Jake Style to Caillou Style

At the beginning of the Day I was talking with Davin and started to explain that his hair was falling out a little. I asked him if he wanted to have a short hair cut or if he just wanted to let his hair fall out. He really doesn't like getting his hair cut so he decided to just let his hair fall out. Well by the afternoon his hair was getting everywhere! Everytime something brushed it a lot would come out, so Chad and I decided it was time for a shaving party. Chad talked Davin into having a short haircut. Holly and Tyson were on their way over to watch the kids while we were going to go to the store and we changed plans on them. :) While we were waiting Davin thought it was fun to pull his hair out and throw it all over, and so Chad decided to give him lobster claws so he couldn't pull the hair out anymore. It didn't last very long but he stopped pulling his hair out so it works. All of the grandparents came up with Uncle Dallin and Uncle Greg was there on the laptop through skype. Our hometeacher/friend came over also. He has a very short haircut most of the time and so he was willing to show Davin the difference between just the clippers and then shaving his head smooth. The other great thing was that he was willing to let Davin shave his head. Davin thought that was a lot of fun and his favorite part was putting on the shaving cream. He kept putting more and more on.

 

Davin decided that he just wanted the clippers haircut after Tim was done shaving his head and so we got him all set up. He sat on Grandpa's lap and I buzzed all of his hair off.

 

After we got all of his hair off he changed his mind and wanted to shave his own head. He went over and sat next to Tim and started putting on the shaving cream. He did a few rows of shaving his own head and then Chad helped him with the rest.

After they were done Davin gave Tim a big hug and Davin had a fun new haircut.

Once Davin was busy shaving his head we started shaving all the other boys. The first one after Davin was Uncle Tyson, then Grandpa Cloward, then Grandpa Bingham, then Uncle Dallin and last but not least Chad.

And here are all the boys with their shaved heads! Davin has so much support throughout all of this. It is awsome to see how much everyone loves this little boy.

After we were done with the shaving party we were inside saying goodbye to everyone and trying to get the boys their milk and start getting ready for bed when we had some more visitors. The mia maids had made us dinner and brought it over. They all wanted to see Davin and of course he was really shy and he went and hid behind the pillows on the couch. We invited them all in to have a pic with him, but Davin wouldn't look at the camera. We did get him to turn around for a split second to see if Grandpa had something on his head. :)

When we woke up the next morning Davin asked me when his hair would grow back. I felt really bad and I told him it would take a few months. He didn't really think anything of it and then told me that he thinks we should have a shaving party every night! Thanks to everyone who participated and made this little boys night.

Update

I'm sorry I haven't written very much lately, I just feel like I have been really busy and not a lot has been happening at the same time.

When we got home from the hospital I felt like I had so much information that I had to remember and keep track of my brain hurt. But it really hasn't been that bad. Davin has been a really strong boy and he hasn't had any problems. He hasn't felt sick or hurt. We have only had to give him med a few times. The nurses told me to keep the nausea med in him for two days and then start to take him off of it. Well Davin didn't think he needed the med. so he didn't take the med. He was off after a day and we have only had to give him some occasionally. One thing we had to start when we got home was a shot everyday. This shot is to help Davin's white blood cell count stay up. During chemo all fast multiplying cells are affected so the blood cells and hair cells are included with the cancer cells. Davin really didn't like getting his shot and fought us about it every time. After a while he started to get use to it and we didn't have to hold him down anymore and then he got to the point where he would help choose where the shot was going to be in his leg and he would choose which bandaid to put on. Finally on Monday the 20th Davin got some good news that he didn't have to have his shots any more because his blood count was high enough.

We had a nurse come out to the house twice a week and take blood and then we would get his blood counts later that day. The first time the nurse came out Davin was not happy. I was sick and wasn't around but Chad's Mom had come up to help Chad with the kids. It was a big help because Chad had to hold Davin down and Liam wasn't happy that his brother was so upset. Before the nurse comes out we have some numbing cream we put on his port to help him feel better about the poke but Davin still wasn't very happy this time, just like in the hospital. They got the blood taken and she also checked Davin's temp and blood pressure. After the nurse left and he had calmed down a little bit he said that next time he was going to be better and be her big helper. The next time she came Davin was a great boy! He didn't cry at all and just sat next to Daddy and let the nurse do what she needed to do. He still doesn't like when she has to clean it. They have to clean it a lot. But he was her big helper and he got to put the blood into the vial and shake it up and down slowly. Since that day he has been a really good boy and the nurses big helper.

