As those of you who are friends with Brad on Facebook might have already seen, today was a difficult one for him. He asked me to post today as he’s not quite up to it, and I’ll spare you the worst details of today’s setback. Suffice it to say that he has now been diagnosed with GVHD (graft vs host disease) of the gastrointestinal tract, which comes with a lot of pain and other nasty symptoms. He’s now on IV steroids to treat it. (As he’s once again not eating, oral steroids like prednisone would be too hard on his stomach.) He’s also been given pain meds again, to address the abdominal pain.

We didn’t get a chance to ask a great many questions about what all this portends for the future or how long he’s likely to suffer with this new development, but the hope is that the steroids will work to help fairly quickly. I think he and I are also both hopeful it will help alleviate the irritation of his hands and feet that he wrote about yesterday. GVHD can strike without warning, so in a way it’s good he was still in the hospital when this latest development took place. No word from the medical team yet, either, on how it might affect the tentative plans for discharge next week. The roller coaster continues.