We had a great week with all of us together at home. Jackson and Wyatt were both in the Weippe Parade and had a good time. This trip home, Jackson had a little more energy and we got to ride four-wheelers, go fishing, and even hit some balls. The highlight of the week was when Jackson went for a ride down the street on his bike and came racing back to let me know that he had seen a snake. He said he believed it was a rattlesnake and sure enough it was. We disposed of the snake and the boys ran to let the neighbors know we saved them.
Again, Jackson's spirits were much better than ours as he headed up the hill to Spokane. At church, they described him as a "Warrior". We would describe him as nothing less.
Tomorrow, Jackson is going to Weippe. His Great-Grandpa Bob is the Grand Marshall of the rodeo and parade. We have hoped for a long time that Jackson would be there and we are very happy that the time frame is working out.
Staci is hooking up Jackson to an I-V for two hours, every eight hours. Plus, she has to flush the lines in his catheter and clean the dressing. She is becoming quite a nurse and we are thankful for that; it lets us have more freedom to leave the hospital.
Jackson had a catscan on Monday and the doctor didn't have the old photos to look at yet, but she said it is still big. She said she knows that it has shrunk a little from feeling it. She also said that sometimes these tumors start dieing from the inside out. Obviously, that's what we're hoping for.
Monday morning Jackson and Staci are heading back to Spokane for the third round of chemo. We are so happy to come home, but it goes very fast.
This latest hospital stay has seemed to be the roughest for Jackson. He was in a lot of pain with the mouth sores and the morphine he was receiving for the pain kept him awake. His spirits dropped and he was really exhausted. As soon as he recovered from the mouth sores he began the stem cell harvest. He has had to be very still in bed for the last 3 days because of the femoral catheter inserted to do the harvest. He has been extremely good about the whole thing. They actually drew enough cells on the first day but because of a clinical trial Jackson is participating in, they had to have a 3 day draw. He has also had to have 2 platelet transfusions and 2 RBC transfusions.
Tomorrow we will be having a CAT scan to check on the size of the tumor. Of course we are all praying it will have shrunk from the original 10 cm x 10 cm size.
More good news--Jackson will be able to throw the first pitch for the American Legion Regional Tournament. The game is Thursday August 15th. The opening ceremonies start at 7:00 pm and Jackson should be on the mound at approximately 8:00 pm.
Thank you all again for your tremendous support.
To do the stem cell purge, a catheter was inserted into Jackson's femoral vein. All of his blood is then cycled through two big machines that filter out the stem cells and then immediately return the remaining blood. Once the stems cells are collected, they will be cleansed of any malignant cells or unwanted substances and then frozen for use in his upcoming transplant.
The procedure to insert the catheter into Jackson's femoral vein was pretty scary. He was under anesthetic and thankfully doesn't remember much. He will have to be flat on his back for the next couple days but he's still keeping his spirits up. He even remarked that he wouldn't be bored lying in his hospital bed because he had those two big machines to look at.
We hope to be home sometime next week, but we still won't know for sure.