On Friday we went with Sharon and the girls to the Sussex County Fair. We go to this fair every year but last year Lauren missed out on the fun She had just gotten out of the hospital and was too weak to do much. Plus she didn't have the immune system to be around all the people. Well, she made up for it this year. She loved the Merry go Round, the Ferris Wheel and the little train. She didn't quite get the concept that you had to have tickets to ride and that you had to get off once the ride stopped. When she went on the train the first time she adamantly refused to get off when the ride was over. Luckily we had more tickets! While Timmy loves all the big daring rides (even when he was three) Lauren seems to go for the slower, tamer ones. She begged to go on a little roller coaster type ride but was crying to get off halfway through. She kept saying "I want to go back to the Merry go Round, I want to go back to the Merry go Round"! After all the rides the kids played some games then we ended the night watching the fireworks. The kids had a great time. Hopefully we'll be able to go again one night this week.
Lauren also had her physical therapy evaluation on Friday. It went very well and Lauren had so much fun "playing" there that she cried when it was time to go. I'm glad she liked it so much because we'll be there twice a week for at least the next three months! The physical therapist (Karen) said she looks great but that we have a lot to work on. Lauren has a lot of muscle weakness and limited range of mobility (movement) from all the surgeries and "down" time this last year. It is most apparent in her legs but after watching her with Karen I could see it's really all her major muscles. Her left side is weaker than the right which is the side of her chest the tumor was on and the side she had the most surgery. Some of it could be from nerve damage from the surgeries and might be permanant but nerves take a long time to come back so we won't know for sure for a while.
Tomorrow (Monday) Lauren has a checkup at the Valerie Center. I'm a little anxious because it will be the first blood draw without her line. I promised her we'll use lots of "magic" (emla) cream. They'll check counts and we'll send blood to Sloan for the HAMA test. (HAMA results should be in on Thursday)
Lauren started her 5th cycle of Accutane today. We had to postpone the start of this cycle due to a skin infection on her arm from the PICC line bandage. Because of the side effects to the skin, if she was on Accutane the infection would not have healed and could have gotten out of control. Only one more cycle of Accutane after this!
Well I'll end here as Lauren is standing next to me begging me to read her a book. She says I've typed enough!
As always, thanks for checking in on us and for all the thoughts and prayers.
