He Came Home For the Weekend!

MMMMMmmmmm ice cream for dessert.



I just love when they play together and read books together. It does happen more often than fighting. I just don't always notice because it's not as loud!





One day this week, AJ spent about 45 minutes of his 'quiet room time' looking at his alphabet-animals book. You could hear him laughing his head off. "Ah ha ha ha, a Girotamus! That's hilarious!"

AJ's Pride and Joy

Grannie brought Daddy home for the weekend. Well, apparently, Daddy did the driving, so I guess he brought Grannie home.

Grannie brought over the boys' Christmas gifts. You should have heard the elated screaming! Lego and Duplo EVERYWHERE! AJ is in love with his Star Wars ship and the fact that it comes with a tiny little light saber and an R2D2.

Unfortunately, Dexter loves it too, and is very jealous.

Here's Grannie jammin' in her jammies with AJ.


The boys relaxing and drawing on their whiteboards after we came in from big snow fun. Well, medium snow fun. The boys played in the backyard while I shoveled the driveway and the sidewalk and salted. Then, I joined them in the backyard with BIG plans for a snowman AND a slide. But, you couldn't make snowballs out of the snow, so neither could be accomplished properly. Boo hoo.


Phone Pics

This was when we were shopping on Boxing Day. They're relaxing, sharing a rest in the stroller.

Very blurry, but still a cute pic of Rya and Dex during a playdate.

Dexter on his tummy on a skateboard at the skatepark last week.
AJ scootering by.


One of two trips to Mill Lake last week.



We had hail a couple days ago. About 3 or 4 cm of it in my neighborhood, yet, not 3 minutes away, up the road! The boys played in it like it was snow. I don't know if you can tell that it's made of little balls.
It was getting dark.


But that didn't mean that we couldn't play soccer and basketball.


How's Daddy?

I thought I took a picture of him when he was here! Now, I can't find it!

His urination during the day is pretty normal. At night (he was so happy to be sleeping in his own bed) was probably about every 1.5-2 hours. I think he was up to pee about 4 times. He says it's still painful, but not like before.

It was great having him home, of course. The boys were so excited (and to see Grannie too), and they were pretty good about being gentle with Daddy.

The good news? Richard's appointments this week are only on Monday and Thursday! I'm guessing that means he'll come home on Thursday night and stay until Sunday.

How's Grannie?

Grannie was her usual perky, fun, self! Thanks so much, Norma!!!! Not only has she been taking care of Richard while he's been at the lodge, but, she hung out lots with the boys, AND did the grocery shopping at Superstore AND at Costco!!!

That was awesome! I hate grocery shopping! What a treat!

Grannie headed back to the Island to be with Bud this week.

Thanks again, Norma!



Today

I took the boys to JJs Playzone today to meet an old friend. They had a blast and I got in a good visit. We went at a very unconventional time, leaving just before lunch (thank goodness Dex slept on the way) and coming back for about 3:30pm.

What a great day. I'm just nursing a headache right now. Seems the Tylenol and Advil are doing their job, so it should be a good night too!

I don't want to jinx myself, but it appears as thought Dexter is in undies 24/7 now. YAY!

Late Good News

So guess what?

Today, when I asked him how often he was needing to pee he said "Pretty normal now". I asked what normal meant, and he said that when he's not in the midst of getting fluids and when he's not sleeping, he's pretty much back to normal in that respect. For example, when/if he comes home for the weekend, he thinks he might be able to do the whole drive home without have to stop to pee.

I said, "Since when has it been 'normal'?" He said, "It's been getting better through this week."

I don't know how I missed that.



He picked up his walker today?

Did I tell you he was going to need a walker? He let me know that yesterday, I think, for his VERY weak legs.

Poor guy. It's the kind that comes with the seat, so you can stop and a break. He says he scored one in 'Racing Red'.

Nice.

Feeling Better?

Richard actually said today that he felt like he was getting better.

He's still exhausted. He says the Prednisone (an immunosuppressant) is like an anti-steroid. It's weakening his legs. He says it's really hard to walk.