The blood counts that we watch are, his ANC which is like his immunity level, his white blood cells, his red blood cells, and his platelets. At first his ANC and white blood cells were great and then after about a week and a half they started dropping, and we got his last blood draw before we go back to the hospital today and they were the lowest they have ever been. It makes me a little nervous but they are still at a very acceptable level. His red blood cells went down a little and have slowly been coming back up. The one I was the most worried about were his platelets. They went really low the lowest they got were 67 and they were still ok and they said they wouldn't do a transfusion until they got down to 20 but I was still worried. The good news is that the latest test came back above 300 so I was a lot happier about that.

The original plan for Davin's chemo was that we were going to go back in tomorrow the 29th and Davin would stay overnight and then come home but the oncologists decided that it might be better for Davin if he just came into the clinic and did the chemo during the day and then he would get to go home that night. I asked him what he wanted to do and he decided to just go during the day and not have another sleepover at the hospital. So instead of the 29th we are going in on Friday the 31st. It will be a long day but the nice thing is that we won't be at the hospital getting woken up every two hours to go to the bathroom all night. :)

Davin's hair started to thin on Thursday the 23rd. At first it was just a little bit when we got him out of the shower but as the days went on, more and more kept falling out, until today everytime he touched something a lot would come out. By the end of the day a lot of his hair on the top of his head was gone. So this evening we decided to have a head shaving party. I will post more about that tomorrow with pics of everyone who joined in and before and after pics.

I hope I covered everything that has been important in the last few weeks. We get to start again on Friday and hopefully Davin will be just as strong of a fighter and won't get sick again.

Last Day of Treatment One

The nurses came in at 8 to take vitals and listen to Davins heart and everything. I was really mad because I wish they would have just waited a little longer until he was awake because he wasn't able to go back to sleep. He would have slept longer and I could have slept a little longer also. Davin was feeling great and wanted to go play right away. I made him wait until I was ready and then the first thing he wanted to do was do more art projects. He had so much fun with all of the art supplies. I have a bucket full of papers with random things all over them. We also played a lot of games that he got from relatives. We played dino bingo, a big floor puzzle and a fishing game. During the day was had a lot of people come talk with us about everything making sure we were ready to go home and we had numbers if we had questions or needed something. By this time my brain was so full I felt like I knew everything and nothing all at the same time. Everyone kept asking me if I had questions and I didn't know if I had questions because I didn't even know what I should ask. The social worker was really nice and kept telling me it was ok and totally normal to feel like that and kept reminding me that I can call anyone and they will answer my questions when I had them.

During the day, Davin was playing in his room and I went out into the hall to ask the nurse a questions and Elliot the therapy dog was there. He was there to see another little kid but the nurse told him he couldn't see the dog. Since Elliot didn't have anything to do I asked if Davin could see him. The nurse said yes and the trainer said "Where to?". Davin was excited to see Elliot. Elliot even got up on his bed with him. Davin sat and pet the dog and hugged him. He got to feed him a treat again and he had a blast having the dog hang out for a little bit.

One time when Davin was playing in the room he had gotten the tubes all wrapped up around the IV tower and then he decided it was a good time to climb up over the end of the bed. As he was coming up he was having a hard time and I tried to help him. As I lifted him up I felt the tubes pull and I realized he was stuck. When I looked at his chest I noticed that the needle had come out of the port. We had to get a nurse in right away and help us access the port again. It was really tramatic for Davin. He didn't even have any of the numbing cream on it. They did have a spray that makes the spot really cold so that it isn't as painfull but he still complained that it hurt. I felt really bad. It was too bad that he had one more dose of chemo to do or we could have left it out.

Davin had done so well with the chemo that the doctor told us that we could bump up his chemo another hour plus the two they were planning on so that he could start at 2 instead of 3. That was really happy because we were all ready to be home. We waited and waited for the nurse to come finish my teaching and give Davin the last of the chemo, but she was really busy with something and kept telling us she would be right in and it just took forever. About 45 min later we finally started the last dose of chemo and Davin was walking all over the room playing with everything. The nurse told me to just read the sections in the book that I needed to and sign the paper saying I understood the things I read and that would be the end of my teaching. That wasn't helpful at all! Luckily the nurse from the night before had talked about a lot of the information and I just looked up a little bit of things I needed some more info on. After the chemo was done Chad and I started to pack up and get ready to leave. We signed the discharge papers and were off. We left the hospital right in time for rush hour traffic.


