Cancer is not the same for everyone

This is in response to many people who look at me like I'm lying that my daughter has cancer or that she is on or ever had chemotherapy. Or they look at my daughter and say - she doesn't look like she has cancer or say she doesn't look like she's on chemo.

I would like to explain that there is a "stereotype" of what you "should" look like when you have cancer or are on chemo. I too was unaware and believed that cancer means you look a certain way or that chemo meant you looked a certain way. Because that's what we see.

I'd like to explain that having "cancer" does not mean you are skinny and frail. Some and maybe most do....but this is not a rule. Being on chemotherapy does not mean you throw up or you lose your hair or you become emaciated.

Haven has Ganglioneuroblastoma Cancer and ROHHAD Syndrome. This is an odd group of issues. What is more important is that she does actually have BOTH. ROHHAD Syndrome is known to have Ganglioneuroblastoma....but it's EXTREMELY rare to find a child with both. Her cancer is a known cancer but it didn't affect her the way many of the other children are affected. She has a Paraneoplastic Syndrome or ROHHAD Syndrome. The ROHHAD causes extreme weight gain (not usual with a cancer patient). Again she falls under the condition called ROHHADNET.

Her chemo - which I didn't know until January of this year - is a chemo that actually GROWS hair. She will not lose her hair on this chemo because a side effect is hair growth. Kris was actually wondering if it would work for him because her hair has gotten so thick.

There are many forms of chemo and many cancers they are used for. Sometimes one is used or many are used. Haven has been on 3 different chemos in the past year. The only chemo that made her sick was Cytoxan and we had medication to counteract the vomiting. Sometimes she would get sick but 99% of the time it just made her tired for about a day.

Some chemos aren't even used for cancer. A low dose of Cyclosporin is sometimes used for Psoriasis. Which seems crazy to me....but hey it worked on someone and now they use it.

Anyway, learning about cancers and chemos has confirmed my belief that you don't judge a book by it's cover and you don't assume everyone reacts to a disease or treatment the same way.

We finally like Barbie......

Haven decided today that she finally likes Barbie. She has NEVER played with dolls in her entire life. The other night she played with a wooden doll that had magnetic clothes and really had fun. Today she received a package from Grandma and Grandpa in Utah with what looks like a Bratz doll (hmmmm.......) and she has been playing with it for over 2 hours.

She even got her other dolls out that people had sent to her at Christmas. You may think I'm crazy because I'm excited my daughter is playing with dolls......but she NEVER has ever before. She never plays and over the past 2 weeks she has been playing like crazy. She sits by herself and just plays.

She plays, she talks more, she has a sweeter personality, she asks for food less, she SLEEPS all night long.......I am a believer in this chemo treatment. I believed in it last year and I feel the same way now. My daughter has never laughed like she does now and has even teared up during movies. THAT IS AWESOME!

Oh....she got a Walmart card in the mail yesterday from Laurie Bowes --- so guess who has to go buy clothes for her Barbies tonight! :)

ROHHAD: Cardiology -- Pulmonology

These are the two next big doctor appointments we have.

Cardiology has been added as an extreme importance. Haven's resting heart rate has been staying around 150. It has been constant around 130-150 for over two months. But I remember her in the hospital last year and it stayed around 140. We should find out next week when this appointment will be made. She will wear a monitor around her chest to monitor her heart rate while awake and active. I received some emails about heart rates and emailed NIH and our doctors. The first number being on the low end (some of our friends stay around this when resting) and the second number being on the high end.

EDIT: Just heard from the doctor - they use the Harriet Lane Handbook for resting heart rate calculations:

Ages 5 - 7:

Low End: 65
Average/Normal: 100
High End: 133

According to NIH resting heart rate:

Newborn infants: 100 - 160 beats per minute
Children 1 to 10 years: 70 - 120 beats per minute
Children over 10 and adults (including seniors): 60 - 100 beats per minute
Well-trained athletes: 40 - 60 beats per minute

Her doctors are also putting in a referral for a Pulse Ox monitor. We didn't believe we needed one only a month ago but on Friday I received an email from her doctor and the referral has been placed. She will wear this at night when she is sleeping - it will monitor her heart rate and oxygen. I am very relieved to have the doctors ordering this. I have been extremely concerned about her during her sleep. This will at least ease my mind a little.

Pulmonary will be on April 16th. This will be a very important meeting and our first with the doctor. We will discuss all of Haven's sleep studies, the ABG, and other information that I have received and noted from the other mom's that I am concerned about.

Endocrine will be on May 4th. This will be our 6 month follow up meeting.

Oncology also informed Kris that every Friday Haven will now have full labs done - not just Cyclosporin levels. They will test the hypothalamic hormones, Cyclosporin levels, sodium levels, and other needs for the lab testing. This is more than Haven usually has but is needed for the records and to see if anything is changing, good or bad.

Haven will continue on this chemo treatment for one year. At 6 months the Oncology team will review all of her results with the medical board.

There is the small quick version of it all.
Thank you to everyone
Love ya

Home from the Hospital!!!