They've got his appointments down to once every second day, but he takes home fluids on his off days to administer himself via his Hickman Line.

He's still peeing every half hour and says it's about the same at night while he's trying to sleep. I guess all the fluid is flushing him out well.

He's hoping to maybe come home for the weekend. That would be awesome.

Dust = Depressing

So, I thought I'd get my butt in gear and start cleaning up Richard's office today.

Not cleaning it out. Just cleaning up. Slowly, it's become our dumping ground to get stuff out of the way. I'm not talking like "Hoarders", but definitely like the old show "Clean Sweep" where there was one room that was getting out of control.

Mostly, I was just trying to get stuff out that didn't belong in there and get some paper recycling out of there.

What I wasn't expecting was to get teary-eyed. There's a lot of dust in there. It just shows how long it's been since Richard's been in his computer room doin' his thing.

And, I came across some old pictures.

Boo hoo.




Regarding Richard -

I don't have anything new to report, really. He's still hanging out at the lodge with his mom. He actually didn't have an appointment today which meant some nice overdue rest for him.

Last he mentioned, he's still peeing every 30 minutes or so.

I've asked him to update his blog, but he says he just doesn't have the energy.

Took Richard to the Lodge Yesterday

I took Richard back to the lodge to check in yesterday (Wednesday).

Thank you so much Jen (and her, and her husband, and her mom and dad too) for watching the boys so I could stay for Richard's appointment and spend some more time with him!

I think he had a nice night at home and enjoyed his comfortable bed, but I also think it took a lot out of him to be here.

He's still often in a lot of pain. And, often discomfort.

He had his LBMT appointment for 2pm. I dropped him off out front and took off to go park the car.

His appointment was just supposed to be to get a bag of fluids and some meds, but you never know, right?

I got a chance to talk to the nurse some more. It's actually a virus in his bladder. It's not just the scarring. She kind of described it in a what-came-first-the-chicken-or-the-egg kind of way. When someone gets a stem-cell transplant and gets drugs to keep the graft at bay and more drugs to keep the GVHD (graft vs. host disease) in check, it suppresses the immune system, obviously, allowing for more chances to get a virus. But, you have to do it or the GVHD will take over. Jeepers, I hope I'm explaining that correctly. Richard did have the first signs of the GVHD a while back (the rash on the arms, the vibrant green puke).

We are just waiting for the virus to leave and the bladder to heal.

People have asked when he'll start to feel better. I don't know.

But what I do know is that if it weren't for this bladder situation, he'd be a lot stronger and feeling better. This kind of threw a wrench in the plans of getting stronger for the time being.

Just about 10 minutes from the end of his appointment, his 'chemistry' results came back (magnesium, potassium, creatinin, etc - I don't know if I spelled those correctly). His Creatinin levels had doubled which isn't good, but isn't surprising since he was taken off the constant fluid drip when he was going to be released from the hospital. They now wanted him to come in twice a day for his appointments to get enough fluids and were going to be hooking him up to another bag right then (adding another hour onto his appointment that had already been 1.5 hours). Richard and one of the nurses convinced the doctor to just let Richard do the other daily bag of fluids at the lodge or at home at night. That doctor had obviously never heard of a patient doing that themselves, but the nurse had, many times. She did say, "For certain patients" which I think means, patients who are capable and clever enough to be trusted to do the hook up to the Hickman Line properly and without a problem. Richard is definitely that guy and has already done his own fluids before (as long as there aren't meds). There is a hook right above his bed at home and at the lodge for hooking up the bag of fluids.

The doctor seemed pleased with that.

Another question that has been recently asked of me is "Why can't they do THIS in Abbotsford?"

He's not just going in (like when he just got admitted) for the bladder situation. He has to be in regularly at the LBMT. The only place someone goes for their Leukemia check-ups and appointments is VGH. If he were admitted in Abbotsford for all of this bladder stuff, there would be no one there to do all the things that need to be done and checked for his Leukemia/stem-cell transplant.

