A Week in Fever Zone

As I write this Christopher is finally home from an unexpected 7 days in the hospital. This put quite a damper in the much anticipated 2 week break from Chemo!
He was admitted with a fever last week and possible infection which he was treated heavily for. He also had a biopsy of some suspicious spots on his arm and leg for which he was also given even more meds though there was no conclusion or diagnosis as to the specifics...just that the 3 big gun antibiotics and anti fungal medication got rid of it. It is always something.
The main reason for the lengthy stay was his blood counts had bottomed out and just did not seem to want to come up. He had 2 transfusions which helped but the process was slow and painstaking for Chris who was getting REALLY bored and tired of those 4 walls!
On Monday, August 24th, he will begin another 3 week run of chemo. Unfortunately, the nature of this game wreaks havoc on his system so though he may have recovered this past week and is in pretty good shape to go the next few rounds, he may again end up crashing. The good news is he had his last round of "Cisplatin" which is the chemo drug that makes you really nauseous and causes the blood counts to drop so drastically. So maybe the week he has "off" at the end of this 3 week gig will actually be a break!
Still waiting for the go ahead from Dr. O'Connor to start the prosthetic process. We should know more about that when we see her September 10th and are keeping are fingers crossed.
Christopher's school starts next week and though he will not be there the first day, we are hoping to try and get there on days when he is not in the hospital (oiy) and when he is feeling healthy enough. He is above average in his academic ability so we pray he will be back on track soon after his protocol is over in November.
As always, many thanks for all the positive thoughts and encouragement. Peace, Patty

Round 10 Completed!

Took a while to get this video uploaded as we did not have Internet in the hospital. We have been home for a couple days and enjoying life outside of Wolfson's...finally!

Christopher did very well despite his angst about puking and having this take it's toll on his system which it usually does. Could be that he had been out of Chemo for over a month due to his leg complications. As risky as that was as far as the cancer goes I think the upside is it gave his body a chance to rebuild. He hung tough during these past 3 weeks and hopefully we will have the next 2 off. Typically his counts will drop after a week or so, causing a fever which means back to the ER and hospital. This time he wants to remain optimistic and is eating well, trying to get good sleep and focus on some trips he has coming up which keeps his spirits up!

We saw Dr. Jiang, the Chinese Dr., on Friday and he gave Chris some homeopathic medicine for his kidneys and liver as well as something to help the skin around his incision heal.

Monday he will see Dr. O'Connor and is hoping to get the go ahead to start the prosthetic process. The "stump" is finally healing so it should not be long now. Just keep the thoughts and prayers coming...they are working!

Peace, Patty