2 week break!

     Since our last post Everett has completed his second round of Consolidation 1 (2-3 hour arsenic infusion 5 days/week for 5 weeks).  He did AMAZING as usual, and aside from the week we spent battling a GI bug, the past 5 weeks of treatment have been uneventful. 

     We are so excited to be together as a family for longer than just the weekend and found out last week that this break from treatment will be 2 weeks, which is a week longer than we expected.  When I say it, 2 weeks doesn't sound like that long, but after 2, 5-week rounds of treatment, where we only spent friday through sunday nights together, 2 weeks as a family sounds like an eternity.  Finding out your child has cancer changes everything in your life, and for me, one of the hardest changes to deal with has been having to spend so much time away from my husband and my boys.  Thank God for our breaks, where we just get to be a regular family.

     We will be taking Everett to Childrens next Tuesday (May 24) for a bone marrow biopsy to see whether our little fighter is still in remission.  We ask for prayers that the leukemia is still gone and that he sails through the biopsy with no complications. 

     Everett will then be admitted for Consolidation 2 on Tuesday, May 31, and will remain hospitalized throughout his treatment and until his blood counts begin to recover and he has enough of an immune system to safely come home.  This next round of treatment means ATRA twice a day for 14 days, a lumbar puncture to check for leukemia in the central nervous system, a dose of chemo given directly into his spinal column, 2, 3-hour IV infusions of a very high dose of chemo on days 1-4, and a short infusion of another type of chemo on day 4.  Consolidation 2 has the potential to be pretty rough, so please say a prayer that God will carry Everett through his treatments, protecting him from the worst of the side effects.
 
     We would like to thank our amazing friends and family for their continued support.  Without all of you, I know we couldn't get through this.  In particular, John and I want to say a special thank you to our Rondald McDonald House sponsor (you know who you are).  This person has been amazing, paying for our entire Ronald McDonald House stay since Everett's initial diagnosis.  There are no words to fully express what a gift this has been for our family.  Having a sick child means a lot of time spent away from work (unpaid) and countless additional expenses every month from medical bills (even with great insurance and medical assistance) to the cost of weekly trips to Pittsburgh for treatment.  But thanks to the generosity of one person, one of our major expenses (housing while Everett is at Childrens) has been taken care of, so that we don't have to stress or worry about how to pay for it.  Thank you, thank you, thank you. 

Val