We actually made it home fairly fast. When we got home we had a fun suprise left on the garage door. The neighbor kids had made a big welcome home sign and colored pictures on it. Davin thought it was fun. When I went outside to take pics he had to come out too and be part of the pics. That night Davin played with Liam and all the toys that he hadn't seen all week. We got to bed a little later than normal but we were all happy that we got to be together and not in the hospital where they were constantly waking us up. I did wake up in the middle of the night and checked on Davin. He had a full diaper so I decided to change it because I didn't want to deal with everything cleaning it up in the morning if it leaked. Davin is so use to having his diaper changed when he is sleeping. He doesn't open his eyes and he lifts up his bum and everything. It was kind of cute and sad. I'm just glad that he got a good night sleep.

 

Day 2 of chemo

Davin had his scan at 8 in the morning so I woke up at 7 (when he had to get up and go potty) to get ready. He woke up at 7:45 and I thought it was the perfect time. When I went to ask about the scan the nurses told me that they weren't ready for us and that they would let us know when they were ready for us. At 8:30 the nurses told me that they would be ready at 9. We went down there an hour late and they made us wait in a waiting room forever. When we went back to the scanning room they started to put Davin to sleep and that takes a while and Davin needs a lot of med. to fall asleep. They had to use three different med. just like they did when he did his MRI and he finally was asleep. I got to stay in the room this time and watch. It was kind of nice to be with him and know what was going on. As he was falling asleep he peed and this time he didn't have a diaper on. It was a huge mess and we had to undress him all the way and that took a while to clean everything up and set it all back up. We finally got it all ready and started the scan.
When the scan had about 5 min left Davin started waking up. They gave him more med. to make him calm down and go back to sleep. As we were finishing and waiting for Davin's bed the tech was saying how we couldn't wait for the bed because Davin and I were late coming down for his scan and he had two people waiting to come into the room. That really frustrated me because we had waiting for an hour for them to tell us they were ready. The bed made it just in time and we were able to put him onto his bed and went back up to his room. We had a nurse that came with us to be with Davin and watch his vitals until he woke up. Because they had to give him more med. right at the end he was really asleep. It took him a long time to wake up. It was almost 12:30 before he was all the way to wake up.

Chad was at home with Liam all morning with my parents. When he was ready to come up everyone decided to come up and visit Davin. The boys were so happy to see each other. I love seeing how much they love each other. Davin showed them everything he had been doing and took Liam to play in the little playroom on the floor. He started doing an art project with my mom and Liam loved playing with kitchen. At the end they boys found little cars and were both driving all around the halls in them. After all the playing I got to go home with Liam and my parents. It took forever to get home. I had no idea that there would be so much traffic at 3:30 in the afternoon. It was nice to be home and relax a litle bit. At 6:30 I left and went back up to the hospital to stay with Davin again.

Chad was with Davin while they started chemo. He did great and didn't get sick again! He went to sleep great and I started my discharge teaching. I learned a ton and by the end my brain was so full. There is so much that you have to watch for when your child is going through chemo. It makes you really paranoid and you feel like you have to lock your kid in a bubble. But that isn't realistic so we just have to watch him carefully. The second night was so much better for sleeping. Everytime the nurse came it to make Davin go potty he had a wet diaper so he just changed it and I didn't have to really wake up at all. I got to sleep for 6 hours until Davin woke up and started doing his working noise. I finally asked him if there was something wrong and he said "no, I'm just singing a song." He kept doing it and I finally couldn't sleep anymore so I got up to try and rub his back and make him go back to sleep. I touched his side to help him roll over and found out he was drenched. We got everything cleaned up and got Davin back in bed and he went to sleep instantly. We got to sleep a little more until the nurses came in at 8 and had to check davin's vitals and woke him up.

Starting Chemo

Wed. morning we came up to the hospital. We went to get Davin's contrast injection before we were admitted like the doctor had told me. We got there and they gave him a little oral contrast and then we decided to wait on the injection because they didn't want to give him an IV and access his port later so they told us to get the port accessed and then they would come give him the contrast. That was all a little confusing but we left and tried to figure out where we were suppose to go next. We found the right section of the hospital where we would be staying but they weren't ready for us (we were early) They told us that we had a hearing test scheduled and sent us over there. Davin got his ears tested as a base line to watch as he is getting chemo. Hearing loss is one of the side affects for one of the drugs that he was going to get. Chad and I really didn't want anything to happen to his ears and were really frustrated that this could be a side affect. Davin's hearing was great and he even got a big ABC puzzle.

