Wednesday, August 22, 2007

21 Aug Update




Here's a long overdue post and some recent pictures. You can see Sam and Ben goofing around, a pic of Sarah with her hair growing back and also a rare picture of me during our annual trip to see Thomas the Tank Engine at the Illinois Railway Museum. The boys both had a great time despite the rain. Thank God they were selling ponchos there!
Sarah is feeling ok these days. Gemzar chemo is hitting a rythm of one week on, one week off. She still gets Herceptin ever week and the 2wks schedule allows her body to keep up with the blood cell production with some booster shot help here & there. I think we've also got the right formula for her nausea under Gemzar - two of the anti-nausea drugs seem to have proven more effective with this treatment so that's a huge relief for Sarah. She still gets some nausea, but it doesn't freeze her in her tracks like at first... and it usually lasts for one or two days.
The plan will likely be to have Sarah get another MRI shortly after we get back from our vacation. We should also have some fresh tumor marker results waiting next week which will hopefully validate that the Gemzar continues to work.
Ben and Sam are getting excited about going to school. Ben will experience First Grade, which he sees as a big deal, and Sam will get to go to Pre-school like a "big boy." :)

Friday, August 03, 2007

3 Aug




A few T-ball pics - Ben playing shortstop and then right after a good hit. Sam didn't want to be left out of the picture-taking, so we got some shots of him too! (you can see the remains of a Harry Potter lightning bolt tattoo on Sam's forehead - those were a BIG hit).
We're doing ok this week. Sarah didn't get chemo this week due to a low white blood cell count. Although we want to get her as many treatments as possible, she can't help but be a little bit relieved to get a week off due to the nausea that sometimes goes with it. Her hair is slowly starting to grow back now since Gemzar chemo doesn't affect hair - and the nerve damage from the Abraxane is completely gone as well.
Ben's last day of summer camp was today and now we've got a few weeks where the boys will be home all day until school starts. We better come up with some things to keep them busy or they'll be driving us crazy... :)