Dad’s Entry:

Since so much was going on with our daughter, it took us a few days to get this blog together. During this time, we were periodically providing updates via Facebook, text messages and phone calls, and some might have missed those updates. Below is a recap of our families first few days in the hospital. Some of these I was able to get from Facebook posts, and others I am just writing from memory.

Saturday August 3^rd:

The amount of people that are praying & the compassion we have received from emails, calls, texts and private messages bring me to tears and thankfulness! I promise we will read all the texts and messages when we are able.
Below are answers to some of the most asked questions

* Yes, we will start a blog you can follow about k’s progress with daily updates to help Chris and I feel sane.
*We will be living in the hospital for a minimum of 4 weeks.
*Kaylee begins chemo Monday August 5^th, at 9am.
*K was diagnosed with “B cell A.L.L Leukemia on August 1st.” It was a huge shock to us & news we were expected to absorb very quickly. Not easy.
*Yes, we would love for you to tell others to pray & share her story with your church. God is bigger than Cancer & prayer can produce miracles!

The blood work came back in today, and her white blood cell count is 106,400, down from 159,000 on the day of diagnosis (normal is 5,000 to 10,000). She is considered high risk leukemia, which is a WBC of 50,000 or higher. Also, her blood was 90% white blood cells, which have turned into leukemia cells.

She will receive her second blood transfusion tonight. After the first blood transfusion, she was acting like our little girl again. She sat up in bed until 10:30 PM last night playing and laughing; that was the first time we smiled in two days!

Sunday August 4^th:

We have been having family and friends come and visit all day long. Some tears have been shed and some prayers have been said, but we have all remained positive knowing that God will get our family through this.

We took Kaylee outside to play in the garden, which raised her spirits and ours. For a second, we felt like it was just a regular Sunday playing outside with our daughter. She also got to see her cousin today, Micah. As soon as he entered the room, she got this big smile that lit up the room and yelled out “Icah” (her version of Micah). Micah brought a remote control car for them to play with today, and as he raced it across the room, she chased it laughing the entire time; this warmed all of our hearts! Our hearts stopped though as she tripped over the car falling on her face, giving her a bloody nose and lip. Mom tried to lunge for her as she was falling, but it happened so quickly, she couldn’t catch her. Because Kaylee’s platelet count was soooo low (clotting part of the blood), we started freaking out; the doctor’s calmed us down telling us she would be all right, and to just watch it over the next hour. She did end up with a black and blue nose, but 15 minutes later she was ready to play again.

Today’s blood results came in, and her WBC is down to 49,010 (praise God!); that is a 66% drop since the day she came in. She is still considered high risk, since she was above 50,000 when she came in, but the doctors said this is a good sign. Her platelet count is still low at 49,000, and we need it to be at least 100,000 for her surgery.

They will check her blood levels in the morning to make sure she is good before her spinal tap, bone marrow aspiration (extraction), port installation and first injection of Chemo in her spine. Once she has recovered from surgery, she gets four other chemo medications throughout the day. Let’s pray for her platelet levels to go up, or she will need another platelet transfusion at 4AM.

Monday August 5^th:

At 4 AM, blood was drawn. By 6 AM, the results were in, and her platelet count was 102,000!! She will not need another platelet transfusion!

At around 9 AM, we followed Kaylee into the pre-op room. We think she felt our anxiety, because she sat there and cried, and wouldn’t let go of mom the entire time. They gave her something to calm her nerves, and within 30 seconds, she was as calm as could be. After a few questions with the surgeon, we hugged our daughter tight, gave her a kiss, and watched them wheel her away; this was probably one of the hardest things we ever had to do.

After one hour, the nurses came to our room and told us the surgery went well, and she was in the post op room; she would have to wait there by herself for about 30 minutes to make sure she is ok, and then they would bring her back to the room. The nurse also told us that after they were done in the OR, Kaylee woke up and said… “All done!” to which they replied “All done”, she then closed her eyes and fell back asleep. If that doesn’t melt your heart, I don’t know what will!!

When they brought her back to the room, we noticed that she was VERY puffy and bright red. After the doctors monitored her for about an hour, she started to get a fever (101.5). They told us it was probably a reaction to the anesthesia, and gave her Benadryl. We also decided to do our part, and ask everyone to pray about it, and within 30 minutes the fever was gone; within 1 hour the swelling went down, and her face started to go back to her normal color.

Over the next few hours, she started to receive her first round of Chemo therapy. As the doctors told us, this round of treatments were very anti-climactic, which was a blessing. Kaylee went through this round of treatment without any bad side effects, and she was a trooper the entire time. This just showed us how strong our little girl really was, and that the Lord was giving her the strength she needed to make it through this tough time!

#Pray4K

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. – 2 Corinthians 1:3-4