In and Out

We came in yesterday around noon and started his chemo at 3pm. He gets 4 doses of very high-dose cytarabine every 12 hours with a shot of L-asparaginase to top it off. Then, amazingly enough, they send us home for 5 days while his counts drop! That means we'll be back home on Sunday morning until Friday when they do the same regimen again. I was curious about the cytarabine this time because I heard there was a national shortage of it, but it turns out Primary's bought theirs ahead of time, so they won't have to ration any. (for those of you who are curious, I asked about the PEGylated version of asparaginase, and they said it varies for which protocol they use, and it's sometimes better tolerated than L-asparaginase).

I think it's been as low-key as it could possibly be in a hospital. The only thing is that Andrew's pretty wiped from being woken up every three hours for diaper changes and eye drops (they mercifully spaced the diaper changes from 2 hours to 3 hours for my sake). He gets really upset with both diaper changes and eye drops, and needs to be comforted for a while each time. As usual, his first night in the hospital is pretty scary for him, so he's been waking up an hour after I put him down each time. He's sleeping great now, though, and he's still eating like a champ.

I asked about the criteria for his central line removal, and they say as long as his counts recover and he's eating, they'll pull it. So, that means that probably 5 or 6 weeks from now, he'll have his bone marrow aspirate (he didn't have one between the last two rounds), and then he'll be a free man. Yay! They've really been concerned about his blue lumen not working, but I really don't think we'll need it. As long as his yellow one stays in tact, we won't need to re-place his broviac or get any PICCs. We're really hoping that is the case and praying it will hold on for just another couple of weeks.

I got to talk to a couple of moms here last night. One of them is a new AML diagnosis that lives just down the interstate a few miles (the same mutation as Aubree! Monosomy 7! I couldn't believe it), and the other was a lady whose son's T regulatory cells went haywire and started attacking his organs. Whoever heard of a Treg disease? I sure haven't, and apparently, no one else has, so they named the disease after him. Anyway, I love talking to other moms because I get to hear amazing stories like how one kid puts in his NG (nasogastric) tube himself (it's a tube that goes through your nose down to your stomach), or how this 6-year old wanted to go to a sleepover, so he flushed his own lines that night. Stuff like this continually amazes me.

For those of you living in Utah, you can understand why I feel like I live in a snowglobe (since it was snowing yesterday). I thought it was funny that the weatherman was saying he felt like he had cabin-fever, and I was just thinking, Oh, Mr. Weatherman, you have no idea.

We're really hoping and praying Tanner is clear of his cancer and can be ready for transplant. He's had a few setbacks, but he and his family have been so strong. Thanks, everyone, for your continued support.