Yes, Abbotsford has a Cancer Clinic, but it's for Cancer, not a blood-Cancer like Leukemia.

I hope that explains that properly.

Keep the questions coming! I don't mind answering them at all.

After his appointment, around 5pm, Richard was feeling up to joining my dad and I for dinner!
My dad got us skookum seats right beside the bathroom for poor Richard.

Richard got to have his beloved beef-dip. It was a great kid-less dinner (thanks again, Jen and thanks, Dad)!

I dropped Richard back off at the lodge around 6:45pm and headed to Jen's for around 7:45pm. Rather than just picking up the kids who had recently gone to bed, I was invited to stay for a vodka and pepsi (it was raspberry vodka), YUM. I'm pretty much a non-drinker (not to be confused with an anti-drinker), so it was a special little treat for sure!

We retired to the basement (after visiting and chatting with Jen's mom for a bit to talk about Richard) to play Rockband!!! Woot woot! We rocked it out until about 11pm or later.

Thanks for helping me take the boys out to the car, Dave!

It was COLD!

The boys transferred into bed nicely and got to have a sleepover in Dexy's bed together since it was nice and late and I knew they wouldn't goof off.

I, of course, having had that darned pepsi (and the one at dinner) proceeded to stay up until, I don't know... 2am.

I have got to stop doing that! It's going to be horrible setting my alarm for 5:30am for work on Wednesday! YIKES!

Richard's mom was heading back over on the ferry today to come stay with Richard at the lodge. I think she took a 12:30 ferry over. Thanks, Norma!

Talked to Richard a few times today. He was okay... no different, really.

Today was a nice day for me and the boys including a trip to the library for a book exchange (we also took out a Charlie Brown movie that the boys loved), a trip to Costco (ugg), and a trip to the skatepark.

Tomorrow is New Year's Eve. I'm skipping out on the festivities. It's been a lot of running around this week and a lot of late nights. I think I'm going to go rent some dvds with the boys tomorrow (for the evening), we got some white-cheddar popcorn (shhhh... don't tell Daddy), and we're just going to be cozy and vegging out around the house. Hopefully, I'll get all the Christmas stuff put away too.

This year I don't have the motivation (of superstition) like I have in past years. My mom always told me (I think it was her) that you have to put away all your Christmas stuff before the new year.

Bah, humbug. I followed that tradition last year and Richard's Leukemia came back!

Hmmmm... maybe it could've been worse though.

ARG. Now I just scared myself back into cleaning up tomorrow, lest something worse happens!


Have a great New Year everyone.

THANK YOU for making this year (and last year) not as horrible as they could've been. All of your love and support in ALL the different ways that many of you show it have made this journey a pleasant as possible.

That doesn't sound right, but I've re-written it five times and nothing sounds better, so I'll just hope that you understand what I'm trying to say.

Thank you.

Christmastime

Christmastime Q&A !!!

Section 1 - Richard

Q - Did Richard get home for Christmas?

A - No. Richard was in a pretty bad state. Even if they would've let him out, he wouldn't have wanted to come home.

Q - Is Richard home right now?

A - Yes. I picked him up today (Tuesday Dec. 28th). However, the only reason he's at home is because the lodge does not open until tomorrow.

Q - How is Richard?

A - Horrible. The burned out lining of his bladder is driving him nuts. He's going to the bathroom about every 15-30 minutes (meaning about 5 stops on the way home from the hospital). He's on about 6 different drugs. He's weak. He can barely get around.

Q - Is Norma (his mom) coming back over here?

A - Probably on Friday so that she can hopefully stay with him at the lodge. He will definitely need help existing at the lodge.

Q - Did you record the boys opening their Santa gifts so that Richard could watch?

A - Yes, but only on the camera, not on the video camera. If you'd like to view the video, it's on Facebook. Send me a message on there and I'll direct you to it! I couldn't upload it onto Blogger, unfortunately.

Q - Did the boys have a great Christmas?

A - Yes!


Section 2 - The Boys' Christmas


Q - What are they wearing?
A - It's our little tradition to open up one gift on Christmas Eve. It's their new jammies!

