Finishing Something Big

April 08, 2019

We have been trying to process how exactly to write this post. It comes with a lot of emotions and also a lot of struggles. Today we finished something big. Cooper completed active treatment for leukemia. Today we said goodbye to a lot of meds that make him feel horrible. We said goodbye to 3-5 doses of chemo a week...sometimes more. We said goodbye to being confined within our walls. While we are so happy to have this stage behind us, we did not say goodbye to treatment. For those of you who have been following our story, we mention a lot how leukemia is a little different in that when kids complete "active" treatment, they do not ring the bell and they continue to get IV chemo for the next 2 1/2 years.

That being said, we believed that April 8th, our end game...because in this you can't have a 3 year end game, you will lose it, would bring us relief. We thought that on April 8th we would exhale, rejoice, breathe. We did not. We didn't feel relieved, instead we left the hospital just lugging a different bag of mom and dad worries than we carried in there. Because sadly, something will always be there, and clinic and the people in it are a consistent reminder that there is no normal...which is why since the beginning we have always written "normal". Actual normal seems like a distant memory. The worries, the PTSD, all of it is still there, your worries just shift, or you have a different way of coping because something within your trauma has changed, not gone away.

Don't get us wrong, we are happy and thankful to be where we are but is certainly is always something. The milestone of his last hospital day of "active treatment" is most definitely exciting.

Cooper and Dr. Cara

Cooper and his nurse Jill. In clinic you are assigned a nurse so there is some consistency in addition to your 2 main doctors. Jill has gotten us through so much and Cooper just adores her!

Physical Therapy with Miss Briel

LAST nasty bag of high dose methotrexate!!!! Woo Hoo!!!!!!

Busting out of Hopkins excited for a 2 1/2 week break. This will be the longest Cooper has gone without chemo and without setting foot in a hospital for 9 months!!!!

After his last treatment we all got out to go watch our neighbor Brett play baseball. Coop got to go a little early and pitch with his buddy Brett and he had a blast!