We arrived at the hospital around 8:30 am on Thursday to get ready for Haven's surgery. She was all happy. We hadn't really told her too much about it yet. She gets very anxious now so we waited until we got upstairs to explain it all to her.

When we got upstairs we met with the anesthesiologist, Dr. Elliott, and her eye doctor, Dr. Guyton. I really want to say how happy we were and are with both of these doctors. You are handing your child over to someone you don't know and have to really feel comfortable. Both of them made us and Haven happy. Dr. Elliott is one of the best anesthesiologist we've ever had at JH. I told Kris I wish we could request anesthesiologists each time, because I'd request him.

Haven got the "G"s on the side of each eye. This notes which eyes will be done and Haven needed both.

Heading off to surgery. Bluesy went with Haven. She said all her other babies were too scared to go to the eye doctor. Bluesy also had her eyes done, Haven said. Dad took her back - as I said before I only went one time and won't do it again. She did very well. She put her own mask on to fall asleep. The flavor of the mask this time - Popcorn. I was informed by Haven that popcorn flavor is very nasty!

She did extremely well through surgery. When she came out after round 1 we were able to visit with her. I only went back to see her for a short time - Dad stayed with her most of the time. I helped with holding her down to get eye drops in. Then they put her back under for round 2.

All in all - we arrived at 10:30 and were released from recovery room at the eye center around 4pm.

Haven was taken to the 4th floor of the pediatric building. She had a private room to recover in. About 2 hours after surgery they said she could have something to eat and she was so excited because I was going to get to feed her like a baby. We had lots of fun playing "Guess what food this is?". She was very happy to get carrots because as she says "they are good for the eyes".

Haven finally gets some sleep. She had a couple doses of Oxycodone and this really helped with the eyes. They were burning quite a bit. She kept asking for a mirror but we told her that hospitals don't have mirrors on the kids floor. We knew if she saw her eyes that she would freak out.

Dr. Paz-Priel came to visit us on the 4th floor on Thursday to see how she was doing. We were very happy he came by. Then her nurse from Oncology, Katie, called to check in on her. She was very happy but couldn't understand why Katie couldn't be her nurse over here.

As soon as Haven was conscious enough she wanted to make some phone calls. As soon as she got out of surgery she was begging to call Lauren. She had to call Lauren because she told Lauren she would. We called Lauren twice and left a message. Then when Lauren called back she got in trouble for not answering her phone and was told that she couldn't put her phone back in her purse incase Haven needed to call. It was very sweet. Sorry family - Lauren came first! :) But Lauren is her bestest friend she says.


Haven's port. She likes to check out her port every day to make sure it is looking ok. She also likes to look at it a million times when it's accessed. She said I had to show everyone how it looks and that it doesn't hurt when it's paper tape.

Finally awake on Friday. Haven was moved to the 8th floor for Inpatient Pediatric Oncology in the middle of the night. We had hoped to receive the Rituximab in the wee hours but were not able to get it until around 11am on Friday.

This is Miss Haven's right eye. They had to do both eyes. The doctor said the absolute way to check the eye roll is when they are asleep. We thought only one of Haven's eyes were bad but when she is asleep both eyes roll very far out and a lot of correction had to be done on both.

While receiving our chemo on Friday Haven woke up with a bit of energy - not normal for her. She wanted to walk around the floor and check out the play room.

We all played a couple of games and after about 30 minutes she got a bit tired. We headed back for a bit of a nap. Around 3pm we learned that Cyclosporin actually comes in two different types. There is the "N" type and the "S" type. Even though we specifically went over it with the nurses on the 4th floor and we showed them the box of her Cyclosporin we somehow received the wrong type.

We now know Haven gets the "S" type. However, this evening she received the "N" type. Haven's levels are checked twice a week and she should be at 200, anything over 250 puts her at a toxic level and we usually skip a dose. Around 3pm the doctors came in and told us that we received the "N" type and Haven's levels were at 389. We had to run tests on the liver and kidneys and they checked her over for blood pressure and watch for tremors.

Waiting on our tests to come back from the lab Haven fell asleep on the couch for a long time with Dad. Dr. Evelyn was very apologetic and very comforting in our wait for the results. Finally around 8pm the results came back and Haven was clear to leave the hospital. We got all excited and started to pack up when Haven reminded us that she still needed her port out!

Haven's nurse, Kim, came in and this was Haven's most dreaded time. She had been anxious about removing the tape from the port and removing the needle. She wanted to make sure this nurse knew how to do it like Nurse Katie does. She asked if they could make her sleep to remove the tape. But we made it through and Haven helped out.

This is a close up of Haven's eyes on Friday evening. Check out the difference. The doctor did an awesome job and we are very happy with everything.

Haven slept very happy last night. She slept all night and never woke up and I don't believe she even talked in her sleep. She woke up around 8am this morning and went back to sleep around 10am. We told her she could sleep all day and even at 2pm she is still asleep. :)

We are happy to have our baby back home. All of Haven's photos are uploaded in to her FLICKR account. You can click HERE to see all of them.