Duffy/Mom Blogging

Sorry for the delay~

This week has gone pretty well. We were so blessed to have my mom and stepdad drive in from Florida for a quick visit. A few days before their visit, my dad was here recovering from knee surgery, so K has had quite a bit of attention, which is always good. I took my dad back to his place on Sunday afternoon, and my mom and stepdad arrived Sunday night. My mom and Ron were determined to try everything to get K to eat more this week & gain weight. Kaylee has so much fun with them and is such a Grandpa’s girl! Their last night in town, they made sure Chris and I were able to get out for a very overdue date night, so that was a blessing as well! Mom and Ron headed home on Thursday morning, and K had a short chemo appt scheduled on Friday (Oct 18^th.)

We arrived early for a change, and K knows now as soon as her name is called, that means someone is going to prick her finger to draw blood, weigh her and check her height, bp and temp. She automatically starts to pout and then sticks out her bottom lip as soon as we sit down in the small vitals room. The crying begins as soon as K sees the nurse put on the blue gloves before they prick her finger. Great news though, Kaylee gained ½ a pound! Thank the Lord for that answered prayer! We were taken back to the chemo room to wait for her blood results. When K’s Oncologist came to meet with us, we learned that K’s platelet count was still relatively ok, but her hemoglobin count was very low. The Dr said that I would need to take K to get local labs (blood draw) done on Monday (tomorrow) because she would most likely need a blood transfusion at the latest; on Tuesday. K’s ANC count was also quite low, so we needed to be a bit more cautious about where we took her over the wknd, and be on the lookout for a probable fever (which would land us back in the hospital~ no thank you.) We found out that the only chemo K was scheduled for that day was Cytarabine (also known as Ara-C) which is the same injection we have had to give her. The Dr said “As soon as we get you the chemo injections for the week, you can head home and do the injection yourself tonight if you want, or wait and we can do it in a few minutes.” At the same time that Chris said “Yeah that would be good!” I was saying “No, no, no.” (I cannot stand giving her chemo injections, it breaks my heart, and I honestly would rather they just give her the injection and get it over with.) Chris won out that discussion and as soon as we got the things we needed for her chemo injections this week, we headed home.

Other than looking very ghost-like all weekend, K has been very happy and energetic!( <– also an answer to our nightly prayers) She had a blast at Chris’s cousin’s baby shower today, and she loved getting so much attention. She played and “talked” to her cousin Avrie most of the time today (Avrie is only 3 months younger than Kaylee, so it is always heartwarming & amusing to see those two together!) Much to our disappointment, K isn’t eating well at all again, and I continue to pray desperately for her appetite to increase. (For those that have asked, we have tried everything from every supplement drink that a kid under the age of 2 can drink, milkshakes (she won’t drink them), junk food, protein, fruits, desserts, veggies, carbs….you name it~ we have tried it.) I never thought I would be as excited as I was, when she ate 2 small pancakes I made for her this morning for breakfast! Apparently when going through chemo, all food tastes very metallic, and chemo takes away your hunger anyway, so imagine when you finally do get hungry and your food tastes like you are eating a battery! I wouldn’t want to eat either, poor thing! 😦

So, tomorrow I will be taking her to get blood drawn at a local lab and most likely will be taking her to the Children’s Hospital Clinic for a blood transfusion once we get her report back. We also have a short chemo day scheduled for Friday. Side-note, Kaylee turns 20 months old on Thursday! (Wow, so hard to believe she’ll be 20 months old already!)

So, our prayer requests this week are for: God’s complete healing of K’s cancer, K’s appetite to increase so she doesn’t lose any weight, for her to be calm tmwr during blood work, for her to be calm at the clinic for the blood transfusion on Tuesday and chemo on Friday. We are praying for the chemo not to affect her negatively in any way. We are praying that we can find a way to make these nightly chemo injections somewhat easier on all 3 of us. Of course we are still praying that Kaylee will continue being the energetic fighter that she already has shown us that she is. We are so thankful for sooooo many things that the Lord has shown us during this journey so far, and are blown away by how many people are touched by her story! We continue to fight this disease with our daughter, pray with and for our daughter and try to instill positivity and happiness into her daily life!

Thank you for keeping up with our story, sharing our story, praying for Kaylee, and helping her kick cancers butt!! GODS GOT THIS…we just need to pray!

#PRAY4K

Bible verse we have picked out for K’s Battle

Jeremiah 29:11~ “For I know the plans I have for you” says the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”