Q - What are they doing?
A - Shooting and Karate chopping, of course because I have two boys.

The jammies say "Cool Like Daddy". Last year's were "Handsome Like Daddy".


Q - What's going on here?
A - The boys are seeing their gift from Santa for the very first time. Dexter is peeking through the wrapping paper to notice that it's "noo tooz". (new tools)


Q - What's going on here?
A - While I'm making coffee for the morning, the boys are opening their many little stocking stuffers: Notepads, markers, pens, candy, Bakugan, Ben 10 watches, etc.

Q - Sonja, you didn't buy Dexter a gun, did you?
A - ARG. Yes. I caved. He wanted these laser guns more than anything in the whole world. They are his gift from Mommy and Daddy.

Q - Why does Grand-Dan look so perplexed?
A - He is trying to help AJ transform his new Transformers.
Q - What is that in the background? Is that a guitar?
A - Yes. Dexter is always taking AJ's guitar. He wanted one so badly. AJ wanted that to be his gift to Dexter.

Q - Where is this taken?
A - After finishing up Christmas morning at my very own house for the first time EVER (with my dad too), I packed up the boys and headed to my mom's to finish off Christmas morning. My dad headed over to the Island to his sister's place.

Q - Who is that?
A - My brother, Paul, watching the boys open their gifts.

Q - The boys are still in their jammies?
A - That's right. I may have done my hair and make-up, but we went to mom's to finish off Christmas morning which means still in our jammies!

Q - Sonja, will you ever buy them non-matching jammies?
A - Maybe next year. Maybe next year.

Q - Wow, did Dexter get his own Leapster, just like his brother's?
A - Yes he did, from Gram and Papa. AJ's just coaching him here. (Thanks, Jared for helping me get this set up on the computer!)

Q - Wow, Sonja, they look like absolute angels here. Your house must be so peaceful all the time! How relaxing for you!
A - Okay, that's not a question... and.... no comment.


Q - Where is everyone?
A - I know, right? I think there were a few too many family members worried about giving Richard their horrible coughs and colds in case Richard came. So, they didn't come!
(We missed you Mike and Erin, Shauna and Mike, and Michelle! Thanks for coming by to see us, Uncle Len!)
Clockwise from the left
Dexter, Kim (my sister), me (if I were sitting down), Mom (who I got to sit beside for the first time ever, I think), Ken ( my step-dad), Uncle Al (who you can't actually see because he's up getting his dinner on your far right), Auntie Brenda (you can only see her hair), Jared (Kim's boyfriend), Paul (my brother), and AJ.

Q - Did Kim purposely wear a plaid shirt just to match with your kids?
A - Hee hee. No. I told her to wear it.

Q - Did Jared wear a plaid shirt just to match with Kim?
A - Hmmmm. Maybe.

Q - Do those five Transformers attach together to make one giant Transformer?
A - Youbetcha! That was AJ's gift from Mommy and Daddy.

Q - You let your son play crazy video games?
A - Ummm, yah.... no. I come downstairs to find him thinking that he's playing Call of Duty B.O. with Uncle Paul. Uncle Paul turned out okay. He's a pretty great kid. Hopefully Dexy will too.

Q - Is it just me or do they look a lot alike?
A - It's not just you. And... they don't just look alike. They act alike. Dexter IS Paul at age 3.

Section 3 - The Breakdown of Christmas

Christmas Eve

My dad comes over to spend the night and Christmas morning with us. I make those leave em' out all night cinnamon buns and some peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.
When putting out the carrot for Rudolph, AJ says, "Who's that for?" I say, "For Rudolph." He says, "What?! You mean Rudolph's real, like in real-life?" I say, "That's who I'm putting the carrot out for."

The boys and I had a hard time getting to sleep. So much so, that in an effort to be able to get out of his room, my late-bloomer-potty-trainer Dexter decided he would come out to alert me that he needed to do his first real poop on the potty. Sneaky bugger.

