She Did It!

This precious baby girl has finished her final round of chemotherapy. 6 cycles. 18 long weeks. Hours and hours of infusions. She did it! Not only did she do it, but she did it with a smile on her face. She was so sweet today I could have taken a bite out of her. Lucky for her I'm on a diet!

Her tremors started about an hour after receiving her first dose of prednisone this morning. She takes a maintenance dose daily of 2.5 ml, but for the first five days of all of her cycles it jumps to 20mls. Basically it makes her want to jump out of her skin. She doesn't sleep, she shakes uncontrollably, and she is wired the entire time. Just in case you hadn't noticed one of the side effects of the prednisone are those CHEEKS. Even though my sweet Ashley Kate can't control the side effects the drug has on her body she does have control of her attitude. She continues to amaze me. God has given her such a spirit of joy. Even in the midst of awful circumstances she smiles, she laughs, she plays. I am so very proud of her!

I wish I could tell you that the tumors were gone, but I don't know that they are. I don't remember if I ever shared with you just how large they were. A total of four tumors were found. 2 in her right lung, and 2 in her left. The smallest was just under one centimeter. The next was approximately 1.5cm, and the two largest were 2cm across. I never realized just how large 2cms could be. When you mark them with a ruler across her x-ray 2 cms becomes very large and invasive inside her tiny lungs. I will never forget the sinking feeling that came across me as I looked at the measurements. How could she do this? How could I do this? The truth. We could not. I knew in my heart at that very moment that she was in His hands. She was living according to His plan for her life, and this too must bring glory to God.

It may have looked like or sounded like I was at peace with all of this, but I can assure I was not. At night in our room I would cry. I would silently scream into my pillow as she slept. I was scared and I was hurt. On several occasions our nurses would come in and find me crying puddles of tears. During those first few days I tried to be strong, but I was not. Ash was the one with strength.

So what do we do now? We wait and we pray. Our oncologist said he would like us to be in Omaha in four weeks to have her scanned. In the meantime we take each day as it comes and we live. We enjoy. We celebrate. Tonight I am happy to say that she has done her part. By early next week (Monday or Tuesday) she will begin vomiting. Her WBC will drop, and then she will sleep. After a week of feeling yucky she will bounce back and begin to move on with her life. After 3 or 4 weeks we will have a plan. Cancer free or round 2(18 more weeks).

Thank you so much for praying for our gherkin today. She is happily playing with her nan and has no intentions of sleeping tonight. Dave and I are going rest so we can be ready to spend a very special day with our children tomorrow. I will share the details with you tomorrow night. All I can say is that if you have never seen a sweet pickle stuffed into a pink swimsuit and wearing sun glasses then you have no idea what you have been missing. Goodnight my friends and may the Father bless you. Trish