100th Post - Chipped tooth

So this is my 100th post on this blog.  Most of the posts deal with Sarah's Leukemia and the subsequent treatment.  That seems to be the driving force of our family for the past few months.  Even a simple vacation for Christmas turns into a week devoted to Sarah.   I am sure one day we will look back on it and not understand how stressed we felt at this time.  We truly feel for those who have to deal with this for years.

Sarah was released from the hospital today with some IV anti-biotics.  That means that we need to give her medicine through her port every 8 hours.  She is left accessed and will be so until her numbers come back up.  This is one of the major differences between Primary Children's and Seattle Children's hospital. Sarah is scheduled to get labs on Saturday.  We are praying that her ANC is above 500 so that she doesn't need to stay accessed for our trip home.

I came home from teaching today and found that Gus had chipped a tooth.  I heard that something happened between him and Lilly and he hit his tooth on the floor.  His front tooth has a decent size chip out of it now.  We called our dentist in Seattle, who is a good friend, and he told us that he wasn't too worried about it, and that he didn't think someone needed to look at it before we returned to Seattle.  We are grateful for our friends.  It helps to smooth over some of life's bumps.

I know at times that it might feel like I just added my thanks to those who support us and pray for us as a closing to the blog post, but we do feel so grateful.  I hope that each of you know that we feel the love and support and it sustains us.  I hope that all those who do pray and think about and support us feels the love of the Savior.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Dec 28th update

Wednesday was  a decent day for Sarah.  I got her to eat a few bites of roll during the day, as well as drink water.  She hasn't had much of an appetite.  She has also been addicted to the cold packs this time.  She started with some of the heating packs, but when she was introduced to the cold packs when she had the high fever, she has preferred them.

Sarah's blood pressure dropped last night and they had to give her some more fluid to help keep it up.  It has been good all day today.

We are right down the hall from Natalie Fish.  I have been able to go and visit with Tyler and Uncle Red. Natalie looks good for what she is going through.  I hope that Sarah doesn't have to go through a bone marrow transplant.

Thanks for all the support, prayers, and thoughts that are had on our behalf.

In the Hospital, Again

Tuesday was a long day.  At 2:30 in the morning, Sarah comes into the room where Jess and I were sleeping, saying that her tummy wasn't feeling good and that she needed the heating pad.  Jess felt her and found out that she was hot.  She was 101.9 F.  That meant that we needed to call the doctor and have a trip to the ER.  I got ready while Jess talked to the doctor.  Sarah and I made the trip up to the ER.  Sarah threw up on the way, and I had to pull over to clean her up a bit before continuing on.  We got to the ER around 4am.  They did the normal stuff of getting her port access and taking some blood.  They started her on an antibiotic while they sent the blood to the lab.  The initial numbers came back with the white blood cells at .6 (or 600).  This wasn't a good sign since it meant that her ANC was most likely going to be below that.  Her ANC came back at 100.  That meant that she had an automatic admittance to the hospital.

My mother came up to relieve me at 7:15 am, since I had to get up to Deer Valley to teach a lesson.  They transferred her up to the ICS (Immune Compromised Services) Unit right after I left.  She was given Tylenol for her fever and has been watched and checked often.

Her fever has spiked a few times during the day.  She had some visitors shortly before dinner time.  Around 8pm, her fever started climbing.  It got up to 41.1 C which is 106 F.  It was scary and it took a bit for the Tylenol to start working.  Jess got to the hospital right after it started dropping.  It was good to have her strength and support.  She is sleeping now and hopefully should sleep through the night.

Christmas was good for us, except that everyone else got sick.  I threw up during the night after Christmas, but felt good enough to work up at Deer Valley the next day.  Others in the house got sick on Monday.  We assume that Sarah has the same sickness that the rest of the family got.

We are grateful for the prayers and support.  Thanks for the comments and notes.

