Rachel has had a lot of jaw pain the past few days, caused by the vincristine (which does something to the cranial nerves, causing the pain.) She’s not able to take Tylenol, ibuprofen, aspirin, or Aleve for the pain because all of those will mask a fever. Since chemo will lower her white counts and reduce her ability to fight infections, doctors need to be able to tell immediately if she has a fever so they can start treating an infection as soon as possible. With low white counts, any fever will already be showing up later than normal so it’s really important to know as soon as it shows up. Therefore, her only options for pain relief for the duration of chemotherapy (7-9 months) are narcotics, which Rachel doesn’t like taking unless she absolutely can’t stand the pain. Thankfully, the pain is finally starting the lessen today, so I think she’s over the worst of it for this round.