My Good Luck Charm

Today was our first full day here in Costa Rica, and I swear the sun came up at 6 a.m. J.R. woke up ready for the day. Did I mention how great he has been acting? Naturally we have his Leapster with us which he rarely puts down, but even still, the bean has been a dream. How lucky are we?

I don't like talking about luck, because it's inevitable that once one does (at least in my case) that's when it starts running out. So mum's the word. Before we took off on Sunday, my friend Brenda brought me a lucky silver token inscribed with the words "wish it; dream it; do it". Well at least I THINK that's what it said, as I have nearly rubbed the writing off from grasping the token so tightly. I won't say if the charm has worked as to not jinx myself.

Our ICM (Institute for Cellular Medicine / clinic where J.R. will get his IV's) appointment was at 8:30 this morning. Our driver picked us up (miracle) at 7 anticipating the Manhattanesque traffic one encounters here in San Jose. Naturally we made it in 20 minutes flat. Normally the protocol would be this: patient goes directly to CIMA Hospital on day one where he is sedated for the catheter and bloodwork. In J.R.'s case, the doctors had us go to ICM FIRST where he could be checked out. J.R. is getting over a sinus infection, and so we wouldn't have to cancel our trip for the THIRD time, the doctors said "just come and we will play the treatment schedule by ear." They are so wonderful. Dr. Tomas, who is a female which is ultra-confusing considering she has a male apellido (surname), looked J.R. over and said his one ear was red but it would not cause any problems. Hooray! We're actually doing this.

After lucking out with J.R.'s health, we participated in what we thought at the time was a useless presentation about what to pack for our trip (hello, we're here!) and the need for sunscreen while visiting. We rolled our eyes only to fry ourselves to a crisp at the kick-ass hotel pool an hour later. We are such losers. The couple we met at the hotel traveled to ICM with us, and we met a new couple at the presentation. I know this is a horrible thought, but the more affected children we run into, the luckier we feel to have J.R. Believe me, living with the bean is no picnic, but this one 3 year old little girl at the clinic...all I can say is pobrecita. If she was awake, she was screaming bloody murder. The irony of the situation is that her (very young) father is a doctor. I had to distract myself by turning to Tim and telling him I thought the dad looked like Steve-O from MTV's Jackass (oh yeah, now Dancing with the Stars). Ironically he asked 4,000 questions at the presentation and Dr. Lara (a guy) took the time to answer each and every one of them. In Spanish.

I remembered why I DON'T speak Spanish at home- it's because the little I do speak, I do so sin accento. Entonces (for that reason) people think I am fluent, and think that's carte blanche to go all old school on me and start speaking 1,000 mph losing me at "hola." Well estupida Kristi asks Dr. Lara to answer Steve-O's questions in English. But I ask in Spanish! Therefore midstream everyone forgoes the need to speak English, and by the time all is said and done this is all I could gather:

Human cells have surface "markers" that tell the body which type of cell it is- be it skin cell, neuron, you get the picture. Stem cells are undifferentiated. Therefore once they are introduced into a patient's system, the body does not know to reject them...or at least the rejection rate happens with a statistically insignificant percentage of cells. In fact just recently the clinic STOPPED the procedure of incubating the patient's blood with several different stem cell samples to determine which sample produced the least amount of rejection. After over 200 procedures, the clinic found that the amount of rejected stem cells consistently fell between 5 and 7%. So it's possible that 95% of the 9 million cells (I think that's the amount that's injected) are "accepted" (if that's the medical term for the opposite of rejected).

Are you still awake? My point is...I had to translate most of this! Hooray for growing up in Bonaventure with Angel Gomez, Advanced Placement Spanish, Universidad (go FIU!), and memorizing Gypsy Kings lyrics for shits and giggles (NO easy task I tell you!). I rock!

J.R's last hurrah with water had to take place before our 12:30 p.m. hospital appointment for the catheter placement. So after being shuttled back to our DOPE hotel, we let the sunbathing/burning begin. At least we had the sense to douse J.R. with sunscreen. As we speak I am typing with one hand and applying aloe to Tim's torso with the other. Again, losers with a capital L.

CIMA Hospital is a stone's throw from our hotel. Cool. After being assured that all we had to do once we got there was whisper ICM and they would trip over themselves to help us, the staff looked at us like (and I quote Tim) "we asked them if we could board the space shuttle". Once again someone dropped the ball, but I've said it once and I'll say it again...that pura vida attitude is catchy. Even though I yelled out something reminiscent from Sally Field's performance in Not Without My Daughter, I knew everything would be fine. They eventually did figure out who we were. The BEST part came when Tim calls me over to translate- he figures out that halfway through giving our information to an admissions clerk that the dude didn't speak English. No big deal; I'm fluent (in my own mind) and I can handle this. As a nurse enters to room to take J.R. to prep for the procedure, the clerk leans over and says to his coworker in Spanish, "oh, it's the kid who's the patient, not the dad?" Thank the Lord I had the sense to tell Tim this story AFTER we leave the hospital. He would have been madder than Mothra.

J.R. was a real trouper and so was his dad. I laughed myself to tears when Tim put on the size XL scrubs and they were SO tight he looked like a (burnt) stuffed sausage. The REAL, sad tears came not when they took J.R. away, but as I had to hear the 3 year old girl we met at the clinic scream herself to sleep next door. My heart just broke for her. The COMPLETE irony? She still has no diagnosis. Pobre Dr. Steve-O. And I am one lucky, lucky mommy.

We were told that J.R. would be "angry" as he came out of the anesthesia. All I could think was GRRRRRRRRRRREAT, J.R. has 45 minute crying spells after waking up from naps, so I could only imagine how this would go. As luck would have it, he did great! And the little man who can not tolerate a band-aid (no I am not kidding) has maybe asked 3 times in 6 hours if he can take the bandage off.

The real test comes tomorrow. Our appointment at ICM for J.R.'s very first stem cell injection isn't until 2:30 p.m, so we have a looooong day's work ahead of us keeping his mind off of the pool. We didn't want to do any excursions this day (rainforest, beach, zoo, etc.) because God forbid we get stuck somewhere and can't make it back for the appointment. Soooooo the saga continues tomorrow. At this very moment J.R. fell asleep with his Leapster in hand, and Tim is watching some Chris Rock movie that I think was only released in Costa Rica. As for this lucky girl, I'm off to bed after a second dousing of aloe-vera. Peace out!