December 9, 2010 in Uncategorized with 18 Comments

We celebrated Gray turning three Tuesday night with a small, and short, party with mostly family and just a couple friends. Gray’s party was a Toy Story theme but Gray loves Buzz Lightyear the most! We had a really fun party! A family friend made a Buzz Lightyear themed birthday cake and as an extra added surprise Buzz Lightyear himself stopped by to deliver some special gifts! Needless to say, Gray loved his presents! In fact, we made the mistake of letting him open his gifts first before singing happy birthday and cutting his cake and once he saw all his new toys he wasn’t really feeling the whole “blow out your candles” portion of the party! Ha! We couldn’t blame him though! I mean when you just opened new Thomas the Train toys, Rock N Roll Elmo and Buzz Lightyear is standing in your living room cake and ice cream just don’t seem quite as exciting! Eventually he did come to the table for some cake, though. Thank you to you all for your many birthday wishes to our little man! It’s wonderful to see him turning another year older!

Today, we are checking into the hospital for another inpatient round of chemo. This round is very different from the others in that we will only be in the hospital for three days. While we’re happy about that we can’t help but be a little nervous because during this round Gray will receive two full days of IV fluids and then one day of very strong chemo. It’s kind of hard to believe that a medicine he usually receives over an entire week he will now be receiving in one single day. We’ve been warned that since this round of chemo is condensed into such a short period of time Gray will again be at a much greater risk of getting sick and developing mouth sores, among other side effects. Please pray that he doesn’t experience any new side effects. He did get sick with his last round of chemo and it’s just plain ol’ NO FUN at all! I guess that goes without saying but it’s one thing to care for your son who has cancer and it’s another thing entirely to care for your son who has cancer and is also throwing up all day. And then to add mouth sores on top of that…? No thank you. We do have some discouraging news to share. We struggled with whether or not to make this public but we know that all your prayers are truly what is sustaining our family during this time and we honestly believe whole heartedly in the power of prayer so we chose to go ahead and share this with you in the hopes that you will continue to lift Gray up in prayer each and every day. When we went to clinic at the beginning of the week for blood tests we also met with our doctor’s assistant who had some information that we did not want to hear. As you know, we’ve been discussing surgery to remove Gray’s tumor once he is finished with chemo especially since the tumor has shrunk so much. Well, this week we learned that a portion of Gray’s tumor has wrapped itself around his aorta, the main artery that runs from your heart. This is disheartening news to say the least. If a tumor has attached itself or wrapped itself around pretty much any organ it may still be operable because they can often remove a portion of that organ if not the entire thing depending on which organ it is, BUT when the tumor is wrapped around your aorta that portion is not operable. It’s difficult to even type those words. The PA explained that when they do surgery they will do their best to scrape as much of the tumor away from Gray’s aorta as they possibly can but she also very bluntly told us that because they will have to leave some of the tumor inside of Gray and because Neuroblastoma is classically known to quickly reproduce itself that Gray’s chances of his tumor and cancer returning is beyond expected. This journey has more ups and downs then we can even possibly begin to explain in words. It feels like we constantly take two steps forward and one step back. We were just telling you days ago the good news of Gray’s tumor shrinking and his bone marrow being cancer free and now here we are delivering this news. It’s almost difficult to even feel anything at this point. The highs and lows are too difficult to bear. We almost feel like turning off our emotions entirely and just coasting through our days. We do covet all of your prayers during this time. We know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God hears our prayers and He IS our great healer! He has a plan for Grayson and we believe that it includes healing! Please stand WITH us and stand FOR us when we can’t stand for ourselves as we continue walking with Gray on this road. Thank you all so much.

“Hear my cry, O God; listen to my prayer. From the ends of the eart I call to you, I call as my heart grows faint; lead me to the rock that is higher than I. For you have been my refuge, a strong tower against the foe. I long to dwell in your tent forever and take refuge in the shelter of your wings.”  Psalm 61:1-4