It's not uncommon for men and women to lose weight and thereby reduce their pant size or dress size--usually a desireable event--but I've never known a baby to lose a diaper size...until now.
Talitha is trying to eat a little each day but it's not keeping pace so the feeding tube gets to stay around for a while yet.
Encouragingly, Talitha's white blood cell count (finally) showed an increase in this morning's blood draw. If the increase continues tomorrow morning they say chances are good Talitha will come home for a few days.
The count this morning was 200; when it gets back up to 1,000 she gets to start the whole process over again for induction cycle #2. For the sake of perspective, when she left the hospital on January 24th after a week of chemotherapy, her count was at 2,700; the low end of the "normal" spectrum for white blood cell count in a child is 6,000.
It seems harsh to hit her with the chemo guns again so soon, but if they don't, it gives the bad guys (cancer cells) time to regroup and dig in with greater resistance. You kind of have to keep the bad guys on the run and confused or they wise up and figure out new ways to get you.
In many ways it's like fighting evil. If the evil can find a way to work its way into your life without you seeing it for what it really is, it can wreak havoc on you. But identification is only the first step. Once you see it for what it is, you have a choice: (1) ignore it and pretend it's not there cause it doesn't seem so bad and nothing's really that wrong, or (2) aggressively fight it till it's gone...REALLY gone. (And that takes time and sometimes it's a repetative process that can hurt.)
We've had to face the harsh reality that even one un-killed cancer cell left over after Talitha's treatment spells disaster. That's why the oncologists aren't messing around.
I'm starting to see a spiritual corollary...and I pray for help to understand and apply it.
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