Cisplatin Shmisplatin

We are still home!!! It's pretty crazy that I've started to feel like we've been home too long. This is the longest we've been home after a chemo round since the 2nd round (the outpatient round). Nate has been doing awesome! This round is the same exact drugs and doses that he got for the 3rd round. The 3rd round where he threw up so much and wouldn't eat at all and got so dehydrated that he looked like a skeleton and wouldn't walk, and barely talked or even lifted his head.

We brought him home at 1am Sunday morning. He threw up more on Sunday than we would have liked, but was happy, energetic and running all over the house. He was eating little, but drinking a ton of milk. I was nervous but knew we would be taking him to the clinic on Tuesday to make sure he wasn't getting dehydrated. After Sunday, the throwing up almost stopped. He has basically thrown up one time per day until yesterday, which is so awesome! Yesterday and today, he hasn't thrown up at all!! His appetite isn't that great but I have seen it start to improve the last couple days. He has continued to eat a bit though and has been drinking a TON of milk.

I took him to the clinic on Tuesday and Friday last week and his numbers were great each time and we were headed back HOME in about an hour. Very few of our clinic visits have not involved being there most of the day...and most of them have resulted in admission. So, it's very nice to go for a quick check and head home! His numbers (ANC and platelets) did take a dip from Tuesday to Friday...but his ANC was still good and the platelets weren't low enough to transfuse yet.

We are headed to the clinic in the morning for another blood check...and most probably a platelet transfusion. Nate has had a nose bleed off and on ALL day today...one bad one that we weren't sure if we were going to be able to stop (but we did, after holding him kicking and screaming and pinching his nose for about a half hour). So, I will actually be glad to sit at the clinic all day to get Nate his platelets as long as he'll have less nose bleeds. I'm also interested in his ANC because sometimes when it bottoms out, kids will get a "neutropenic fever" just because they have no immune system and not because they have infection (this is what happened to Nate after the 1st round). This fever would put him in the hospital until his ANC recovered. We are all too familiar with the fact that Nate can go from being awesome one day, to being in the hospital the next, so we're trying to enjoy each moment we get at home. We keep looking at each other like, "do you believe this?!?". He was just so, so sick last time...and almost not sick at all this time!

This little boy's body is just so remarkable. The word "resilient" doesn't even begin to cover it. He is truly, Super Nate! We just HAVE to know that he will totally beat this monster. his body is just too smart for this disease. When he feels better, his body tells him to eat...and eat a TON to keep him strong and healthy (when he's feeling good I CAN NOT keep him out of the fridge and pantry...and I don't try). Once his body has experienced a set of chemo drugs, it's like it learns how to not make it so hard on him the next time. It's just miraculous to watch him. He's running around this house playing with his brother and sister and wreaking havoc like he didn't get pumped full of poison a week and a half ago.

Even on these spectacular days...cancer sucks...and Nate takes it all in stride. He starts his day with 3 yucky medicines and a shot...and ends his day with more yucky medicine. He has to lie still during the painful removal and replacement of his dressing once a week. This weekend he's also had to endure long periods of time having his nose painfully pinched to stop his nose bleeds. Then there was the 4:30am wake up call for vomit AND diarrhea all over the bed. All that...and this was a week from heaven as far as we were concerned because Nate was mischievous, sweet, goofy and spunky. Nate was Nate! Really though...it sucks that I have to be thankful that my son is still acting like himself, despite what he goes through every day.

Tonight I cleared out all of Nate's summer clothes and did some organizing in his room. I cleared out his drawer full of cloth diapers (one of the many things we had to give up when cancer took over our life) and filled it with all the medical supplies we have to use every day for Nate. It made me so sad to pack up those cloth diapers. Cloth diapering was important to us. We started when Wes was born and have continued with Nate and Ellie. We have had at least one cloth diapered baby in our house constantly for the last 5 1/2 years...until July. It makes me angry that we've had to give up so many things that were very important to us to make room for cancer. Cleaning out this drawer was a very physical expression of everything we've been giving up for the past 4 months, and replacing with "cancer stuff"...and it made me sad.