November 13, 2010
The last few days have been a whirlwind of visitors, doctors
and finally getting both of us home for a family fun evening. Last week my sister-in-law Tara was able to
come spend an overnight at the hospital with Josie so that Marc and I could
both come home together and then last night my sister-in-law Lisa did the
same. It was so good to have some
“normal” family time. Our girls have
been doing great with all of the juggling that we have had to do, but it has
started to wear on them. Eliza got a
little teary the other night when I called her from the hospital – she asked me
when I was coming home for the night and I had to tell her I was not going to
be home. She said “well, that makes me
so sad” and almost cried – thankfully Aunt Lisa gave her extra hugs that
night. The girls came up to the hospital
last night and as we were walking to the cars to take them home, she
accidentally dropped her gum from her mouth – you would have thought something
absolutely terrible happened from the way she was crying. That silly gum was the last straw for her and
she cracked. Thankfully we had some good
mom and dad time with them last night and this morning and they appeared to be
refreshed and ready to go again.
Josie had an MRI on Thursday to see if there was something
triggering her reflux/vomiting. The MRI was still not very clear for the
Pediatric Radiologist to read since there is still so much blood from the
surgery. This is to be expected though, it
typically takes 6-8 weeks post-op for the blood to clear enough to get a good
image and it has only been 3+ weeks since her surgery. They do believe that the reflux/vomiting is a
result of the pressure and swelling in her brain. We dealt with this issue prior to this
surgery, so we are not surprised by it, but we are bummed that it has
returned.
Typically with chemotherapy, a person’s white blood cells
get low and that in turn causes them to get sick because they can’t fight off
infections and germs as well. Josie
seems to not be affected this way and her white blood counts are staying quite
normal, in fact, they were giving her shots to boost her white blood counts
each day and had to back off to giving her shots every 3rd day
instead. This is a huge answer to
prayer. Along with this good news, we
have been once again hearing the “H” word again. Going “H”ome is the word on the hospital
floor and possibly as early as Monday or Tuesday of this coming week. This is exciting news and a bit unnerving at
the same time. We were nervous to take
Josie home the last time, but this time she has a few more complications. She has a broviac port that needs to be cared
for and used, she has more medications this time around and she is still
missing that portion of her skull. We
know we can care for her, but it will be different than what we knew last time,
then again, nothing has been typical with Josie. J
Josie still has one more injection of chemotherapy for this
cycle, but we have been told that we could just bring her in to the hospital as
an “out-patient” and then take her home again.
The next cycle would start somewhere around the beginning of December
and then we would be in the hospital again for a little while, but again, we
have been told that if her numbers stay pretty steady, that stay may be shorter
too. We are quite amazed by all of this
information and are extremely thankful too.
We completely see God’s hand moving in Josie’s life – we are
in awe of what He is doing and can’t wait to see what He plans next for
her.
We continue to covet your prayers – she is doing well, but
we know she still has a long road ahead of her.
Blessings,
Darcia & Marc
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