It's been almost a month, and I've yet to write an update about E's lumbar puncture procedure from July. I figure it's about time, before my memories become foggier.
E is in Maintenance. That means his lumbar punctures, and therefore trips to SickKids are a bit more spaced out. We now go every 3 months, as opposed to having them once a month in frontline treatment.
If you recall, I had previously written about a phone call from E's oncologist to alert us to the fact that they had found some blasts in E's blood after a lumbar puncture procedure. Everything worked out in the end though. Sometimes, when the bone marrow is healing itself after chemotherapy, it emits blast cells. Not all blasts end up as leukemia cells though, some are just immature cells that are still developing. This is what E's oncologists figure had happened back in February. Due to illness, E's March lumbar puncture had to be pushed back, and we ended up having to wait 6 weeks instead of the usual 4, for the next procedure to test for the blasts. It was quite a stressful month-and-a-half of waiting, but we eventually got the all clear.
E's oncologists have told us that the first phase of Maintenance is the phase with the highest chance of relapse. As you successfully progress through maintenance, that chance of relapse decreases. Naturally then, between that tidbit of information, and the previous scare involving blasts, I had been quite nervous, worried, and apprehensive about the July lumbar puncture, given that it had been 12 weeks since the last procedure.
July 11th arrived, and my mother-in-law had slept over the night previous to help with getting J off to daycare. We were out the door before J was awake, and the trip downtown was better than I was anticipating. It was a light day for lumbar punctures, and there was only about 5 kids in total. We went through all of the pre-procedural steps: checking in, getting E's port accessed, height & weight, taking blood, and a visit with the oncology team. After that, it's just a case of sitting, and waiting for E's turn.
Right as we were called, there was a group of people around the nurses' station. At its centre was a boy who may have been about 8. It was apparently his last day of treatment, because they were bringing out the bell, and they were preparing to do the end of treatment ceremony. I congratulated the family as we walked past them to Cujo's Room for the lumbar puncture. Waiting to bring E in to the procedure room, we were able to witness the ceremony. The boy rang the bell, and afterward, he smashed a whip cream pie in his dad's face. I clapped when the group broke out into applause, and my eyes welled up with happiness for that family. I was also thinking about how far we've come from E's diagnosis, and how much further we still have to go before E has his turn to ring the bell.
E's lumbar puncture was uneventful. As usual, it went well with no problems. He slept for most of the hour post-procedure where he is supposed to lie flat. He woke up maybe 5 minutes before the hour was up, so we kept him entertained with YouTube, and some milk to drink. The results from his blood also came back clear. No blasts. I was able to breathe a huge sigh of relief.
Since then, he continues to receive his daily oral chemotherapy, though he's starting to despise it. We dissolve the pills in water inside of syringe, and then squirt the solution into his mouth for him to drink. He used to tolerate it, but lately it takes one adult to hold him down, and another adult to try and hold his head still while administering the dose. It's my least favourite part of the day. He's also been in for bloodwork at the satellite clinic on July 25th, which came back fine. Yesterday, August 8th, was another trip to the satellite for more bloodwork, and a push of vincristine through his port. Yesterday also marked the start of steroid week, so we'll see what kind of baby roid rage happens this month. And that about wraps my July/August catch-up.
We are on the upward swing
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