After we did the hearing test they had our room ready for us. We came back and they got us all set up in the room. One of the first things we did was access Davin's port. He really didn't like it and there were three of us holding him down and he screamed. But we got it done and now he doesn't have to get any more pokes while he is here. They started giving him lots of fluids. One thing that they want to watch with chemo is that Davin is going potty every 2 hours, so he has to be well hydrated. While we were waiting for all the liquid to go in we watched some tv, played lego star wars, and he did some art projects where he cut and glued paper and pompoms and pipe cleaners together. He also made a book that he titled "All About Me" he drew a picture on all the pages and he tells a different story everytime he reads it.

We had lots of nurses and doctors come and talk to us and explain all of the med. that Davin was going to get and all the side affects of each one. The first night he was going to get two different chemo drugs, and the next two days he would only get one of them. The chemo drugs go in like an IV through his port and they take an hour to go into his body. We started his chemo at 7 pm, and he was done with both at 9:30 and sleeping by then. The nurse had to wake Davin up every two hours during the night and make him go potty. It was really hard and at 2 Davin was really tired and really didn't want to go potty. We worked with him for about 45 min. until we got him to go. From then on everytime he got up he didn't want to go potty. It was a fight but we got him to go in the potty or in his diaper.

The first day of chemo was a success. Davin did a great job and he didn't even get sick at all!

Davin's Party Before starting Chemo

Davin had a pinata that he had wanted to do for his birthday and we hadn't gotten around to doing it yet and so as a last fun thing before starting chemo we invited his neighborhood friends over and had a pinata breaking party. Davin was really excited and everyone had a ton of fun. The pinata was really hard to break we even broke the stick trying to get into it. The oldest neighbor boy ended up doing most of the breaking and then there was still a lot that didn't fall out so I ended up digging all the rest out. Davin had a ton of fun and it was the perfect little party before he had to spend the next few days in the hospital.

 

Davin's fighting story

Throughout all of this we haven't told Davin much of what is going on. He knew that he had something in is tummy and that it was making him sick. Whenever he gets sick Chad has always explained it to him as good guys and bad guys. And the med. we give him makes the good guys stronger to fight the bad guys. Well Davin is really into Star Wars right now so I have been thinking of a way to tell him what is going on in a way that he would understand it. So this is how I explained it to him:

Davin has really bad guys in his tummy (the cancer cells). They are the dark lords of the sith, so the emperor, and Darth Vader and general grievous. And these bad guys are making a big city in his tummy (the benign parts of the tumor). We are going to send in the Jedi (the chemo drugs) to kill the bad guys. Davin has chosen some like Luke, Mace Windu, Obi Wan, and Yoda. We have told him that the doctors are going to send the Jedi in through his bump (the port) and they are going to kill the bad guys. While the good guys and bad guys fight he can feel a little sick and sleepy, but mommy and daddy can give him med. to help him feel a little better. After the Jedi go and kill all of the bad guys the doctors have to go in and get the rest of the city that wasn't destroyed in the fight (which will be the ending surgery).

Davin liked the story and was really excited to get the Jedi in so that they could kill The Emperor. The one part he wasn't so excited about was taking out the city at the end. We have talked a lot about it and convinced him that it is easier to take it out then have the Jedi destroy it all. I think that this story has helped Davin understand what we are doing and how important it is. Hopefully it will also help him fight off the cancer cells and help his body while he is going through everything in the next few weeks.

The Results

Tuesday July 31st we got the results from the pathology. They did find some cancer cells and Davin has Ganglioneuroblastoma. We did an MRI the day before and all the doctors had looked at that and come to the conclusion that Davin's tumor is too large and too involved with the bones at the base of his spine to just go in and remove it. The surgery would be really difficult, risky, and involve many specialty surgeons, so they wanted to do two cycles of chemo to shrink the tumor enough so that they can remove it easier.

Dr. Elderidge our oncologist also said that because of the kind of cancer Davin has they have a special scan that they wanted to do. It is called a MIBG. They give Davin some contrast one day and then the next day he goes in and She said it was kind of like the MRI, and it should light up all of the cancer cells so that they can see where those cells are exactly. Dr. Elderidge has scheduled that for Wed. Aug. 8th and then his scan is on the 9th.

Chad and I were really sad about the fact that we had to do chemo. We were really hoping that they would just do the surgery and we would be done with everything except recovery from surgery in a week. Instead we are facing two months of chemo and then a surgery. Not fun!

