Thursday, July 28, 2005: This morning Leela fell ill, probably with the virus that made Maya and me sick earlier this month. Both Maya and I had a pretty high fever for four to five days. Unfortunately, anytime a chemo patient has a fever it means a trip to the clinic and if his or her immune system is too low, an admission to the hospital. When we took Leela to the clinic this morning, we fully expected her to be admitted. Even though it is almost three weeks since her last cycle of chemo, last Friday’s blood test indicated that her immune system was well below the level that would make an admission necessary. However, as it turned out, Leela’s immune system had rebounded in a big way since last Friday. So luckily no hospitalization, but if this illness follows the pattern set with Maya and I, Leela will be sick for around five days.

A week from today Leela is due to go in for the first day of her last cycle of chemo. You might think that Geetha and I will be jumping for joy. Yes, it will be some relief. It is no small thing that we will not have to worry about dealing with the regimen or the side effects of chemotherapy. But post-chemo a new worry will come to the fore—did the chemo work. Leela’s chemo was not aimed at any “observable” cancer. Chemo was recommended for Leela because the cancer had progressed to the point where some cancer cells may have escaped the eye before it was removed. So there is really no way to really know whether the chemo worked. We just need to wait and watch. The chances are very good that she will not have a relapse, but every time she goes for an MRI, falls ill, or even behaves somewhat differently we are probably going to wonder, “is it the cancer?”