You all deserve medals of honor for bravery on the battle field. You have and are facing a mortal enemy. You have all done this with grace, honor, and courage. I read your last post and cried for all you are going through. And you are right, the world is a better place with our precious, one of a kind Danielle. We all want to watch her grow up and find her place in this world, as she has demonstrated such an amazing capacity to adapt and carry on no matter what has been thrown at her. She is amazing, truly amazing and she has the best parents at her side, the best hospital tending her and support group behind her. We are all praying, sending positive thoughts and love. I will be on my knees a lot during the process and have written dates down on my calendar. She will get so much loving at Christmas she will radiate with all the love. Love, Aunt Cindy and Uncle Dennis
New “Red” bangs. Thank you Aunt Darlene! 🙂The RARE smile. I think this is so beautiful.She looks so grown up. I sometimes have to remind myself that this very wise person is only 12 years old. She is such a strong and brave soul.
May 2017 be the year for renewal and health. That’s a prayer I say a lot in hopes that my daughter will be seeing the end of cancer this year and be able to grow up in peace and happiness.
This Christmas has been rough, I didn’t send out cards this year, we just have too much going on. I’m sorry to all of you who usually get a card from us, let’s see what 2017 brings.
Update on the B.M. transplant:
Danielle is going in for surgery tomorrow to get her Hickman port placed – this will be used to deliver the new cells into her body. We are nervous as any surgery is risky and she only has 6 days to heal before her intense chemo begins.
We then check her back into the hospital on Dec. 28th, this is -8 days and she begins her chemo. The chemo she is getting will destroy her existing immune system, she will lose all of her hair and she isn’t too upset about that as mom will not be urging her to wash or comb it. I swear there are days, she wishes her teeth will fall out too, so I don’t harrass her to brush them!
She will immediately start anti seizure meds as the first couple days of chemo can cause seizures. The next couple days she starts another type of chemo that has very corrosive properties and on day 3 she will have to be woken up every 2 hours to use the restroom. She will not be a very happy camper with only 2 hours of sleep in between wakings, but that portion will only go on for 2 days. Hmmm, this brings back memories of how she used to wake me up every 2 hours for feedings.
This chemo will also be very harsh on her digestive system causing a lot of nausea and other unpleasantness I won’t go into, but needless to say, I now see why we encouraged all the weight gain. I pray it was enough, but we will bring her anything/everything we can that may entice her to eat while going through this…oh why of why doesn’t Mr. Bento deliver yet? Dad and I need to check into Uber Eats…lol
After 7 days of chemo, she will get one day of rest, then we do the B.M. transplant. Once that is done, we have a very dangerous possibility of her body rejecting the new cells or of developing a condition known as graft versus host disease. These are both situations we do not want. Her chances of success are 50%. Please pray for my baby girl. Her father and I are so scared, we cannot even consider the possibility of losing her. This world is a much better place with her in it.
We will try to update you as we know more.
Thank you and have a Merry Christmas, we’ll see you in the New Year.
Danielle will be getting her bone marrow (B.M.) donation under several extenuating circumstances:
She got her B.M. biopsy yesterday, if it comes back and leukemia is gone, the B.M. Transplant will be scheduled.
That’s contingent on the donor being available at that time, which means if they are not available we will start another round of chemo, if they are, we start a whole new adventure.
To prep for a B.M. Transplant she will undergo 7 days of round the clock chemo! that’s double what she has ever had so she will be very weak and run down, but they do this so that her immune system is gone and prepped to accept the donor’s cells.
Needless to say, life has been very tough, but we are pulling through as best we can.
I’m trying really hard to make Christmas as normal and special as I can for the kids, but it is hard to have “normal” when your entire life if ruled by microscopic cells that you can’t even reason with.
If you’re reading this Danielle, someday you will be this happy healthy little girl again! Mommy loves you.
