Ben's New Year's Thoughts

(This post is by Ben - we forgot his username so we are just typing under my account. Oops!)

I'm so excited that it is the last day of 2008! I am one year closer to being done with chemo!!!!
Happy New Year!


(We are off to the hospital for Vincristine and a blood check. We will give an update later.)

Well, they're fun to catch anyway . . .

We went fishing today. Nothing too challenging -- a little artificial pond in Anaheim where they stock tons of trout and starve them so little kids can catch something easily. Ben and David caught three big trout, which I then prepared in three ways for them to eat (cajun style, battered and miso/panko). No takers, so Dakota and I had a feast! LOL

Also attached is a photo from the day when Ben took Dakota to school for "pet share." Happy holidays to all!

Ben the Playmaker

Ben had his best hockey game of the seaon yesterday. His team beat the best team in their league 4-1, with Ben chipping in THREE assists! He also blocked a shot and played with tremendous confidence. He won a bunch of battles for the puck and had a great time playing. Pretty cool stuff!

On the cancer front, he's feeling great!

Karate Kids

I just need to brag for a moment. The boys tested for their yellow belt in their karate class yesterday. They both passed! Yeah! Then with the whole class and all the parents standing there watching, the instructor singled Ben out as the best student of the class. The instructor said that he will be bringing Ben a special prize for all his hard work this past semester.

After the festivities were over and I went to sign the boys out, the instructor commented on how amazing my boys are. They are both completely different but each wonderful in his own way. He also said that Ben has a real talent for karate. His discipline is amazing for an 8 year old boy and he also noted that nothing seems to phase him. Ben remains calm and under control and is just a complete joy to be around. :)

As you can imagine, Ben was just beaming the rest of the night. He is so proud of himself!

Another Spinal Done

Ben had a spinal tap this afternoon. The procedures are usually scheduled in the mornings for kids but due to some scheduling issues this one needed to be in the afternoon. Ben was a pretty good sport about not being able to eat or drink anything - a trooper as usual.

The PICC center was very busy and a bit behind schedule. Because Ben was so eager to get things started Ben's amazing and wonderful nurse, Karen, got a room ready for him so he wouldn't have to wait any longer. They take such great care of us!

There were some issues getting him asleep. Due to the fact he gets weird and terrible hallucinations from the Ketamine the doctors tried to just give him Versed. During his last spinal it took 3 ccs (or whatever the measurement was) to put him out...but this time he was extremely stubborn! Even after 6 ccs he was still chatting away with the doctors and nurses. They finally gave him a very small dose of the Ketamine and it knocked him out right away...but only for a few minutes and then he was very chatty again. It is very strange as a parent to be talking to your 8-year old and have them be totally wasted! Luckily he came out of it pretty quickly and we didn't have to stay at the hospital nearly as long as I feared we would be there. We are back home and Ben is feeling great and so excited to be able to eat.

We just received a call from Karen letting us know that his numbers look great. White blood count is 3.6, Polys 2117, hemoglobin 13.3 and platelets at 229,000. Because of the good numbers they are increasing his medication doses up to 75% of normal levels (they had been reduced down to 50% last week because of his ear infection and low numbers).

All is good here!