Advent - Day 174

No news is good news, right?!  Between Ellie's schedule, final exams/mountains of grading, coaching, the holidays, and of course peeling small but intent 2 year olds off of furniture parts they are not supposed to be on....the blog has taken a back seat for several days.  Once Ellie got discharged from her final IM hospital stay on Dec 12th, we've been able to spend a week in relatively calm waters just doing what we do this time of year. I would say a few months ago I would spend the more "normal" times with a very nervous and guarded optimism, which is important because the bigger picture is never lost around here, but can be very hazardous to your endurance.  Polly and I now enjoy these days so much when she's feeling good that I can only describe it as similar to closing your eyes, turning the music on, and just immersing yourself for whatever time you have that day to do so.  Today we had a major breakthrough on the potty training front, something we are not able to do very consistently (or normally if you will) with Ellie (unlike other kids her age) because her digestive system is so out of whack from the chemo.  But today, there was progress and she knew it.  Priceless smiles and applauding were plentiful this afternoon as a result.

The latest in-patient stay at El Camino went by fairly quickly.  She cleared the Methotrexate in record time for her four stays over the entire Interim Maintenance (IM) phase.  The pattern after discharge has been that she gets home happy and stays that way for about two days.  The Chemo side effects then usually slam her about day 3 after discharge with Thanksgiving week being the worst episode as I am sure you read a while back.  This past week, she did take a turn on Thursday with the appearance of some mouth sores but overall the effects have been much milder than the last time.  And AMEN to that.  The Popsicle remedy turned out to be a bust.  She just didn't like the taste of them thus reinforcing the a lesson we have learned many times when seeking advice - every child reacts differently to different things at different times along the chemotherapy path.  Polly does an incredible job of anticipating side effects right as they are about to come on by hitting them with our arsenal of prescription drugs.  Two in particular have been great - Glutamine helps to lessen the mouth sore magnitude and Ativan helps alleviate nausea, pain, and also aids with sleep.  She was definitely feeling better this morning, enough so that we took an excursion to Serra to pick up some of my materials to be graded and spent a few minutes out on the field kicking the soccer ball into the goal.  Best accuracy in town from the 1 inch line!  She's gonna be a lefty like her Dad.  :)

Her blood counts in her follow up visit to LPCH (post in-patient stay) this week were great.  ANC up at 1800.  No need for any transfusions.  The residual chemo in her body may decrease that value over the next couple of weeks, but she really has done nicely this whole phase with recovery.  I'll never say Never, but theoretically we are done for good with the mouth sore inducing HD MTX drug.  Currently, we are in a 3 week recovery segment.  2 weeks to finish off IM, and then a third week that buffers the start of the next phase of treatment so she can get her counts up even higher.  We give her Mercaptopurine (6-MP) in nightly doses after dinner time and will do so through Dec 23rd which also will likely suppress her counts a bit as well.  We have one final lab day before Christmas on the 23rd to check her counts.  The hope is that she is not Neutropenic so we can go out a little bit on Christmas Day to see family....but frankly that concern is so minor because I'm just happy that she will be home.  They have warned us the next 8 weeks of treatment, so aptly named "Delayed Intensification" (DI), is going to be the roughest round of treatment yet.  We are scheduled to begin Day 1 of DI on Dec 30th, so I'm going to save any worries for what's ahead until then.  For now - its Christmas time.

The Advent season always seems to be a lot about preparations and anticipation of what's to come.  On the twins' level, its about scampering up the stairs every morning to seek out Eddie Elf's new observation deck locale and then turning to dig out the day's treat from my mom's supremely quilted Advent calendar that we have hanging in the living room.  The four of us polished off the tree decorations this past Thursday night and even this morning there was our first ever conversation (ok, first that I was privy to be a part of ) about what sorts of items we should be prepared to leave for Santa and his reindeer on Christmas Eve.  Within all of these details, there is a undoubtedly a promise of something bigger ahead.  Advent allows us time to reach out and bring together those we love so that we can bear witness together when those promises are finally fulfilled.  How that occurs is different every year and thus is the magic of Christmas for me.  Faith, Hope, Love and Family.  Perhaps we won't be able to go far from home next Sunday.  Not sure we'll really need to.