Sept 9th thru Sept 16th

Sept 9th-- Saw MB this morning and gave her the digital camera. She will be taking some pictures today of Ryan so if I see her tonight I'll post some new pictures of him, if not then I'll get them on tomorrow.   That is, if after giving MB the lesson on how to use the camera, she doesn't take pictures of her thumb or the lens cap : )  They got some possible good news this morning.  It seems the antibiotic is working so if the culture comes back OK Ryan might get to go home later tonight and just have a nurse come to the house every 8 hours to give him an IV there.   He then could stay home until the next round of chemotherapy on either Monday or Thursday.  Hopefully for MB, Gary, Kim, and Ryan's sake they will get released today even if it is only for a few days before they have to go back in. 

Sept 9th  4:00--  Ryan just got home from  the hospital.  Hopefully they can all catch upon some well needed rest before round 2 of the chemo.

Sept 10th--  Everything's going good so far today.  That is except for the hair.  Ryan was starting to lose some hair they gave him a buzz cut to make it less traumatic on him.  Ryan apparently thought he was Samson and freaked out over the hair cut.   He kept picking up clumps of hair and trying to stick them back on his head.   Beth said it was the worst thing she had to do yet.  I'll try to get some new pictures of him with the new haircut and also scan in some from a couple summers ago when RP gave him his buzz cut back then. 

Sept 11th--  Gary has become a pro at giving the IV to Ryan.  Every 8 hours they are now giving him the IV themselves without a nurse having to come to the house and help.  It looks like, depending on how the next blood test goes, they might push his next round of chemo back a few days. Not much else new to report today.  I'll post again when we hear about how the blood tests come back. Hopefully it will show an increase in his blood count.

Sept 12th--   Ryan got back some good blood test results.  His counts have climbed from 100 to 9800.    This means he can now start rd.2 of the chemotherapy.  This is scheduled to start on Wednesday.  He will then be in the hospital for at least 5 days with this. MB said his hair is falling off in clumps now.   We all have colds so are staying  away for now.  That is why I don't have any new pictures yet.  We don't want to expose him to the colds.

Sept 13th--  Ryan woke up and demanded mashed potatoes this morning.  Granny's comment was he was spirited in asking, Gary called it something else!!!!  Schools here were cancelled today because of the hurricane so things are a little hectic. Gary came into work today before Ryan starts his next round tomorrow. 

Sept 14th-- Ryan had a good day yesterday and is taking it easy so far today until he has to go back in for round two tonight.  Granny got to experience her first "Sanibel snow day"( otherwise known as no school for a hurricane!).   No real news to report today but the next few days there should be a lot as the next phase starts.

Sept 15th--  Well Ryan is back in the hospital and not very happy about it.  Apparently he was scheduled to be number 3 out of 5 for treatment today and they had to bump him up to number 1 because he was causing such a raucous. Mom said that rather than the anesthesia mellowing him, it made him angrier.  MB said he has now lost about 70% of his hair.