Test Results In

Sorry for the delay in posting her test results. She is still in remission. The bone marrow aspirate did show some young lymphocytes, but they are not cancerous and are indicative of a bone marrow that is recovering (she had this at the end of her Delayed Intensification phase when it took almost a month for her counts to recover). However, this has nothing to do with platelets and he has no idea why hers are so low. The only answers are that she is fighting a virus or this is her baseline. Dr. Joe did say that if they are low again in 2 months, he may do another BMA. I ended up calling my pediatrician who really has been fantastic throughout all of this and even asks me how I am. He said that when he sees kids with low platelets, but everything else is fine, he usually has them come in for another check in 2 months. If the platelets are still in that range, then he takes that as being their normal platelet count and he said he has plenty of patients whose normal platelet counts are in the low 100s. He also believes that we should not discount the fact that Dave and his mother had ITP (an autoimmune disorder where the body attacks its platelets). Now he is not saying she has ITP, but it's something that we should always keep in the back of our minds and perhaps she had something before her leukemia diagnosis that was not diagnosed and the chemo masked. It got Dave and I thinking about how as a toddler, Catherine always had more bruises than her peers. In fact, the big bruise that developed on her back just before her diagnosis was not what sent me running to the doctor. I do recall thinking to myself that I should bring her in, but she said she had fallen and she was the type of kid to bruise so I thought nothing of it (famous last words as I was told by her oncologists that this bruise was internal bleeding from low platelets). Bottom line, perhaps, she does have an abnormally low platelet count. Of course this whole ordeal has shaken me to my core and even with good test results, I am not over it. My post-treatment honeymoon phase is officially OVER!! I stare at her constantly. I'm always asking Dave if she looks pale. When she is watching TV and just laying there, I pester her on whether or not she feels okay or is she tired. Every bruise (and there are so many) makes my stomach ache. The other day I picked her up from Nature Center camp and she had a bruise on the inside of her lip. I was sick to my stomach as that is not a normal bruise. I started to get that haze in my head and I was ready to call Dr. Joe (although this was on July 2 and the New England pilgrimage to the Cape had already begun and there was no way I was getting on I-95). Luckily, I showed it to a friend who said that her kids get bruises like that when they get bumped in the mouth and then I remembered that the day before, Catherine got whacked (accidentally of course) in the mouth by a friend in the pool. And here we are a few days later and the bruise is gone...only to be replaced by so many more because she is indeed so much more active and always bumping into things. Basically, I know going into our 3 month appointment that her platelets will be below 150,000...I've accepted it. I also know that the roller coaster ride of cancer is still on and bigger than ever with more twists and turns than I could have imagined. I have a favorite saying and when I get upset I just try to remind myself that today is a gift and that is why they call it the present so try to live life to the fullest.