Later that night Dr. Elderidge called me again and told me that she had set things up to admit Davin to the hospital on Wed. when he comes up for the contrast and he would start his chemo treatments. As far as I know (I will learn more on Wed.) the treatments start with Davin staying at the hospital for 3-4 days. Durning his stay he gets a dose of the chemo drugs everyday. The first time there will be a lot of teaching both for us and for Davin. After those few days we go home and try and help Davin not be too sick. We will also have to watch his blood count. Dr. Elderidge said that we could possibly do that at home and if we can't we would have to go up to the hospital a few times.

Today Chad talked with the surgeon and he said that we probably won't do more than the two cycles of chemo. So hopefully we can plan on doing a surgery to get the tumor out around the end of Sept. We still don't know how sick Davin will be or if he will loose his hair. From things that Chad and I have read most people start loosing their hair within 1-3 weeks of starting chemo. We will just have to see how well Davin reacts to the drugs. I am hoping he won't be too sick because he never acts sick when he is. Hopefully he will just be a little sleepier and not too grumpy.

As for visitors we can't let anyone come over that is sick. We really don't want Davin to have a harder time being sick than he has too. Another sad part is that Davin won't get his wish for a puppy as soon as he was hoping. They have told us not to introduce any new allergens of any kind which include puppies. But we will get through this and it will really only be for a short time.  

The hospital stay

I got to go back and be with Davin while he was waking up from surgery. He kept throwing up a little in his mouth and choking on it. He was really tired and kept falling asleep and then would wake up again and look at me and go back to sleep. After they had monitored him for a while they got us our room and we to the hall where we got to meet Daddy and went upstairs. He slept for a while and then woke up and wanted to eat something. Which was really nice. He had a few shortbread cookies and some apple juice. The nurse went and found him some movies she thought he might like. He ended up half watching half sleeping through Bob the Builder. My parents came up and got to see him and hang out for a little while. After the movie was over I turned it off because Davin was asleep but he woke up a few min. later and got really mad at me for turning his movie off. He was still watching it and couldn't believe that I would just turn it off in the middle. :)

Around 6:30 Chad's family came to see Davin and brought Liam to see his brother. Both brothers were happy to see each other. It has been really hard the past few days not being able to be together as a family, and Davin and Liam are almost always together. At 7 they made us change rooms and we had a big parade with everyone following us all the way down the hall. I liked this new room because it was a lot bigger and our cell phones worked better. (they don't work very well when we are up at the hospital) Holly and Tyson were super sweet and went and got food for me and Chad. We hadn't eaten all afternoon and hadn't really even thought about it. After everyone got to talk for a while, and the boys played with a few presents Chad's parents left with Liam. It was getting late but Davin was having his dinner and watching movies. He wasn't acting sleepy at all. The nurses really wanted him to get up a walk a little so right before the playroom closed we got him to walk into the hall to get into a wagon and the nurse wheeled him over to see all the fun toys that he could play with tomorrow if he wanted to go back. The people at the playroom were nice and let him borrow a few bags of toys to take back to his room. He got some legos and some dinos. When we got back Davin played with the toys for a while and then Chad and I decided it was getting late enough that we should start trying to go to bed.

The nurse wanted to give Davin some lortab before bed so that he didn't need med. as often. That was the biggest fight ever! He hadn't even tasted it and he was refusing to. We ended up holding him down and he screamed as the nurse gave it to him. NOT FUN. I was hoping that the med. would make him sleepy and we could all get some rest between the nurses checking on Davin all night. But that was not the case. He watched some more movies and played with his new leap pad. And finally at midnight I went and asked if we could do some more med. that would help him go to sleep.  After that he went to sleep fairly quickly. That night was probably the worst night of sleep I have ever had. By the time I would fall asleep (I was having a really hard time making my brain stop thinking) someone would come in. They came in at 4 to check on him and then at 6 for blood work and then at 8 the team of surgeons came in. We tried to sleep until then and decided it was worthless so we got up and started to get ready.

