Just Okay

February 4, 2008

If you have to pick a time to go off of celebrex after fifteen months, it probably shouldn't be the Friday before the first soccer tournament of the season. It almost certainly shouldn't be the Friday before the first of three weekends in a row when you have soccer tournaments, where you will have three to five hour-long games each weekend.

Going off of celebrex makes most patients say "Yikes, the pain!" just because it does such a good job masking aches and pains that patients forget that they have those issues. In fact, when I googled "discontinuing celebrex" I found that the common feedback from users was just that, or as one user put it: "Bam I am in pain, sluggish, wore down, joints hurt worse then ever, thought I had the flue bug, but figured it out." Erin did fine at the games on Saturday, as long as I kept the Tylenol/Motrin rotation coming, but Sunday, when I cut back, she remembered the second reason why she took celebrex (the first being its surprising anti-tumor effects).

The Mystic '97 had a respectable first tourney, winning one and losing two. All the games were close scorewise (0-2, 2-1, and 0-1), but we actually dominated the run of play in the first game we lost (except for two ugly goals we let in when our defense pushed up too far and went flat). It truly was one of those unlucky games (we missed both a PK and an indirect kick in the six-yard box) when we couldn't finish our chances from anywhere on the field and the other team did. We bounced back in the middle game and played quite well. It was Erin's best game of the day. She marked quite a fast and athletic forward and really didn't allow any guff. In the final game we stayed tied at zero until the last five minutes when a series of breakdowns put the other team's most skilled and speedy striker one on one with our keeper.

Had we won another game, we would have played again on Sunday, but for Erin it was probably better that she took it easy. Erin did watch the AKC championships Saturday night and fell in love with every single dog she saw. Sunday, she didn't feel like doing much: back pain, her left (non-tumor) side hurt, and she had absolutely no get up and go. She continued to unsort the Legos, processed a little email, watched the football game, and except for church and Sunday school that's about all (practically nothing for her). I sent her to school this morning with more Tylenol and a drinks bottle for hydration and got an email from the teacher a bit ago that said "So far so good."

I can't wait for the blood draw this week so we can resume the celebrex and get back to normal.