Christmas Morning

I thought the boys would wake early at 6:30am, but at 7:15am, I couldn't wait any longer and went and woke them both. Dexter had technically woken already, but not AJ.

It was great! It took the boys way longer than I anticipated to open their gifts. They just wanted to play with each thing that they opened!

I had planned on leaving the house at 10am to head to Mom's, but ended up leaving the house more like 12pm. No one seemed to mind. I told them to do as much Christmas-Morning as they wanted before I arrived.

It was really nice spending my first Christmas morning with my dad since I was about 9 years old! Thanks for coming out, Dad!

We finished gift opening at Mom's, the boys had their lunch, we put Dexter down for his nap, and lazed around a bit before getting ready for Christmas dinner. Uncle Len came out to visit before heading back to his Christmas dinner.

Christmas dinner was delicious and fun as always. Thanks everyone!

I called Richard during the day so I could ask him to open his Christmas gift from me while we were on the phone together. I had a t-shirt made for him that said "Stem Cell Transplant Survivor Since 2010" much like one I had seen on a website.

The boys and I stayed overnight until Boxing Day.

Boxing Day

It was a nice, relaxing Christmas morning at my mom's, as usual. The boys played with their toys while I puttered around getting packed up. We said our good-byes around 11:30am or so.

I still wasn't totally sure whether or not I'd be picking up Richard from the hospital this day at this point.

I ran in the door, threw all the gifts and bags into the house, packed a quick on-the-go lunch for the boys, and drove to the mall.

I always go to the mall on Boxing Day to get my More Time Moms calendar at 40% off and usually to pick up the boys' yearly ornaments that they choose themselves (but we bought ours last week instead).

I remembered the stroller, thank goodness! I had hoped Dexter would sleep at the mall since I would be running into his nap. He did not. However, BOTH boys were awesome at the mall. They really seemed happy to be out and about. It's been a lot of dreary, rainy days, so outside is outside, I guess!

I got my calendar! YAY! Last year they were out. It just about did me in! I was lost without my calendar for a whole week or so!

Usually, on Boxing Day, we go to The Joniec's house at some point (that's Richard's friend Tarrie and his wife and kids). This year it was a Christmas dinner over there. Thanks you guys! We had fun! The boys had a blast playing with all the big kids!

The 27th

Finally! A day to just relax in our own house so the boys could finally play with the rest of their new toys!

But wait! It looked like I'd need to drive out to Vancouver with the boys to pick up Richard. I had Erica, come drop off Jack for a play-date. I spent the morning cleaning up a bit, getting ready, and packing for the day to go to Vancouver to go get Richard.

Then, he said he wasn't coming home after all, but there was no sense going for a visit and bringing out all his stuff since he was probably coming home the next day. If not, I would go visit him the next day.

Erica came to pick up Jack, and she took AJ with her so the boys could go play with Jack's Christmas toys! Thanks, Erica!

That early evening, Dexter and I went over to Erica and Kevin's for a night of yummy burgers, the best coffee I've ever had in my whole life, some dancing on the Kinect, and of course, Rockband. It was a nice early dinner which meant I could get the boys home just shortly after bedtime instead of having to put them to bed over there.

I spent the rest of the night trying to clean up the Christmas-Tornado and lounging.

The 28th

Time to pick up Richard from the hospital! Mom and Ken came out to watch the boys, so I could drive to VGH to go get Richard.

As I said, he's horrible. He can barely get around. I would've driven him straight to the Cancer Lodge if it was open. Still, it was great to see him and bring him home, even just for the one day.

It was a long ride home with all the pee-stops we needed to make and prescription runs at two pharmacies to get his Morphine and 4 other drugs for stomach issues, blood pressure, and easing spasms that he's having due to the bladder issues.

Once home, Mom and Ken got a small chance to visit with Richard, but he just needed to vegetate.

Thanks Mom for bathing the boys and sticking around during dinner, it made the day a lot easier! Thanks too, for taking them for a walk in the mud. That made AJ's day and Dexter's too!

The boys got to give Richard his Christmas gifts tonight and give him some much needed hugs, but they had to be pretty gentle with him.

