Super Hero Cooper

  Today Cooper had his 19th surgery and final lumbar puncture with chemo. It was also the last time he would ever have his port accessed and receive IV chemo. The days following his procedure will also be his last doses of high dose steroids. Today we marked a lot off of our list of things that we hope to NEVER do again. Cooper will still continue oral chemo until the 29th, but the most difficult chemotherapy was completed today.  I took this picture at a stoplight because I will never forget driving up to Hopkins that first night. I knew Cooper had cancer. I don't know how, but I just knew it in my heart. I remember feeling like I had 400 lbs. sitting on my chest when I saw the skywalk to Hopkins, knowing that this place and this view was going to be engrained in my memory forever. It still to this day gives anxiety when I see it. It brings back everything. This morning, I felt this strange and surreal feeling of calm when I saw Hopkins. Something I've never felt before. All ...

Today we are heartbroken. Today we said goodbye to our Boxer Flash. While losing a pet who is a member of your family is a "normal" part of the progression of life, Flash was different. He wasn't just any pet. I know that everyone believes that their dog or pet is the best, as they should, but Flash wasn't just a member of our family. Cooper was his boy. This dog was different and the farther we get into this journey the less and less we believe that things in this life happen by coincidence. Even the bad and the ugly, there is a plan, and while we may not like the plan, there is one. For the last 2 years we have been trying to drive this out of control bus that we call life back onto the road to normal. However, I think we have realized that defining our normal isn't our call. So after the birth of a baby, almost 2 years of leukemia treatment, some points where we were very scared of relapse, and a global pandemic which has forced Cooper out of school...

I believe that over the last 2 years of Cooper's cancer treatment, we have learned a lot. I believe that we have grown a lot as a family, grown a lot as human beings, learned our strength that we didn’t know we had, but this has also left us with a lot of questions. Questions about why. Questions about God, questions about our faith, questions about why the world is the way that it is, why we have so much suffering, and why humans choose to tear one another down. Questions that I feel sure I will be left pondering because I’m not meant to know the answer.  I am not one to write political things, and often keep those opinions and thoughts to myself. I also realize that people DON’T read our blog to read about our opinions or politics but to hear about Cooper’s progress, but hear me out, because I believe I have an important message to share. I think that the last 2 years has given us a perspective that many people don’t have, and for that I am thankful. However, I think tha...

We've laid low with commenting on the recent events of the world for a few reasons, it's a sensitive topic for us, we really don't know what to think, and our opinions may not necessarily be popular. However, we've made a point to document this journey and this is part of it, so here goes.... I think if I had any patience left after the last year an a half plus of our life, it went away in the last 2 weeks. It's waned significantly for a lot of reasons. I think the "me me me" mentality in our culture is astounding, and this situation only magnified it. The world is in panic, we have shut everything down when literally not 3 weeks ago half of the public schools had active flu and you couldn't get a Clorox wipe in the place, but I digress. The last 2 weeks there have been a lot of things I have seen and heard that are a hard pill to swallow. Most people have asked  "how on earth are we going to do this 14 day quarantine and COVID-19?" When we...

We had a wonderfully unexpected awesome experience this weekend with another former JMU Duke. For many of you who have followed our story, you know how special the JMU Dukes are to both us and to Cooper. You've also heard about Cooper's friendship with Raven Greene, and in many blogs we have also mentioned Cooper's favorite player from the team last year Jimmy Moreland. One of the reasons Cooper loved Jimmy so much is not because he was an amazing player (even though he WAS) or because he was going to make it to the NFL (even though he has), but because he supported Coop from day 1. He always wore his Cooper bracelet, never takes it off, and he would also often send messages to us cheering him on or supporting him in some way. Jimmy is a kind and good person and has always shown support for Coop.  Last year Jimmy got drafted to the Redskins so I thought it was only appropriate that we go watch him play since he is right down the road.  Jimmy's Mom, Yvone, has a...

Whew!!!! We did ALL of Disney in 3 days! Turns out when you don't wait in a single line, you move pretty fast through the parks. so 3 days an 45 miles later, we headed to Universal Studios. At the end of Cooper's active treatment, we took him to Universal, so this was a nice change of pace because it was really not crowded and Cooper kind of had an idea of what he wanted to do. This time he was prepared and made sure to wear his Harry Potter cloak! Evyn got to come on the Hogwarts Express and also see Manheim Steamroller's Christmas concert Legoland was also very quiet and a nice change of pace from Disney. Cooper really liked looking at all of the large LEGO models.

Kristy's parents came with us to Animal Kingdom, which we have to say, was SO much cooler than is used to be. A lot has changed at animal kingdom and Cooper absolutely loved the Avatar ride. Grammy was a little unsure at first because of how intense it is, but she was a trooper and we all had an awesome time! Avatar world Cooper was really excited about the dinosaur ride.