Christmas Eve

Well Christmas Eve was more exciting than most.  Because my brother and his family were in town and they were doing Christmas with Kim's family, we decided to do Santa's stockings a day early.  We also did my parent's traditions along with it.  These traditions include breakfast and clean up before going in the room withthe Christmas tree and opening presents one at a time.  This made for a long day but it was fun.

Jess and the girls got sick in the late afternoon.  Jess had the chills and didn't feel well.  Both Lilly and Sarah started running fevers.  We gave the girls priesthood blessings and worked on getting people to bed.  We checked Sarah's temperature and found it was 101.6 F.  Because Sarah has a central line (her port), any time she has a fever over 101 F we need to take her to the ER so that they can do a blood culture.  So, at 9 pm on Christmas Eve Sarah and I head up to Primary Children's Emergency Department.  Not quite how I was expecting to spend Christmas Eve.  My parents took over putting Lilly to bed and finish up the last minute wrapping for Christmas.  At the hospital, Sarah had some blood drawn and was given an antibiotic to prevent and bacterial sicknesses.  I am glad that Sarah's numbers were high or else it would have been an automatic hospital admittance.  We got home around 1 am.

I wish the excitement ended there.  Jess was woken up in the middle of the night to Sarah screaming.  Lilly was throwing up over the side of the top bunk.  It was hitting the ladder and splashing everywhere, including on Sarah, hence the screaming.  Jess got it cleaned up and everyone is doing better this morning.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas and hope you are blessed as you remember the birth of our Savior this day.  We are grateful for the love and prayers that we recieve and that are said in our behalf.

Christmas Eve Eve

Lilly got to go up skiing on Thursday with her cousins, Brooklynn and Emma.  Uncle Aaron and Grandpa Butch joined us as well.  It was a fun day with the sun out.  Lilly improved a lot and was working on her turns.  She even got off the bunny slope and skied down Success (one of the long green runs at Deer Valley).  It was a fun day for all of us.

Friday was a log day.  Sarah and I had to get up early to head up to Primary Children's.  The blood sample that they took on Thursday didn't work to get any lab results, so they wanted to take a full blood draw.  This means that they either access the port or do a needle in the arm.  We knew that Sarah wouldn't like the needle in the arm, so we had to go up to Primary's to get the port accessed.  Her ANC was up around 4,000 but her hematocrit had dropped a half a point to 21.7.  Hopefully her hematocrit will go up the next draw on Monday.  

When we got home (around 10:30am), we had a big family picture taken.  Since we hadn't been together as a full family for a long while, my parents wanted a picture.  We tried a couple of shots in different areas of the house.  Hopefully we got a good shot of everyone.

Friday night was the big Blackham family Christmas party.  The past few years it has been here at my parents.  That meant that we had to help set everything up.  It was a good party with a Nativity and Santa coming at the end.  The girls had a fun time.  Sarah came up and spent some time as well.  Jess, unfortunately, got sick earlier in the day and wasn't feeling good during the party.  She ended up going to the ER right after the party, and found out that she had a UTI.  

We are grateful for all the support that we receive and the prayers made on our behalf.  

Thursday Update

Sarah got her lab results late Tuesday.  Her ANC was 1100, but her hematocrit was 22.  They transfuse whenever it gets below 20.  They scheduled another set of labs to be done on Thursday.  We got some steak and got her to eat it on Tuesday night.  On Wednesday, you could see her start feeling better.  She went upstairs from her basement and played with kids.  Aaron and Kim and their kids got here Wednesday evening.  It was fun to see her play around with her cousins.  She didn't want to eat dinner and retreated to her safe place in the basement for dinner and the rest of the evening.

We are excited for Christmas and the activities that it brings with Family.  We are grateful for all the support and love we feel each day.

In Utah, Again

We are safe in Utah.  The drive was pretty uneventful which is the way we like it.  We stopped with my Uncle and Aunt in Richmond, WA.  We love to see them on our trips.  The girls and Gus did decent in the car.  Gus even took one nap, even though he usually takes two.

The sickness I had been feeling over the past week or so got worse and I made a trip to the insta-care this afternoon.  They though it was a possible sinus infection and gave some medications to help with it.  I hope it clears up quickly.

