The End Is Near

7:30 am

"Sara...hello...where is everyone?"

"Snort...huh...oh, NO!"

...and thus we started our day, woken out of a dead sleep by my Mom, who came to watch Tessa while I took Alex to his 8:30am appointment.

I jumped out of bed, got some breakfast in the kids, and Alex and I headed up the hill to get his monthly dose of poison injected into his veins.

Alex has had a cough, and had been so tired the last few days, that I wasn't sure what to expect with his counts. They came in at 3,400 - WAY too high again. So, our doctor notched Alex's Mercaptapurine dose up, and started to talk to us about end-of-treatment.

Before we could begin, I wanted to bring up an issue that was really concerning me and Eric. Alex had developed what seemed like classic teenage acne all over his cheeks. We also were noticing quite a stench in his bedroom (teenage boy stench). I did some research on the issue, and discovered that precocious puberty is a possibility for children treated for cancer at such a young age. Precocious puberty means that his body hits puberty MUCH too early, and can stunt growth, and can have other complications.

Now, don't everyone freak out on me here. He didn't have radiation to the brain, so this could just be that Alex is a stinky kid, who needs to shower every single day... (smile)

The doctor examined Alex and ordered some additional blood tests to check for abnormal hormone levels. We should have the results in a few days. If he does have this, well, it will be a breeze compared to cancer. He would just be on hormone suppressing medicine, until it was the "normal" time for him to hit puberty.

So, back to end-of-treatment issues. Alex will have his final dose of Vincristine on 11/17/2010. His final pill will be a steroid pill on 11/23/2010. I guess we go out with a BANG! He will get his Port out soon after, but will continue to have blood draws once a month for the next 12 months. Then, it will go to once every 3 months, then every 6 months, then every year.

For the rest of his life.

In three months, we will stop the doses of Septra each weekend. In six months, his body should be fully recovered from the Chemo, and we can "catch him up" on his immunizations.

This was an aggressive cancer, and if it was to come back, it most likely would be "relatively quickly" (whatever that means). What they DO know is that they DON'T know if it will return. We hope he will be one of the 80-90% who are cured for good. Every month that he has a clean bill of health, we will be one month closer to "cured". I asked "when can we start using that 'c' word, you know, 'cured'?" Our doctor wasn't sure if it was 5 years from diagnosis, or 5 years from end of treatment. She was going to get back to me with the answer. I'll let you all know.

Either way, the end of active cancer treatment is approaching quickly. The ripples from his treatment will continue on for years...

I guess we truly never will be done with cancer.

I just want cancer to be done with Alex.

PS - to read more about precocious puberty, click HERE.