It seems both simultaneously long and short since we began this journey. Remember the friend of the friend who I mentioned was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer the other day? She went to SCCA today to start her process- port placement, etc. Hearing her words of the shock of being at the center brought back a whole slew of memories from waayyyy back when we started. The shock of people at the center. The shock of actually being there in general. It's amazing how the novelty of that shock wore off so quickly to where now we are pretty immune to it.
The day was pretty normal by all accounts- Oliver felt tired and yucky, but that is about status quo or how he should feel. I am in a conference that I attend annually- this year based out of Washington DC, which is ROUGH given it starts at 5am Washington state time! The kids had a blast playing around in typical summer days. They set up a "track" to race... I mean, looks totally safe, right?
I decided to attend the conference online this year, just due to how things are going with Oliver-- that way I would be local and not 2000 miles away, for the just in case. TURNS OUT. Great decision. At around 5:30pm, Oliver spiked a 101 degree fever which continued to rise. By 6:30 it was 101.6. Colleen called SCCA who told them to go in right away. His white blood cell counts were so low earlier (almost neutropenic), so likely could be an infection given the fever. Justin, Colleen and Oliver headed in to the hospital for what is hopefully one last hurrah of that fun! Around 9pm, Justin texts to ask if I could come bring Oliver's car and pick him up because his fever was down to 99 and the ER was being incredibly slow at finding resolution (fast track: it took 7 hours for them to be released....) The kids and I were just heading to bed, but I think Justin felt bad about promising to be there for them, and given that every was "static" and likely Oliver would not be admitted, we were considering the 4am wake up calls for us both to work tomorrow morning. Turns out that they think Oliver has an infection ("general") and so sent him home with antibiotics after midnight.
We were lucky that we got to see a beautiful sunset on the way to/from the hospital!
We were just headed to bed, and I threw the kids in the car without shirts or shoes to head down. Ha!
And while there, Colleen and Oliver picked up a matching gown for Owen!
After a bit of a climax for this last day of infusions, given the unexpected hospital trip, I have decided that this is going to be the last DAILY update on Oliver's journey. It has never been my story to tell and I have mentioned before that it has been awkward at times telling such intimate details, even if I do live some of them personally. At this point, we are expecting the next couple of weeks to follow how the last couple of rounds recoveries have gone... lots of nausea, lots of fatigue, but mostly resting and powering through to heal. I started this forum to update everyone on how Oliver is doing, and it has served its purpose well. However, I am not sure that there will be many updates to post in the next couple of weeks that are very revolutionary other than the above- so my updates would mostly be pictures of Oliver on the couch saying: same old.. I will continue to post on an intermittent basis if there is anything "out of the ordinary" and obviously will post upon once we have the "next steps" and plan.
This has been a good resurgence of blogging so, that said, I will continue to post as I am able to about what's going on in our life- spoiler alert- it's mostly kids and looks a lot like the above. I won't be linking those posts to facebook so just check back here, and often, for anyone who cares to see new posts.
This has been a journey. I have a feeling it is far from over. I can't even put in to words how far we've come. And I likely have no concept, really, of how far we have to go. But for now, we head in to the last unofficial week of chemo which is the recovery period, and we fill hope-filled at what might lie ahead. As we march onward, we are lifted up and supported by the team that has surrounded us: the doctors, the hospitals, family, friends, supporters WE DON'T EVEN KNOW. All of these people have offered pieces of themselves to allow us the ability to continue on in this journey. We've learned more than we thought possible. We've shown strength when we felt weak. We kept going even when we felt like quitting. Above all, we have to believe we accomplished the main goal: healing. #oliverstrong
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