The girls and Gus have loved being at their grandparent's.  They have more people to play with and they get to stay up later.  Sarah is showing some signs of low levels of hematocrit.  She has labs scheduled for Tuesday morning.  Hopefully, she doesn't need any transfusions while we are here and Utah and she can have fun with family that comes around.

We are grateful for the love and support that we feel from all of you.  Thanks so much.

Home Again and Travel Plans

Sarah's methotrexate level was 0.07, so she was able to go home on Friday.  She was excited to go home. She still has a cough that is probably due to a cold.  We are planning on leaving for Utah after lunch on Saturday.  We are stopping at my Uncle Russ's in the tri-cities area.  The girls love to stop and see Uncle Russ and Aunt Judy.

Friday night, I had a touching experience that I wanted to share.  Gus has been crying pretty hard going to sleep.  I went into his room to try and calm him down.  He cried just as hard when I was trying to comfort him.  After a few minutes of just holding him, he started to calm down and let me lay him down in my arms.  I then was able to put him to sleep holding him.  I don't think I have ever been able to do that.  I was given some inspiration that this is a lot like the Savior and us.  How often does the Lord just want to hold us and give us comfort, but we resist and fight.  Finally, when we submit to his will, we get an overwhelming sense of peace and love.  It was a touching experience for me.

We are grateful for all those who have prayed and supported us during this time.  We have felt a great love from many people.  We are constantly supported by those who care and love us.  Thank you very much.

Good News

I know my mother have been praying for Sarah's methotrexate numbers to clear quickly, as we are planning on leaving for Utah shortly after Sarah gets out of the hospital.  Last time, Sarah's first methotrexate level was 2.0.  The following day it was 0.19 and she was released the following day with it somewhere around 0.03.  We got the numbers for today and it was 0.96.  That means she has a good chance of hitting the 0.1 number by Friday so that she can go home.

Today has been a mostly good day.  Sarah hasn't wanted to eat much all day.  She has done of good job of going to the bathroom.  There was a stretch this afternoon where she was going every 10 minutes for a couple of hours.  She still has a bit of a cough but has been doing good.

We are grateful for the prayers and love and support that we feel from all of you.

Tyler Fish Family

I just wanted to put up a quick post about some family of ours.  One of my cousin's cousin, who I consider family, is going through some treatment that we hope to not have to go through with Sarah.  They have 2 kids that are getting ready to have bone marrow transplants.  There website is here:
http://fishesformarrowwishes.blogspot.com/

One of the things that Tyler posted is that you can help by giving blood.  Our hearts go out to Tyler and his family.

Never a Dull Moment

Sarah's first day in the hospital was exciting.  Since we are in isolation, I have been unable to get things from the parent's room, like I had with Sarah's past stays.  We have had to ask the nurse to get things from the fridge.  It has been a little more difficult but we will manage.

We were told around lunchtime that we had a 500% chance of moving rooms.  Because Sarah was only getting chemo the one day and they needed bed space for other kids, they moved us out of the SCCA (Seattle Children's Cancer Alliance), or hem/oc, ward down the hall to an open room.  We moved at shift change which is around 7pm.  The new room is G-3023.  It is a lot bigger and nicer than the room that we were in.  There is a sofa bed, rocking chair, and a big window.  It is a nice change.

Sarah had some exciting things happen before she made her move.  She got a visit from a policeman who was bring some presents and helping the kids in the hospital shop for their families.  So everybody in our family got a present.  Sarah was excited to get something, as she always asks the nurses for more toys.

The other thing that happened was that Sarah was moving her bed to be in a sitting position, and she knocked over her IV pole.  The pole holds up saline, the methotrexate, and some sodium bicarbonate solution.  When it fell over, it pulled the saline tube out and it was leaking all over the floor.  Luckily, the other 2 bags and lines didn't have issues, and the saline tube was clamped off and not currently being used.  One more thing to keep our lives interesting.

Thanks for all the love and support.

