Another week of waiting.
There was a heaviness in my spirit this morning. I could feel it as I drove Blake and Aubrey to school.
Chris called as Brady and I were headed to get his labs drawn. Chris had had an appointment early this morning because of an old injury, but he said he felt it too.
He said as they did the ultrasound on his leg he almost lost it. Just the weight. The emotion. The trying to hold it together.
The heaviness.
NCH called within the hour of Brady’s labs being drawn. They had been watching for them.
“His platelets look great! They skyrocketed to over 300! But unfortunately,” I felt like I already knew the rest, but I listened, “now it is his ANC. It dropped all the way to 300.”
300? It was 2,500 one week ago and 1,300 on Thursday. 300? Ugh. I just knew this was going to happen.
After a very lengthy discussion with our amazing nurse, the decision was to wait an entire week to recheck.
Another whole week.
I walked back and forth in front of our house for about twenty minutes while we discussed everything. Then, I tried to figure out how I was going to package it as I told Brady the news. I took a couple deep breaths, put a smile on my face and walked back through the door.
“Great news buddy! You get a whole week off of going to the hospital! We aren’t going to recheck until next Monday.”
I felt like a fraud. I just candy coated news I was devastated to hear. But I just didn’t know what else to do.
Then, the heaviness came back. There is no reason for it. Nothing is “alarming” in his labs that would indicate the treatment isn’t working. Nothing. In fact, his body not rebounding yet, while not super common, is also not concerning.
It is just a heaviness I can’t explain. God, please let me be wrong. Please.
Chris got home tonight and I could see it in his eyes. The heaviness. As we talked we both teared up. He feels the heaviness like something is coming. Something really hard. God, please let him be wrong. Please.
With all the heaviness Chris and I are feeling, an amazing thing did happened today. For the first time since his diagnosis, Brady talked about the future.
“Mom,” he said thoughtfully, “when I grow up I want to be a lab doctor. Actually, I want to work on the 12th floor overnight. I want to help the kids that have to stay at the hospital.”
“Wow, buddy,” I said, “you have a huge heart so I think you would be great at that.”
A couple tears ran down my cheek as I added, “Plus, you know how hard this is so you could understand what they are going through.”
The future. I’m the midst of this heaviness, he talked about the future.
“The cords of death entangled me; the torrents of destruction overwhelmed me… in my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice; my cry came before him, into his ears.”
Lord, hear our cry.
#waytobattlebrady#bravelikebrady#leukemiawarrior#childhoodcancerawareness#thisishard#keepgoing#joychallenge
Today was day 7 of our joy challenge. We delivered some cupcakes to a super special family, but fell short of our five person goal for the day. So, hopefully this post will bless or speak to someone’s heart today