Saturday, March 12, 2005

Feeling like Hermits.

So, Abby's still doing good, actually really good. We have had to postpone the start of the second part of this phase of treatment again because her blood counts still weren't up high enough of Thursday. On Sunday we will get her blood run again and hopefully she will qualify to start, her ANC has to be around 750 currently it is only 500, good just not good enough.

Lately we really have been feeling like hermits though. A big part of it is that we can't take Abby out in public when her ANC is below 500 (neutropinic). For the first 6 months that is just how it is going to be though her counts will be low, then bounce back then the chemo will take them down again. After the first 6 months though it should be better since they try to keep her counts between 750 and 1000 ANC. I'm looking forward to those years of the treatment just so we can interact with people.

That's what we miss the most, adult interaction with friends. I mean don't get me wrong, I like cutting paper into tiny pieces and putting stickers on construction paper and even on occasion cutting the stickers into little pieces, all great fun but a little monotonous sometimes. Maybe a house will help with that because we will be able to have people over and actually have a place for their kids to sleep other than the bathroom and out bedroom. But really, we just miss people and I think the reality of 2 months of living with out the adult friend interaction in our lives has finally started to wear on us. Maybe also it is the fact that the last two weeks have been relatively easy, no meds, just a couple trips to Denver, and lots of mellow nights at home.

So anyway, things really are going good, I think we just desire true community but we just don't really know how to do it either. So if you know how or have ideas on how to help us stay connected during these immuno-compromised months post a comment, give us a call, email, write us a letter, or just stop by... or all of the above; we'd love to just say "hi" and enjoy some conversation.

I'll post soon as to when Abby is going to go down again to CHOA for her all day chemo session, probably Monday if her counts are good.

Love you all!

Tuesday, March 08, 2005

To low to start

Well, Abby went in to get blood run yesterday and it turns out that she is still too low to start this next part of the consolidation phase. Her ANC (immunity) is only 350 and it needs to get to 750 before we can start. She get blood drawn again on Thursday and if the results are good, we'll take her down for the all day chemo on Friday, if not then we'll wait till next week and she how her counts are.

Other than that things are still good. It is kind of nice to have another week of no meds. The only thing we have to watch for is the fever thing with her low counts.

Just a quick check in, hope all is well with you!

Sunday, March 06, 2005

2 months down, 28 to go

Well, on Tuesday, we will start 2nd course of this Consolidation treatment with an all day chemo at the clinic, and then back to the Ara-C and Methotrexate at home. The last couple weeks have been really good, I almost said blissful but it wasn't quite that great but still good. Other than Abby's counts being dramatically low for a week or so, and a couple low fevers there hasn't been much drama... and that is a great thing! So lets catch up now.

Abby has been still having weekly appointments at the clinic, CHOA, and for 2 weeks has been resting from the Ara-C and Methotrexate to let her counts come back up. For these last 2 weeks she has been on weekly spinal taps still with methotrexate administered in the spinal fluid and on Vincristine once a week too.

She also had another eye appointment and the doctor said things are looking good. She could definately see better and the doctor estimated another 2-3 weeks until the blood hemorage is fully dissolved back into the body. Patching her eye has been fine, she likes to be a pirate. Robin joined Vicky here this weekend and brought his own pirate outfit complete with eye patch and cap that he found at pirates.com I believe. Abby got a kick out of having her "Pappa" dressed as a pirate!

See, what else... Tiffany and I got to go to Boulder for an overnight while Tiffany's parents watched the girls. We had a great time! It was really nice to get away for a night and we even talked a bit about things other than Abby or Anna. I also sprained my ankle today, so I'm not much help to my family but I think I'll be healed up good enough by the end of the week.

We are closing on our new place on the 18th, we took Abby and Anna over there for the inspection and they loved it! Especially the back yard, finally a place for them to run around! For the next couple days Abby kept asking to go back over to our new house, even after I explained to her numerous times that it wasn't our house yet. She's a hoot.

I think that's it for now. We'll get a blood test tomorrow to see if her counts are high enough to start back up with chemo on Tuesday. We'll let you know!

Buh Bye