We Made It, for now...
This picture brings me back to happy times on the Commons at The University of Scranton. While not the Commons I spent many a day skipping class and hanging out on, it is still my school and a place I call home. I am not 100% sure what this quote means. I do know an expert on Robert Southwell's poetry, but I never thought to ask him. A quick scroll through Wikipedia and I see the quote is a bit longer, and really highlights the fact that in love, is life. I guess that this quote hangs on the student center in Scranton because it shows that while most of the people there do not "live" in Scranton they love (their school, friends, studies) there and in essence they are living there. Maybe DMilly from Philly can get the meaning of this for me!
I may be wrong, I may be right. I don't know. One thing I do know is that I am glad we are all home. Over the past few weeks we have certainly felt a lot of love from many different places. We saw it every day in the hospital, in our texts messages, heard it on phone calls and everywhere in between, However, I cannot begin to express the feeling of being back in our house, see Blaise in his bed and eating dinner together in our toy room (which is actually supposed to be a dining room). This where I breathe, love and live. Lucy and I have been home each night, but its not the same,the four of us where never really together, but now that Sheriff Woody has return, the whole Round Up Gang is back together.
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| Annie says I am the angry guy in the box... |
The hope is that now we can return to normalcy. Honestly, I am not sure when it will be normal again. I think we are creating a new normal, one that travels West Chester Pike between Havertown and West Philly. Our schedule will be packed; every Monday in the clinic for blood checks, PT twice a week, chemo every other week. Somewhere in there we're going to throw in a surgery on Blaise's leg. And this is the best case scenario. We were told to expect some hospitals stays, to expect set-backs but to keep plowing through. So say some prayers for Blaise, because he's the one plowing, we're just trying to keep him up right!
Chemo
Blaise finished his first cycle today. 1 down 13 to go. When I was a sophomore in high school, Mr. Dugan would flash his fingers down every Friday for the number of weeks we just completed. He would then flash his fingers up for the number of weeks left in school. It was crazy scene from an old man that could barely move. But it stuck with me. Today I flashed one finger down (probably not the most appropriate finger) and 13 up. It was ode to an old teacher and a reminder of how much more there is to go.
Blaise looked great today. I showed up to the hospital (30 minutes late for class) expecting a bald, sick little boy. Instead I saw Blaise mad at Nonie because she couldn't find his Toy Story guys. He looked great, he had a good day. He went to the art club and painted a picture frame. He worked with Rebecca the Child Life Specialist and she made some great in roads with him, you could see it on his face! She told us, "He's thinking this through, you can see the wheels turning." Blaise also decided to do some of the work for his nurses and scan his medicine in and out.
The first doctor to come in on rounds explained that kids do better with chemo because they can't psych themselves out of it. Basically, Blaise does not know what's going on, so he cannot sulk beforehand and make it worse. I don't buy that yet, because our primary oncologist came by and was shocked at how good he looked. He did have a few episodes of nausea, but all in all it was a fine day considering the drugs put into his body yesterday.
Class?
Yup, we had class today. Two of them for that matter, I was 30 minutes late for G-Tube Care class. Ironically enough it was taught by our neighbor, who I did not know. Annie and I learned how to care for the feeding tube in Blaise's belly. Its a neat little thing anchor by a few stitches and a balloon. They teased me in the end by saying in a few months I'll learn how to actually replace the tube. I am not sure how that works, but I'm sure I'll follow up!
We also has "syringe to syringe transfer" class. Blaise needs a shot 24-48 hours after each chemo treatment in order to boost his white blood cells. We were trained on how to administer that shot at home. I guess I am a nurse now, or a murse. "Paging nurse Focker, nurse Gay Focker!"
Lucy
Lucy spent the day shopping with Aunt Suz and Aunt Aly. She came home with tons of new clothes, but was really only interested in Blaise's stuff. She also fell three times in a 20 minutes and cried each time like her head fell off. She's fine, but nobody is happier Blaise is home than her.
St. John Neumann
In a really weird twist Annie just dropped some serious knowledge on me thanks to her friend Cara. Cara's family visited the shrine of St. John Neumann and got us a book and a few other things. For those of you that do know, I took the name John for Confirmation after my grandfather and the 4th bishop of Philadelphia. My grandfather was a few years ahead of John Neumann in school, but they were friends. Well Blaise as baby took a special liking to a little statue I have of him.
In this book, we learn that John Neumann's final miracle for sainthood was in 1963. That year a boy from Philadelphia was diagnosed with osteomyelits and sent home. This happened to Blaise! After a few months of not healing, it was found that Ewing's Sarcoma and given 6 months to live. His family visited the shrine, and after a few months the boy was found cured of the cancer. It was deemed a medical explainable. Welp, say your prayers to the 4th bishop of Philadelphia, founder of the first catholic school system and also apparent healer of Ewing Sarcoma!
Happy Ash Wednesday!
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| Blaise did get Ashes, his Bieber haircut covers them up though... |
