they came to us with the dx. A very rare, very agressive form of Large Cell Lymphoma, already in stage 4, not only in her lymph glands, but also in the bone marrow and spinal fluid. Chemo would be started the next day Jan 8th,2000. We were totally devistated, the odds were 50/50. So we braced ourselves for the long rockey road ahead of us. The chemo was very rough on Lindsey and we were totally amazed at how strong she was and how hard she fought. The chemo caused very bad sores in her mouth and thru her whole digestive system. She was a very brave young lady, never complained, the only time she even cried was when her beautiful long blond hair fell out. After about 4 weeks the Drs. fineally felt that she was well enough to come home, although she was not in remission, so with visiting nurses coming to the house we went home, it was a very happy day for all of us, but also very short lived, after 1 1/2 weeks Lindsey started running a very high fever and back to the clinic we went.
Dr. Murphy thought that she should be admitted for a "tune up" as she called it, Lindsey felt so bad that she did not even fight staying. The next round of chemo was very hard for her, she started bleeding very bad from the mouth and nose and we were told that it was from all the sores in her mouth and nose from the chemo. On Feb. 15th at about 1am she passed out and the Drs. then decieded that she should be put on a ventilator in order to help her body heal, she came to fighting as they put in the vent tube, she was then given meds to put her into an induced coma, she was then moved to PICU and we were told that the next morning they would let her wake up. The next am they let her come to, but she could not talk because of the tube, she did write me a note that said she "wanted her pillow" and that she "wanted to go back to her room and go to sleep". They said at that point she was stable and her sister Alicia was there and other family, so Tim and I decieded to go back to the Ronald McDonald house and get a quick shower, it had been about 4 days since we had left the hospital. I left strict instructions for them to call if anything else was going to be done or if there were any changes and that we would be back in about an hour. That was the last time I would talk to my baby while she was awake. When we returned to the hospital they had induced the coma again to "help her heal". For the next 11 days we watched her blood counts hoping they would start to climb and that she would be allowed to wake up. Things kinda stayed the same for about 8 days then her counts finally started to come up, we were so happy with this little bit of good news, but again very short lived. Her liver and kidneys started to fail and her lungs started filling with fluid, they thought that turning her in bed would help, but it did not. On the night of Feb. 26,2000 we were told that she probally would not make it thru the night and if I would like they could move her over in bed
so that I could stay with her. I stayed in the bed with her for the last night, there was alot of family there and at about 10:30 the next morning after everyone had seen her for 1 last time and we were alone, I held by baby next to me with my arms wrapped around her and told her that it was ok for her to go, that we would be together again someday, that I knew how hard she had fought, how proud I was of her, but I know that she was tired and it was ok. My little girl died in my arms about 3 minutes later.
An autopsy was preformed and the results were that every lymph gland in her body, every organ, lungs, kidneys, liver were full of tumors. What wasn't tumors was destroyed by the chemo. Dr. Murphy who we were told was one of the top Drs. in the world for Lymphoma said it was one of the worst cases of Lymphoma she had ever seen. I asked when it possibly started and she said when the first gland swelled up. About 2 weeks before Christmas. This monster took my baby only in a matter
of about 2 months, only 50 days after dx. If you have children please be aware of this and push your Dr. if things just do not seem right. I don't know how things would have turned out if Lindsey would have been dx just 1 week earlier. Thank you so much for visiting Lindsey's page and please sign the guest book so I will know that you were here.
God Bless |
