Near Miss

It was close, but we made it out of Wesley Hospital!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
HIP HIP HURRAY!!!!!!

His temperature at 4:00 today was 99.6 but they let us go because it wasn't at their magic number.
FINE BY ME!

We may be back in there tomorrow, but we're home tonight.

Blue Sky on a Cloudy Day.

There is a chance that Logan may be dismissed from the hospital this afternoon!!! His last recorded temperature was yesterday at 4:00 so if he still doesn't have a temperature this afternoon they will let him go home on antibiotics. Yesterday, they changed his antibiotics thinking that the two he was on wasn't cutting it for his urinary tract infection and was the reason for his continued temperature (while we all know that it's just neutropenic fever). No matter the reason if it gets us home, I say! Check back this evening and I'll post if we do indeed make it home. COME ON LOGAN!!!! KEEP THAT TEMP DOWN!!!!! GOOO LOGANNNNNN!

DARN THIS FEVER!

Logan spiked another fever this afternoon so add on TWO MORE DAYS to our stay. : (

Maybe Tomorrow

If Logan can stay fever free we'll be able to go home tomorrow late afternoon. His sores in his throat are worse, but manageable with Popsicles and Tylenol. He is hanging from the rafters so we are SOOOO ready to go home.

Blood counts - white blood cells made a very small jump to .5, Hemoglobin up to 9.0 thanks to his transfusion. Platelets continue to drop... down to 35.

UTI and Blood Transfusion

The urine culture came back that Logan has a urinary tract infection and they are attributing his fever to that. This is good news for us since the doctors keep him in the hospital longer if they can't find a reason for the fever (and he's not feeling any pain from that).

We still need to wait for all the other blood cultures to grow out to confirm that he doesn't have bacteria in his blood. His hemoglobin dropped to 6.7 so he will be getting a blood transfusion today. His white blood cells came up slightly from yesterday to .4 ( 5.0 to 15 is normal so he still has a long way to go before he can fight infection on his own).

Update on his fever... he just measured 100.7 which will probably set us back another 2 days being dismissed. Looks like we'll be at the hospital for Amanda's 4th birthday. We'll have to make it up to her after Logan is dismissed.

Still Feverish

Still no word on if the boy has an infection, but he's on antibiotics as a preventive measure. He is feverish as well so at least 2 more days in the hospital... probably more.

Transfusion Last Night

It was discovered last night that Logan had blood in his urine and his platelets had fallen to 4 so he was given a transfusion over night. We are still waiting for the results for the cultures and chest x ray this morning. We also haven't had the update from his latest CBC, but since his lips are white and he's cold all the time I would imagine he's low on red blood cells too. More info will be posted as it becomes available.

Back On Hospital Time

Logan is back in the hospital tonight with a fever. As usual, we won't have any test results until tomorrow at the earliest. We'll keep you all posted as new news becomes available.

Blood Counts

Red blood cells are low... 7.9 but no transfusion until he falls below 7.0. Platelets are low as well at 24 but Dr. Rosen doesn't transfuse platelets unless he is having active bleeding because he can only get so many platelet transfusions before his body starts to reject them. White blood cells are 0.1 with no neutrophils so he has NO germ fighting abilities right now. This is historically the time when he starts running a fever and ends up in the hospital. His temp this morning was 99.5, but it doesn't count until it hits 101.0 so we'll just watch it over the weekend and hope for the best. His energy level today is not what it usually is so we're going to take it easy this weekend and hang around the house.

The More The Merrier

All is well in Wichita. Logan and Amanda are now home bound until after all the chemo is done and Logan can withstand the nasty bugs going around. After much deliberation, Eric and I decided that it was silly to send Amanda to school only to bring home the bugs to Logan so they are both here with me at the dinning room table each day doing their school work. Amanda has had the seasonal flu vaccine, but not the H1N1 and that flu is going around the Derby school district (too close to home). She has also had some classmates with out with various illnesses including croup which would be harmful to Logan. We are so sad to be missing the play dates with the moms group, but we'll be back in the swing of things before you know it!