Back in the Hospital

I got a text from my mother today asking if I was back in the hospital with Sarah.  Yes, we are.  It also tells me that I haven't put up a blog post in a while.  Sarah's ANC number yesterday was 2300.  It was were we wanted it to be.

So we are back in the hospital on schedule.  Sarah gets another dose of Methotrexate today over 24 hours.  She is in the hospital until she gets below 0.1 for her Methotrexate levels.  She did this by Saturday last time.  Hopefully she can do it faster this time.  We are in "isolation", which basically means, we don't have contact with other patients or parents in the ward.  They put us in isolation because Sarah had a runny nose yesterday in clinic.  She gets her own room but the nurses need to get things from the fridge and stuff.  We can have visitors, but they can't linger in the ward after the visit.  Just like before, they also ask that those who are sick to not come and visit.  Sarah is in better moods this time, compared to last visit so hopefully it will be easier on everybody.

Life never seems to stop.  Lilly has been sick for the past week or so with a cough at nights and we have had her not sleeping in the same room as Sarah.  She came home from school with her eyes all red.  Jess took her to after-hours clinic and found out she has pink eye.  So she is home from school today.

This weekend was fun.  Jess took Lilly to the ward Christmas party on Saturday.  She had fun.  She then went with dad skiing for a couple of hours.  She had forgotten all she did from skiing last time.  She did good and is working on getting her stopping down.  We also had a group of carolers from the ward surprise us last night with a bunch of Christmas carols.  It was fun.

Thanks for all the love and support.  We are grateful for all those who show their support for us.

Heating Pad Obsessions

It has been a rough couple of days at home.  Sarah isn't eating very well and is having tummy issues.  We assume that this is a side effect of the drugs she is taking.  She constantly loves to have a heating pad on her tummy.  I think Sarah's Santa list is just heating pads.  She likes the ones you put in the microwave to heat up.  We heat up the one we have 5-6 times a day.

Sarah had an appointment today and her ANC was 2200.  That is good news for the ward Christmas Party this Saturday.  She was also weighed and is down to 18.5 kgs.  She started around 22.5 kgs in August.  That means she is down almost 9 pounds from when we started.  She looks it.  She is no longer our husky girl.  She is just as slim as Lilly.

We are asking for prayers for her tummy issues and that her numbers can be above 750 next Monday.  That allows us to continue the treatments on schedule, since we are planning a trip to Utah for Christmas.

We are grateful for the continued support and love we feel from all of you.

Heading home

It is Saturday and we are waiting for numbers for Sarah's methotrexate levels to see if she can go home today.  I thought I would add a couple of pictures to show Sarah in the hospital.  These were taken the first day in here.

Sarah in her bed with her tower 

The fluids they hook her up too.  The yellow one on the left is the methotrexate.

A quick update on Gus.  He got some medecine for his croup while in the ER and has done much better since.  He slept through the night and seems to be on the mend.  

Numbers are back in and she has a 0.02 methotrexate level.  That means she can head home today.  We will be back in a week and a half or so.

Life is never easy, is it?

Life is never easy, is it?  Jess was up all night with Gus.  She thinks that he has croup and he wasn't able to sleep.  She is taking him to the ER this morning.  Since she was the only at home last night, she wasn't able to take him in the middle of the night.  Luckily we have Sarah's nebulizer that Jess was able to use to relieve his symptoms.  Hopefully, they can in to the ER quick.  At least they are coming here to Children's, so we will be in the same place.

In addition to Gus's issues, we got word this morning that Jess's Mom was in a car accident on her way to work this morning.  We hear that she is ok and Rob, Jess's Dad, was on the way to help her.

Sarah has done good in the hospital.  The doctor's yesterday were still looking at Saturday or Sunday for being released.  We will know more later today.  She needs to have her methotrexate level below ".1".  The level they took yesterday was 2.  She tells all the nurses that she needs more toys, even though she has a bunch.  She had a couple of visitor's yesterday, and loved to see them.  

We are grateful for all those who send us their prayers and support.  We are grateful to have so many people who lend their support to us.