I'm just catching up on his laundry and then I'm about to go gather up the things he needs to add to his bags for tomorrow.


Merry Christmas everyone and thank you for all your cards and gifts. We are happy to have Richard home, even if it's only for one day.
He's in rough shape. Send him all the positive vibes you have! Or, if you like to pray, we'll take that too! Thank you, everyone!

Thanks Richard, for holding up okay by yourself at the hospital for Christmas. Sorry you were so sick. Sorry you couldn't be here.

Visit with Richard, Grannie, and Grand-Dan

The Wii has been a source of fun at night for us lately. This particular night, the boys tried out Mario Kart first. Dexter just wasn't willing to hold down a button while he drove. Toy Story 3 was going to be too difficult. Next, we tried Go Diego Go. This one was a success.
I realized it was a one player game. That would be a problem, so I thought. It turned out to be awesome. Little baby-Jaguar follows Diego everywhere. I told AJ that he was Diego. I told Dexter that he was Baby-Jaguar. They were both perfectly happy with that scenario. Half the time, Dex just sits watching the game like it's a movie anyhow, not even moving his controller.
Can you see Diego and Baby-Jaguar there? They played for about 20 minutes while I did some laundry and put all their clothes away.
Here they are doing stamps this morning. No shirts = less mess.


Guess what?
There's an indoor skate park in Abbotsford now! YAY! We went to check it out, and get AJ some pads of his own so he can practice at the outdoor park too.



A couple nights ago, we went to the playground at 5pm. It was dark! And it was cold! But they didn't care. I had my coffee, so I was good too.


Crappy phone photos, sorry, but you can still see their smiles!



I hmmm and hawed about when to head out to visit Richard yesterday. Kim and Kareen convinced me to head out during Dexter's nap. I packed up, and I headed out to Dad's.

It was a perfect drive. I got to bypass ALL of the backup from the counter-flow lane being in effect at the tunnel because I could use the HOV. Ohhh, people did not like watching me drive up the side to the front of the line. It felt good.

Once we got to Dad's around 3:30pm, right on time, as Dad pulled into the parking lot, we moved the carseat and the booster over and headed to the hospital.

Our visit overlapped with Grannie being at the hospital which worked out perfectly. The boys got to see Grannie, I got to see Grannie, and we all got to visit with Richard. Again, he looks great as always, but that doesn't reflect how he's feeling.

His urine has been clear of blood for a couple days now. Today, he said he's getting longer breaks between needing to pee, so hopefully, that's a good sign.

Just in case he's in the hospital on Christmas day, we brought him his gift wrapped up too along with all the other supplies he requested.

We fit in lots of hugs and love. The boys were good. We stayed for close to an hour.

Dad, me, and the boys went back to Richmond, had dinner at WhiteSpot running through what would normally be Dexter's 7:30pm bedtime. The boys eyes were beginning to close.

I remember, before I had kids, seeing kids peeking over booths, standing on the seats and thinking, "I will NEVER let my kids behave like that at a restaurant!"

Oh, I was soooo naive. The boys are actually really well behaved at restaurants, but... they're still kids.

Dexter, while I wasn't watching, had snuck his head around to peek at the people in the booth behind me. He was reaching his hand through and smiling at them.
me - "Dexter! Sit properly! On your bum or your knees. No peeking at other people!"
Dex - (quite sternly, I'll add) - "I just saying hi to them mom!!!"

However, after Dad brought us back to his place where my car was parked and I transferred everything over, I was feeling like pushing my luck.

I asked the boys (at 8pm) if it was okay if we went to the mall. We did. Dexter was actually falling asleep while we were walking. I was 'one of those moms' that I usually condemn in my mind, silently, for messing with their kids routines and taking them to malls WAY past bedtime.

Here's Grand-Dan looking at pics of the boys ice-skating on his phone while AJ does puzzles on the DS.

Here's Dex, colouring. He looks like he's sleeping here!

Thanks Dad for helping the night run smoothly!

Get better, Richard! We want you home!