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September 24, 2005
By Margot | September 24, 2005
How sweet it is! We are home. We walked in the door last night around 9:30 after a very eventful day. Sammy is line free and very happy to be that way. I thought Andy would burst with joy at having us all together in the house last night. He literally jumped up and down for ten minutes after we got home. Sammy was getting in his pajamas last night and realized he had no line and we didn’t have to pin anything to his shirt and he said, “Can I just run around naked for a while, Mom?” Of course Andy stripped off all his clothes as well. Watching both boys run around screaming with delight and then later hiding their naked selves in the comforters pretending to be rabbits ina burrow while I was Mr. McGregor pulling them out by their feet, I promised myself never to take such moments for granted again. The stress of the past week seemed to just melt away. They are currently playing hide-and-seek and tornado (or “tomato” as Andrew calls it) with their dad and having a ball.
Sammy was booked solid every hour with a scan or a test or radiation his last two days in the hospital. We have to do all the scans again for the antibody protocol and though we agonized over whether or not to register for the study because of the painful side effects, things are in motion. We’ll find out in a couple of weeks if we actually get the antibodies. Dr. Bolotin was worried about the scans so early because radiation causes some inflammation and we may get false positives but we’ll see. The MIBG scan is on Tuesday and she said she’s really interested to see the results of that one as that’s where we saw the spot that gave us such a scare in July.
Yesterday we were down in radiation and a man came up and gave Sammy a bag that said To: Sam From: Joe. Sammy opened it and it was full of Halloween chocolate from See’s Candy. He explained to me that when he first started getting his treatments he was really scared and pissed off about his situation. He met Sammy and Neil and saw them goofing around and laughing while they were waiting for radiation and then he saw Sammy later riding his pole around the hospital with a smile on his face. He told me that seeing Sammy each day before his treatments changed his whole attitude and made him a lot less scared. I had tears in my eyes while Sam got his treatment.
We left the hospital after Sammy got his line out. He had been NPO all day and was hungry. His new favorite restaurant is Chili’s (a chain in California) because it has good dessert. We met Cathy and Ally and Andrew down in Irvine for dinner there and it was packed and we had to wait for a table. Sammy sat down and drank a big glass of chocolate milk right away. He’d had some of his chocolate on the way from the hospital. Then his dinner came and he didn’t eat any of it. He said his tummy hurt. We went to the bathroom but he didn’t have to throw up. He said he really wanted dessert. I asked him if he was sure and he said yes. He took one bite of the chocolate dessert and said he was going to be sick. I got him out the doors just in time (we were sitting close) and he threw up right in front of both doors on the sidewalk. A really nice young guy got us some water and told the manager for me. There were a million people walking through the doors but the manager, who had been so nice to Sammy when we came in, was a star. She told Sammy that they would clean it up in a minute and that it happened all the time. He cheerfully told Andy all about it when we got home, “I had chocolate and then chocolate milk, no dinner then chocolate cake and then I threw up but the lady said it happens all the time.” (I know, not the best mothering decisions on that one) I was so glad it didn’t faze him. It definitely fazed me but it was hardly a blip in his night. He hadn’t thrown up in a couple of days from radiation but he threw up the banana pancakes I made him this morning too so we’ll have to go easy on his tummy.
I must go, Neil left for golf and it’s my turn to be the tornado.
We have three more days next week- one for the tomo and two on his leg. We have the MIBG scan on Tuesday and Wednesday night we’ll be home for good. Hurray!
Sorry for the long update today – probably more throwing up information than anyone wanted to know.
Margot
Topics: Progress Reports | Comments Off on September 24, 2005
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