Team NSH

Greetings from (finally) sunny and warm Alabama.

Today was supposed to begin another round f chemo, and mom and I went to the hospital fully prepared to tackle round #3.

Unfortunately, mom’s platelet count had other ideas.  In order to administer the chemo, her count had to be in excess of 100, but she came in a little too low, so they called chemo off.

Mom pressed the doctor if he had any idea for the reason behind the drop in platelet’s, to which he replied with a good natured chuckle.

“Yeah, I have a pretty good idea.  You’re on an incredibly intense dose of chemo, which can cause a couple of side effects.”

I was captivated while listening to Dr. Cameron explain different stats, readings, and medical jargon today.  He noted that he put mom on an incredibly vigorous round of chemo, one which he rarely uses on any patient.  He clearly saw the fight and the will inside of her and told us, “I decided to try this round of chemo on you, because you’re a marathoner* and I think you’ll be able to fight through it better than a lot.”

(*- OK, so Mom’s not quite a marathoner, but we’ve made an important family level decision to not try to correct the oncologist if he wants to comment on how tough he thinks mom is.  And let’s be honest,… even though she’s never run 26.2 miles, does anyone here think she couldn’t if she wanted to??)

With the low platelet’s throwing a wrench into the plans, we went home with mixed feelings.  Mom hates this chemo and was somewhat glad to avoid it today, but she had also geared herself up for the fight.  She was fully prepped for a battle which never came to fruition, and I think anyone can understand the sense of mixed blessings.

Mom and Dad got together tonight for their ritual with 8 new cards waiting in the mailbox to open and read together.  I took a stealth picture of the ritual tonight, and if a regular picture is worth a thousand words, this is worth the dictionary:

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A couple notes before I sign off:

I know a lot of folks have emailed me with stickers, pictures or just generally supportive messages.  First of all, THANK YOU!  Secondly, I do apologize for not responding, but I’ve been spending as much time with mom this week as possible.  I will be getting to everything in the next few days.

We’ve blown through 150 stickers so far, so another order has been happily placed to make sure we get NSH out everywhere we can.  I’ll be sending out another batch when the order is in, so stay patient with me while we wait for another round.

Along those lines, there will be another post of pictures in cool places, so please don’t think they’re being ignored.

Thank you all again by the continued outpouring of support.  I’ve witnessed first hand how much an email, sticker or card means to her.  She continues to feed off the positive energy we see constantly, and we continue to need all the help we can get there.

Till tomorrow.

-Todd