Platelet Problems

This post is #86 in a year-long series ... Through this series of posts I plan to share our family's experiences during our 17-year-old daughter's year-long battle with brain cancer, which began in February of 2008. My desire is to process through the events of that year from the perspective that a decade of time has brought ... for myself, really. But if you'd like to follow along, you're welcome to join me.

June 23, 2008

Until Hannah was diagnosed with cancer, I never really thought very much about platelets.  I suppose I first learned about them in science class in junior high.  I had a basic understanding that my blood was made up of red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets, and then there was the plasma that all that stuff floated around in.  I even had a general awareness that they had something to do with the clotting of blood.  But I didn't really care about them ... They certainly had no impact on my day-to-day life.

I could never have known what a huge factor platelets would eventually become not only in my life, but in Hannah's.

My email from ten years ago today ...

This morning Hannah had her monthly appointment at Arkansas Children’s Hospital, and all went well. Our first step, of course, was the blood draw, and fortunately, our favorite nurse was there, and she was able to draw Hannah’s blood with only one stick. Then, after quite a bit of waiting, we got to see the oncologist. He was very pleased with Hannah’s progress, and he shared the results of the bloodwork with us. 

All of Hannah’s counts have gone up (her red blood count is in the average range for the first time in a long time!), except for her platelets, which have dropped even lower than they were last week (down to 32,000 from 47,000). She was supposed to start back on the oral chemo drug today, but they will not start it back until her platelets are at least 75,000. He said that it is not unusual for the platelets to drop way down following these early rounds of chemo; and said that over time, as her body adjusts, it shouldn’t be as much of a problem. 

So…we will be postponing her next round of chemo for at least another week. While Hannah is happy about the temporary reprieve, we hate to get too far off schedule with her treatments, although the doctor didn’t seem to think it was a very big deal. The good news is that Hannah is feeling really good right now. Having low platelets apparently does not affect how you feel; it just causes you to bruise and/or bleed easily because platelets have to do with the clotting process. The doctor also gave us a prescription for a different anti-nausea drug, so hopefully when she does start back on the chemo drug, it won’t make her feel quite so bad.

We are so grateful for the doctors, nurses, pharmacists, etc., that God has put into our lives who have really helped us along this road over the past four months. And we are so thankful for all of you who read these emails…many of whom we don’t even know…who pray for our family regularly. Your prayers and encouragement have truly made a difference in our lives. You have truly been a blessing to our family!

God is good, all the time!
Jill and Brad

Grandma and Grandpa Camp

This post is #85 in a year-long series ... Through this series of posts I plan to share our family's experiences during our 17-year-old daughter's year-long battle with brain cancer, which began in February of 2008. My desire is to process through the events of that year from the perspective that a decade of time has brought ... for myself, really. But if you'd like to follow along, you're welcome to join me.

June 16, 2008

Another Grandma and Grandpa Camp was in the books and while Hannah clearly enjoyed the time with her grandparents and cousins, I could tell she was glad to be home.  On the last day of Camp, they visited the Heifer Project just outside of Little Rock, and I drove up to meet them there and bring the kids home afterward.  It was an interesting tour, but it was hot outside, and I could tell Hannah was rapidly running out of gas.  We headed home right after our tour, and I was thrilled to have my girls home again.

Here are a couple of pictures from G and G Camp that year ... As you can see, they really had a great time!  Hannah really liked nothing better than spending time with her extended family.  Those G and G Camp experiences are something that will always be treasured.

Here's my email from ten years ago today ...

Time for our weekly update…Hannah had her bloodwork done today, as she does every Monday, and her counts overall were pretty good. Her platelets have really dropped off, from 138,000 last week to 47,000 this week, but I think that is to be expected following chemotherapy. They won’t give her platelets unless they drop below 21,000…but they also won’t let her start her next chemo treatment until they get up to at least 75,000. The best news is that she has really been feeling good over the last couple of weeks. She had a great time with her grandparents and cousins last week, and was able to do lots of fun things, like horseback riding and kayaking. We are so thankful that she felt good and was able to enjoy herself the whole time.

Thank you so much for every prayer you bring to the Great Physician on our behalf. You will never know the impact these prayers have on our daily lives. God is truly good all the time!

Jill and Brad

Not Missing a Thing

This post is #84 in a year-long series ... Through this series of posts I plan to share our family's experiences during our 17-year-old daughter's year-long battle with brain cancer, which began in February of 2008. My desire is to process through the events of that year from the perspective that a decade of time has brought ... for myself, really. But if you'd like to follow along, you're welcome to join me.

June 14, 2008

So I started this year-long series with every intention of writing some kind of post every day ... and I did really well for 71 days straight.  And then, well, you know how it is.  And that's okay.  I hope to get back on to a little more regular schedule in the weeks ahead, although I'm pretty sure it won't be daily, ha!  We'll see how it goes!

Ten years ago today, Hannah took her ACT test.  She had just returned from her G and G Camp week, and was pretty worn out, but she was adamant about taking that test.  She had just completed her sophomore year of high school, and planned to take it several times over the next couple of years, hopefully increasing her score each time so she could get lots of college scholarships.  She didn't feel well that day, and she still struggled with the "falling out of her chair" sensation she'd had ever since completing her radiation treatments, but she did it!  I don't even remember the exact score she got ... only that she wasn't pleased with it, and felt she should have done better.  At that time, we couldn't know that Hannah's ACT score was not going to matter.  We were operating under the assumption that she would complete her treatments over the next year and start college in the fall of 2010.