In other news, Logan had a CBC blood test today and we'll get those results tomorrow. We expect that he will be low on platelets because he is having a lot of skin bruising, mostly on his arms and legs, but he also has bruises on his nose and right eye. He looks like this sister took him out behind the woodshed! Otherwise he is doing fine, eating like a mad man and running around like a monkey.

Homeschool

Home schooling in the Neal house has begun. At first Logan was not too excited about sitting down with me and doing school work when there were bikes to ride and toys to play with but after we made these nifty school work sorters he found some renewed interest and spent 3 hours working today! The green box (cereal boxes we cut and covered with wrapping paper) is his "in" box. He looks through it to see what he would like to work on next.

Here he is working hard. Notice the pencil behind his ear! : ) He is also a tongue chewer when he's concentrating.

The completed work goes in the animal box. His teacher is going to be coming to the house to work with him too and he's very excited about the idea of showing her all his completed school work.

His writing skills are improving everyday. Here's a short little video of him doing his school work.

Pumpkin Patch

If at first you don't succeed, try, try again! Today Logan is feeling great today so we decided to try the pumpkin patch again (with vomit bucket in the car just in case : ). The kids had a BALL! We took so many pictures and video that it's hard to decide which ones to post but here are the highlights.

Getting ready to go down the underground slide!

Amanda coming out the bottom! SUPER FAST!

Eric inside the slide, ready to go!

Logan was ready for a loud BOOM from the pumpkin cannon.

Paddling around the pond looking for the alligator. (Not to worry, it wasn't real)

I think Amanda got the best deal here! You guys petal and I'll sit and watch!

Giant Air Pillow!

Tree House "Secret" ladder.

LOVING the corn table! We need one of these for our sand! (The dogs keep digging ours out)

I think Eric had just as much fun as the kids.

Corn Maze.

The ONLY family photo we were able to get.

The kids didn't want to join us for the nice up close one.

Look at Logan go!

Birthday Bliss

Happy Birthday to Logan's DADDY! We treated Eric to ice cream sundas at Braum's. I forgot to take my camera of the ice cream faces, but suffice to say, it was mmm-mmm good!!! It's a good thing that Logan is feeling better tonight. It sure would be sad to miss out on ice cream

Oh ya. I forgot to tell you the story! Today was supposed to be a fun day so we packed up the car and were heading down the turn pike when Logan told me that his tummy felt funny. I guess my mommy brain should have interpreted that differently... perhaps into PULL OVER NOW! I'M GOING TO BE SICK, but no. I just gave him a drink and called it good. A few seconds later, something hit my windshield... from the INSIDE! My son, sitting the the VERY back of the car PROJECTILE VOMITED over 8 FEET!!!! (He's going to be a popular guy at college.) So far the official diagnoses is that it was caused by a reaction to the chemo medicine. He seems to be doing well right now with no other side effects. We are keeping the anti-nausea medicine flowing and life in the Neal home is once again crazy, loud, and busy. The only part of this that I can't understand it why it took 2 hours to clean up a mess that took seconds to create! YUCK! (good thing I don't have a weak stomach)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DADDY... NO NEED TO UNWRAP THIS ONE! : )

No School For Now

I've been in contact with Logan's school nurse and it looks like there are some flu type bugs going around the school. Eric and I discussed the pros and cons of keeping him home verses sending him to school and we've decided that it's in his best interest to stay home for a while. For those of you not in the know, each round of chemo reduces his infection fighting abilities to zero, setting up an ideal breeding ground for any germ floating by. In his weakened state, the flu would become life threatening. Eric, Amanda and I have all gotten flu shots to help protect him from us bringing it home, but in a school setting it's uncontrollable. Logan's very sad to be missing his friends and activities, but hopefully he'll be back at it soon. On a positive note, tonight is the last dose of chemo for this round and he has done wonderfully with the new drug.