Davin still didn't want the lortab so we tried to give him motrin instead. He took that a lot better! The nurse told Davin that he needed to walk 4 times and then he could go home. She even made him little boxes to check off on the board. We tried and tried all day to bribe him with something to get him to get out of bed. We also had to bribe him with things to take his med. The first time he got out of bed  was a reward for taking his med. A therapy dog named Elliot came to say hi and the nurse said he couldn't come into the room and Davin had to come say hi to the dog.  Davin cried the whole time. The dog was soooooo good! The trainer gave Davin a treat to feed Elliot. Davin dropped it probably 5 times before he was able to hold steady enough for Elliot to eat it out of his hand. And Elliot didn't even try and grab it when it dropped. Davin petted Elliot just a little and then wanted to get back in bed. The other two times he got out of bed the nurses made him walk down the hall and look out the window. He got to see the trax train, but didn't really care and cried the whole time. While we were waiting in the room trying to get Davin to walk he got a surprise that was sent by his Great Aunt Lynette.  It was a bear with a balloon tied around his neck. Davin loved it. After he got it I don't think we got him to let go of it.

It was getting late into the afternoon and the nurse wanted to let us go even though Davin had only gotten up to walk 3 times. We started filling out the discharge papers when Davin tells Chad "I need to poo" He sad up and got out of bed and walked into the bathroom. I was packing everything up so that we could leave when Davin comes out and says "ok I'm ready to go now" I ask him if he wants to sit in his stroller while I finish gathering everything, and he says no. He also told me that he didn't want to sit in the stroller to go home, he wanted to walk all the way to the car. We got everything ready and left. Chad had to go pick up Davin's med. from the pharmacy so Davin and I walked around a little bit and went outside to the fountain. With a penny that we found in the room Davin made a wish "I wish for a new puppy". It almost broke my heart, he was so cute just saying his wish out loud. After he made his wish he wanted to back to the garden we had sat in the day before. We walked in and saw the fountain. He was very disappointed because there weren't any birds so we didn't stay very long. Daddy still wasn't done getting the med. and Davin was really ready to be home so he told me he wanted to walk to the car. When Chad showed up we were all ready to go. Davin had walked all the way from his room to the car all by himself. :)

The biopsy

Thursday morning Chad, Davin and I leave and go back up to the hospital for Davin's surgery. He is not scared at all and is actually really happy and excited. Chad talked to him a little bit and told him that he was going to go with the doctor and get to wear a "Darth Vader" mask and take a nap. And after his nap we get to have a sleepover at the hospital. Davin thinks things couldn't be better. We went into the preop room where he got his vitals taken and got fun new pajamas. After that we got to go sit in the waiting room to go back into surgery. Grandpa Bingham and Grandma Taggart bought Davin a new cars lego and so while we waited for the surgeon to come talk to us we decided to put it together. It had three different parts to it and Davin put it all together by himself before the doctor came to talk with us. Davin was so happy and everyone kept asking us if he had gotten any medicine to help him calm down. But he hadn't he was just really excited about his mask and nap. When the doctor came, he told Davin a little of what he was going to do. He told him about cutting him and putting in the port and told him he was going to get a few pokes. After that Davin was really afraid and kept telling us he didn't want any pokes. We felt really bad and just kept telling him not to worry about it. When the anesisiologist came to get him Chad walked Davin away just a little trying to keep him calm and I told the doctor not to mention any more pokes. After that we were good. Davin chose a car to drive down the hallway and into the surgery room. The anesisiologist was super nice and tried to make it really fun and was racing with him and different things.

Chad and I went down and had some lunch while they were doing the surgery. It was really nice to not have to sit in the waiting room the whole time. When we got back to the waiting room we had a social worker waiting to talk to us. She had been asigned to us to help us deal with the huge change. It was really good to talk with her and she asked a lot of questions about Davin and what his personality is. After we were done talking it was just a few min. of waiting before the surgeon came to talk to us.

Dr. Barnhart was really happy. He was smiling while he was telling us what he discovered. While they were in the operation he said that they found out it wasn't what they thought it was. BIG SUPRISE! He said it was the other cancer that we really didn't want. Chad and I got really worried but then Dr. Barnhart started to explain why he was so happy. He said that in very rare forms of this cancer it develops through different kinds of cancer and as it develops it kind of kills off the cancer cells. The little piece of the biopsy that they looked at under the microscope didn't have any cancer cells in it. So he was saying he thinks it is either Ganglioneuroma which doesn't have any cancer cells or Ganglioneuroblastoma which has very few cancer cells. From what they found they wanted to wait for the pathology/results from the rest of the biopsy and then he was thinking we could just go in and do another surgery and take it out and not have to do any chemo! Chad and I are really excited about this news and can't believe it. Miracles do come true!

We still had to wait until all of the tests were complete before we knew exactly what Davin had and how we needed to treat it. That is probably the hardest part because the tests weren't going to be done for another 4-5 days.