The Downhill Side

I have been putting off making another entry. I suppose I have felt like I needed to have some earth-shattering news or change to share with everyone.

But guess what? Things are just proceeding as they should.

And her hair was growing back. Her body had been healing just the way it should. She is a strong young woman. She knows what little hair has grown in will fall out again over the next couple of weeks. But she can see how strong her body is in recovering and how quickly it will grow back.

After her first round of chemo after the surgery, she really felt the effects of not being admitted in the hospital. It's one less drug being administered, but the effects of the dactinomycin had, in the past, been masked by the fluids and such that Matti had been hooked up to. So she really got sick. More so than we had been used to at home over the past few months.

She was miserable and was also a little taken back by what she was feeling.

She made it through because of how tough she is. She even managed to spend some time with cousins for a couple of days in Provo and then we drove back home. Mostly, she really wanted to be home to go to the choir retreat that was to be the Monday and Tuesday last.

She made it through Monday completely wiped out and didn't go back on Tuesday. She was just so excited to be around friends and peers again that she didn't keep herself in check, even with Nicki constantly reminding her to do so.

On Thursday, she had her next helping of vincristine and then rested the next couple of days in preparation for starting school today.

I wouldn't say she is excited for school. But certainly for the environment. Seeing and talking to people her age. Mom and Dad are only good for so much interesting conversation, you know.

Her schedule is such that she mostly has choir classes all day. She was able to complete her senior English class over the summer, in case I haven't mentioned that before. So, she only has a math class and US government.

We are hoping to get a totally clear picture on the remaining treatments. We are hoping that we can do the rest of them here in Las Vegas. That will make for a super-fun Labor Day for her at home. But, after her radiation in 3 weeks, there should only be a handful of chemo treatments remaining.

That's the scoop. I try not to be overly excited that we are on the downhill side of this, but I am an accountant and I notice these things. I count and add and subtract.

Good News!!

She gets to start chemo again tomorrow!!!

I find it a little odd that we are glad that she is healing well enough from her surgery that she can continue chemotherapy. I guess if you break it down, it means that her body is fighting strong enough to heal on schedule from a major surgery.  Plus, you don't see this, yet, but her hair is starting to grow back.

Instead of a couple of patches of prickly stubble, she has very short, fine tufts of hair. Of course, that will only be for the next week or so until the chemo takes care of that.

As a reminder, she no longer has to do the in-patient treatments. Tomorrow will be 2 pushes. Then each week, as before, is the vincristine push. Most likely, after tomorrow, we will do the rest of the treatments here in Las Vegas.

Also, a change from what I had previously let you know about, is that she will be coming home this weekend. They are putting off the radiation until after school starts because the doctors wanted her to be able to be here for her first week or two of school.

Based on our current understanding of the timing of things, she will have chemo for the next 4 weeks (maybe 5), then she will go up to Primary Children's for her radiation treatments for a week, with no chemo that week.  Then she will continue her last 6 (or maybe 5) chemo treatments.

So, the number is getting smaller, which is nice. I just want it to be zero. Zero for now and zero forever.

It was good to be up there this weekend and last weekend. Last weekend, as Cassidy and I stopped briefly in St. George on our way home, my father-in-law asked if we planned to go up next weekend (this past weekend). Of course, I said yes. Then he offered to buy us plane tickets using points he has racked up over the years.

I'm sure it was from just because I was tired from driving the past 4 hours or so, with the prospect of another 2 ahead of me, but there may have been tears welling up in my eyes. I can neither confirm nor deny such a phenomenon. But, my thanks to Nicki's parents for making this past weekend's trip a little (by a little, I mean a whole lot) easier.

A Week Without Hysteria

Just a brief update to let you know that the labs came back from the operation last week and the doctors found no trace remaining of the cancer.

This is what they expected, given the initial scans taken in April and the original operation that removed the tumor. They figure that anything that may have been left has probably been killed by the chemotherapy. Yes, there is always a chance that the samples they took could have missed some microscopic traces left elsewhere in her uterus. But, they take several samples to do the testing and there was no visible evidence of tumor.

Assuming all is going well with her healing and recovery later this week, when she meets with the doctor who performed the surgery, she will begin chemo again next week.

Matti's great-grandma (at whose home she and Nicki - and the boys - are currently staying) pronounced that word (uterus) in a way that we had never before heard. It made me think of someone named Russ who is a U of U fan.