Thanksgiving Success!

Hello everyone. Hopefully everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving holiday. We certainly did. We have much to be thankful for. We are very happy to report that we had an uneventful weekend and that we enjoyed the company of our family for the holiday. Maggie enjoyed being held by many--something she wouldn't cooperate with a month ago. She has remained free of infections and has no major cold symptoms. So our decision to go forward with holiday plans was a good one. It was so good to see everyone--both family members whom we have seen periodically throughout Maggie's treatment, as well as extended family that we haven't been able to see since Maggie's diagnosis. With Maggie responding well to treatment so far, the Thanksgiving holiday has new and special meaning to us.

Maggie's counts are recovered fully now, too. Since she wasn't as high as she needed to be last week when she was last checked, she stayed on her Neupogen through the weekend (this is the drug that helps her recover the infection fighting white blood cells). As a result, she now has more of these healthy cells than she would normally (we were hoping for a count of 500 by Thanksgiving, on Monday she had almost 15,000!). This demonstrates the power of the Neupogen to do its job; one of the many medical advances that is benefitting Maggie's treatment and recovery. This drug helps her to recover from chemo more quickly and to avoid infection. Years ago, the chemo couldn't be administered nearly as often because it took a longer time for the white cells to recover to a safe level.

Friday we return to the fourth floor of the hospital--but only for part of the day. She'll have a spinal tap (with 3 chemo drugs inserted into her spinal fluid), an IV chemo, and a shot that helps prevent pneumonia. It will be nice to go home after all of the drugs are administered instead of staying in the hospital. Though treatment is a little lighter now that we've gotten this far into treatment, we still have lots of appointments scheduled for the next few weeks. So that's frustrating. Most frustrating of all? Maggie will have 5 days of steroids starting this weekend...which robs us of our "normal" Maggie. We know that it is an important part of her treatment, so we put up with it, of course.

Lastly, we have a bit of fun news regarding Maggie. For 5 months since Maggie's been diagnosed with Leukemia, we have asked the doctors (sometimes jokingly) if some of her symptoms could be caused by teething. It has turned into the running joke at our house--low-grade fever? She must be teething. Her sleep patterns changed? Must be a tooth about to poke through. At other times we have wondered if she would ever be able to chew food--she had no teeth. Until Sunday, that is. Whitney stuck her finger in Maggie's mouth to find that a tooth on her bottom has indeed poked through. It has grown quite a bit in the two days since. It only took about 14 months to pop through. Given all that she has gone through, this must seem very minor to her. She hasn't seemed to be bothered at all, which makes us very, very happy.

Sorry for the long post, and for the long delay between posts. We hope you all enjoyed your holiday and that you continue to appreciate the health of your children and families.