl. She was looking at my arms trying to decide where to put the iv. Last time I had a blown vein in my left and I didn’t want it there and the right arm halfway between my wrist and elbow is where they did place the iv, so I didn’t want it there again either. The nurse sees in the bend of my right arm I have nice big puffy vein and smiles and says, “oh that’s a good one, can I use that one?” I said, “I really didn’t want the iv there, because I use my right arm so much more than my left.” I could see the disappointment in her face. She says, “I can put up higher so it wont be in the bend of your arm.” I could tell she really wanted to put there. I said, “I can tell you really want to put it there.” She says “Oh I won’t if you do not want me too.” I could see the disappointment in her face. I knew it was my choice, but I was also thinking, maybe she is still learning to do iv’s and the bigger the vein less chance for her to screw up, so I said, “ok. Let’s put it there.”
After a little bit talk, she got started cleaning the area with the little stick with a round foam soaked in. I assume alcohol. Gets the iv in just above the bend of my arm. She asked,”do you bruise easy?” I said, “No.” “Oh, I hope I didn’t blow this vein,” said the nurse. She called for a fellow nurse to come check it. The 2nd nurse looks at and says it’s fine, I will just have a little bit of bruising. I said, “it burns.” They injected some saline in hopes to relieve the burning. Three tubes of saline and one tube of steroids later I felt better.
The nurse gets my Ocrevus to inject into my iv bag. I’m now ready to start the slow 4 hour drip of my 300 millagrams of Ocrevus and its 10:30 am.
Now that I was settled in, I shared on Facebook I had checked in to the Ohio State University Neurology and “I’m ready.” Turned on the tv to see if anything good was on. Flipping thru channels and found Who wants to be a millionaire, is on, watched a couple questions, and turned the channel. I didn’t find anything I wanted to watch. I ended up watching some show on Lifetime, about a boy whom went missing and returns ten years later at 18 years old called, “Wrong Boy.”
Around noon I had my husband go down to the cafeteria and buy me a bottle of water and broccoli soup. The soup was delicious, but very hot. It took me sometime to eat it.
I started to notice I was getting some itching on my right hand. I asked the nurse to give me some benadryl. I was given a dose thru my IV. Which as soon as that benadryl hits your bloodstream you feel it.
As I lay there, not even five minutes later I realised i had to use the restroom. I can barely walk as is, but with the benadryl I felt really drunk and could hardly function. Heavily noted, to go to the restroom before you get the benadryl. I made my husband walk with me, just in case I needed help, being I did use my scooter. My concern was getting out of the bathroom.
I new it was going to be rough. Once I drove my scooter in the restroom and get the door shut. I struggled to get my legs to move. I really had concrete feet, in other words my feet felt so heavy I couldn’t move them. Finally I was able to move with the help of handicap bars. I get myself adjusted well enough to sit down, and do my business. Now time to get back up, think it to myself, “I can do this!” Trying to pump myself up, while worried. “How am I going to do this?””ok,let’s do this!” I was able to rest my arm on the horizontal bar while grabbing the vertical bar to pull myself up. Thank God they hard those bars, because I wouldn’t have made it.
My legs were weak and stiff. Trying to keep myself standing long enough to button my pants. It took me about 5 times, but I succeeded. Now the struggling of moving my feet around to sit back down on the scooter without missing the seat or sliding off. Trying to psych myself help. “You got this!”and with alot of effort and energy I got myself on my seat and had to struggle to get my legs to bend to get them on the scooter one at a time. Man that was rough, but I did it, all by myself! Woohoo!
I leave the bathroom to go back to my infusion chair. Only a few more hours to go.
The rest of the infusion went smoothly and I headed home about 3:15. Still a little tired from the Benadryl but 2 hour car ride allowed me to sleep for a little while.
Once I was home I felt pretty good just slight headache. Saturday and Sunday I was pretty weak and stiff, but otherwise I was doing well.
Life with multiple sclerosis 