Beads of Courage Necklace

This necklace is a program through the hospital called Beads of Courage. The children get to make these necklaces to document what they go through. Each colored bead represents a procedure. For example, the white beads are for each I.V. chemotherapy treatment Hannah has had so far, the black are for every time she has been "poked" to draw blood, the blue are for clinic visits, the red are for when she had to receive blood and platelet transfusions, the yellow are for hospital stays, etc. She has filled up this necklace and will start a new one tomorrow. We have seen kids who have filled up many necklaces by the time their treatment is over. It is incredible what these kids with cancer go through and how resilient they are!

Induction Phase

We are currently in the fourth week of Hannah's first month of treatment which the doctors call "induction therapy". During this month, Hannah has had four types of chemotherapy given by I.V. and inserted into her spinal chord fluid. She has tolerated the chemo pretty well besides an upset stomach and being tired. The worst part of this month has been that she has had to take steroids for the entire month. They have caused all kinds of issues including extreme personality changes, weight gain, and hunger among other things. The above picture was taken three weeks ago when Hannah got home from the hospital. The following picture was taken this past Friday at her last appointment.

She barely looks like the same child and definitely doesn't act like the same! We have four more days of the steroids after which the doctors say that she should get back to normal as far as her weight and attitude within a couple of weeks.

We go back on Thursday for an early morning appointment on Friday. During that appointment the doctors will do another lumbar puncture to give chemo in her spinal chord fluid and another bone marrow biopsy to determine what the cancer looks like and what will be the next steps of treatment. PLEASE PRAY that we will get good reports (we should have the test results back early next week). The results from this bone marrow biopsy are crucial and determine whether she will either continue the standard care of treatment or be considered high risk and have to undergo much more intense treatment in the following months.