I'm not sure why blogging seems like such a drag these days, but it does, so you'll have to forgive me for not keeping it up better. Life goes fast with four kids at home all day. Even my normally quiet hospital days have been more busy. Excuses, excuses. Really, it just takes a lot of energy to write anything very meaningful, so I haven't. I will try to come up with something soon.

But so you know, Steven did make it home from the hospital on Saturday morning. We were all really happy--especially because it had taken them so long to get the chemo going. Saturday morning was the earliest he could have gone home regardless, so I have no hard feelings for the pharmasist who made us wait 4 hours for the chemo on Wednesday. After the hospital, he stopped off at home to change into his swimming suit and headed to a birthday party. He did great, even though he didn't know many of the kids there. He went swimming at a public pool and really did well. He did slip on the wet tile with his crutches, but everything looks okay. We have learned that with crutches at the pool he needs to take extra care, or even not use them. You would think that we would have learned this lesson, really. Oh well.

I will keep you posted. He is due for another round of methotrexate on Thursday.

Steven has been hanging out in the hospital since Wednesday morning. He went through a tortuous methotrexate infusion on Wednesday evening (read: he was throwing up more than usual). He was feeling better by the next day and has been eating pretty well since. He has been busy up at the hospital with physical therapy, a long visit with the nutritionist, playing chess with some of the child life volunteers, playing games with his uncle, doctors stopping in, pet therapists (his favorite), a walk to the patio, video games, movies and books. Hopefully he will get to come home sometime tomorrow, but it may be Sunday--who knows. Rob is up there tonight--a nice break from me, I'm sure.

Swimming

We've had a weekend full of fun--the movies, swimming, fireworks, and waterfights. The swimming was especially fun--Steven was just in heaven. He hasn't been swimming since this all started in February. He says that it was a little tricky to get used to, but after a while, it felt great. I loved it because he could play with the other kids without any kind of handicap. He has been feeling really good. Rob is feeling great, as well. We are gearing up for tomorrow and round 11 of chemo. We've had such a long break this time around that it feels really strange to be packing up again.

We've had a great week. There were butterflies and wildflowers everywhere in the canyon--beautiful. Steven felt lots better this week after his blood transfusion. He got to go shooting with grandpa and we did a hike around Tony Grove lake. He was a pro on his crutches and went most of the mile on foot (literally), but as it was getting dark, I made him hop aboard for a piggy back ride at the end. He is so light! We are newly committed to weight gain this weekend. Too bad the rest of the family can't put the pounds on for him.

His platelets have come up, so he is ready for chemo. Unfortunately, they don't have room for him on the schedule until Wednesday, but I guess that gives us more time to work on fattening him up. I finally took him in for the xray of his foot today to see if it was broken, but it wasn't. Hooray! We only have a few more weeks until they fit him for a prosthesis, so we have to really get working on his physical therapy.

Luckily, he is in good spirits and is willing to do things he doesn't love, like eat and physical therapy. Rob is feeling much better, too, although we still aren't sure what was wrong. He had an ultrasound yesterday and everything looked normal. We don't know what the next step is, but as long as he is okay, it doesn't matter so much.

Almost normal

Steven and Sonja spent the morning at the hospital getting a blood transfusion. He is a lot pinker now with the new red blood cells. They gave him red blood cells, but not platelets. The reasoning there was because he had no bad symptoms from his low platelet counts, and that if they recovered on their own, it would be all the better for him. (Though I'm not sure why the same reasoning for the self-recovery of the red blood cells didn't apply to them and they went ahead with that transfusion... Hmmm, don't think too hard, I probably missed something). ;-)

After that, Sonja took Steven and the kids on a minivacation. Steven desperately wanted to visit his grandparent's cabin. I'm sure they'll have fun.

As far as my health goes, I'm feeling much better this week than last. I got some blood test results back and it wasn't hepatitus, thankfully. Still, something was/is affecting my liver as the tests show, but I think it's on the mend. Little did I know that recovering from a liver infection could take so long. It's not like a flu or cold virus. I wish it were just that. But, thankfully, I'm almost normal again.

Delays

I just got Steven's lab results for the day: his platelets and hematocrit are even lower then they were Thursday. Platelets are now 13 and hematocrit (red blood cells) are 22.8. He is going to get a transfusion tomorrow up at the clinic. I have tried to prep myself for scheduling delays from the very beginning when every answer to my questions started with "It depends...", but we have been so lucky to stay on schedule that this first delay is a bummer. On the bright side, we can fit in a lot of fun in a week--especially a week where he feels good.

P.S. The reason the delay is for at least a week is because they will not start chemo until they can tell Steven's body is making his own platelets--donor platelets don't count.