When Hannah was but a preschooler, she decided she wanted to follow in her parents' footsteps and go to Ouachita Baptist University.  She proudly wore her "Future Tiger" t-shirt and proclaimed to anyone who would listen that she was going to go to Ouachita when she grew up.  As she got older, she never wavered in her decision, even making plans to room with her good friend, Brittany.  Brad and I excitedly looked forward to going to visit her in the dorm (especially since it's only a 40 minute drive down the interstate) and to attending all of her OBU events as proud alumni parents.  I was even going to prominently display one of those "My Daughter Goes to OBU" bumper stickers!  When she died in the spring of her junior year of high school, all that changed.

We still have the opportunity to visit the beautiful campus at Ouachita from time to time, but it's not to visit Hannah or to cheer her on in Tiger Tunes.  For a few years after her death, we had the privilege of awarding the Hannah Joy Sullivan Memorial Scholarship to a rising junior or senior studying in the educational or medical field (two areas in which she had an interest).  We had the opportunity to speak to a "Death and Dying" class last spring, and we've been to a few Tiger Tunes presentations. 

After one of those scholarship-awarding visits a few years ago Brad and I spent some time walking around the campus in the evening. The weather was unseasonably warm, and I've always loved Ouachita's campus at night.  Many things have changed since we were students there years ago, but a lot of things have remained the same, and I'm glad about that.

But, as we walked, I couldn't help but be sad about why we were there at all.  This was not the way it was supposed to be. I should be like all my Facebook friends ... going to visit my daughter at college for a special occasion, excitedly anticipating her coming home for the holidays or the summer, mailing her homemade treats to help her get through finals week.  How did my life turn out like this ... where instead of receiving hugs from my college-age daughter, I was receiving recognition for giving a scholarship that I would much rather not have a reason to give at all?

It was at times like that I had to remind myself that Hannah was not missing a thing by not being a student at OBU. As nice as their new dorms seemed to be, they sure couldn't compare with a mansion in Heaven!  I was the one who felt robbed and cheated by the fact that we missed out on these times with her, and I have to remember that in the eternal scheme of things, I really didn't miss anything either. What's a 3-month visit home for the summer compared to an eternity together in Heaven? There's no comparison!

The sting is still there ... especially as Hannah's friends are now college graduates, starting careers, getting married, and having babies.  She is missed every day ... but she's not missing a thing!

Thankful for "Normal" Life

This post is #83 in a year-long series ... Through this series of posts I plan to share our family's experiences during our 17-year-old daughter's year-long battle with brain cancer, which began in February of 2008. My desire is to process through the events of that year from the perspective that a decade of time has brought ... for myself, really. But if you'd like to follow along, you're welcome to join me.

June 9, 2008

I never knew that life with cancer could be so "normal."  On the days that Hannah was treatment-free, life seemed to go on as it always had.  It was summertime, so we were moving at a little bit slower pace, but there were still school workshops to attend, dentist appointments to keep, cheerleading routines to practice, and basketball camps to sweat through.  We celebrated Bethany's 13th birthday, and life was good.  Hannah was feeling better after having completed her first round of oral chemo ... and best of all, her hair had pretty much stopped thinning as a result of the radiation treatments.

For several years, as their grandchildren were growing up, Brad's mom and dad would host "G and G Camp" (Grandma and Grandpa Camp) for a week each summer.  At that time, they had six grandkids ... all girls.  Hannah was the oldest, Bethany was the second oldest, and they stair-stepped down from there.  It was something the girls looked forward to every year, and it was quickly approaching that summer.  We weren't sure if Hannah would be able to participate ... it would depend upon where she was in her treatment schedule, what her blood counts looked like, how much energy she had, etc.  Thankfully, she was able to go, and I'm so glad her cousins and grandparents were able to spend that special time with her that summer.

My email from ten years ago today ...

Hannah had her weekly bloodwork done today in Hot Springs, and we are praising God for near normal results! All counts were slightly low, but are closer to normal than they’ve been in a long time (with the exception of her white blood count, which was just a little bit lower than it was last week). She has also been feeling much better over the last several days since completing her first round of the higher-dose chemotherapy drug. So much better, in fact, that she and Bethany left this morning to spend a few days with her grandparents and four of her cousins in Van Buren, Arkansas. This is something they do every summer, and we were afraid that she wouldn’t be able to go this summer. We are so thankful that she is feeling well enough and that her counts have held strong enough for her to be able to do something “normal” for a few days!

Again, we are so thankful for your prayers and encouragement! God’s people have been so good to our family throughout the last few months…we can never thank you enough!

God is good all the time!
Jill and Brad

Round One Complete ...

This post is #82 in a year-long series ... Through this series of posts I plan to share our family's experiences during our 17-year-old daughter's year-long battle with brain cancer, which began in February of 2008. My desire is to process through the events of that year from the perspective that a decade of time has brought ... for myself, really. But if you'd like to follow along, you're welcome to join me.

June 2, 2008

Round One of Hannah's oral chemotherapy treatments was complete, and it felt good to get it behind us.  It had been rough ... no doubt about that ... but we had a nice stretch of treatment-free days ahead of us now before Round Two would begin.  We were encouraged.  We could do this for eleven more months if that's what it took for Hannah to be healed.

My email from a decade ago ...

Hannah has finished her first five-day round of chemotherapy…praise the Lord! Thankfully, she has not been as nauseated today, which we hope is a sign that her body will eventually adjust to this higher dosage of chemo. She also had her blood drawn today, and all of her counts are good…not quite normal, but good enough for now. We’ve been told to watch for a possible drop in her counts over the next week or two.

Once again, your prayers have helped us through a difficult few days. We are looking forward to the next 28 days, in which Hannah will be treatment-free, before starting her next five-day round of chemo. God is good, all the time!

Jill and Brad