Hi, Everyone ~
Today marked Ethan’s 20th treatment… so we’re now 2/3 of the way through. Ethan continues to do very well and had made tons of friends in Radiation Oncology. He has so much fun when he’s there that it’s often a struggle to get him home when he’s finished. He’s now taught everyone there how to put out a fire and can’t wait to come in full gear on Thursday for Halloween. Aside from the “emergency vehicles” theme, his favorite toy to pick from the toy closet is a football. So far, he’s chosen four of them and then proceeds to recruit all of the bystanders to play a rousing game of tackle football. It goes kind of like this: “Hut! Hut! Hut! Tackle me – I have the ball!!” and he runs in circles around the nurses station. He seems to play all positions, despite the nurses, technicians, patients, and even doctors who join in.
Two weeks ago, we also added chemotherapy back into the mix as a chemical modifier. He’ll have 22 days of etoposide/VP-16 and 4 weekly doses of vincristine during the course of his radiation. Both agents are radio sensitizers and increase the delivery of oxygen to the tumor cells, making them more sensitive to the radiation. We had to suspend chemotherapy once because of low blood counts, but the counts bounced back up quickly ~ within about 3 days. I expect to suspend the chemotherapy again on Thursday when we have his counts checked, but so far they haven’t gotten nearly low enough to have to suspend radiation.
Ethan’s not yet had any adverse reactions to the treatment, although most will not become apparent for several years and will manifest themselves as problems with memory, throughput and parallel processing (for all of you computer junkies). Although the effects may be taking place now, we won’t be able to detect them until Ethan progresses in school and requires greater use of those brain functions.
For those of you who have not see Ethan lately, he has a little surprise… His hair is starting to grow back!! Its coming in everywhere except for the back where he’s getting the radiation, so it may look a little funky when it gets longer. His 12-year-old cousin, Alex, is into funky haircuts so I think Ethan will dig it. I heard him tell Dr. Lee this morning, though, that his hair is just visiting and that it’s going to go away again. I figure it will probably stick around until mid-December or so when we’re well into our 5th cycle of full-blown chemotherapy.
Our biggest news is that 2 weeks ago, my brother Kevin, Ethan and I had the honor of filming a Public Service Announcement for the PBTFUS that will air in 26 cities next year to commemorate their 20th anniversary. So far, Washington DC is not among the cities, but we’re going to try our best to change that. We had initially declined the invitation due to Ethan’s treatment schedule, but the folks at PBTFUS wanted Ethan enough that they volunteered to fly the film crew to us. How could we refuse?? Kevin and Ethan both did a terrific job! Bert and I will also film another interview-type session with them when we attend their annual conference in November. As I’ve mentioned, Ethan is quickly making inroads to a new career in case the fireman-thing doesn’t pan out…
Take care, everyone, and here’s a preview of Ethan on Halloween… He may have to wear his own costume if he expects to walk anywhere.
Regards,
Kim.