Cooper's last day of chemotherapy!!!!!

Today is Cooper's last day of chemotherapy.  This is so exciting.  It has been a really hard year.  Chemotherapy is bad stuff.  It makes him feel so sick.  It will be so nice for him to be done.  When the chemo road map is finished there is a bell that Cooper will ring.  Here are pictures from his last day.

 Above is Coop and Ben.  Ben is a super great guy who helped take care of Cooper and he happened to be here for his last day.

 Above is Amie, Cooper's nurse.  We were also excited that Amie was there for Cooper's last day because she is definitely one of our favorite nurses.  She was with Cooper at the beginning and we haven't had her again until his last 2 days.  She is 6 months pregnant with a boy.  We are so excited for her.

 This is Tommy.  He is another favorite that happened to be here on Cooper's last day.  He is getting ready to do Cooper's last vitals before leaving the hospital.  He also made Cooper a poster to celebrate his last day of chemo.

 This is the last MESNA that Cooper had to have before he was discharged.  This stuff pushes the chemo through all the important organs so it doesn't cause damage.

 Here is Cooper by the bell.

 Here is the saying under the bell.  It is kind of hard to read.

 Here we together after Cooper rang the bell with Tommy's poster.  Jared and I were a little emotional.  It has been a long hard year and it is hard to believe he is finally finished.

 As we were walking out of the hospital there was this ice sculpture so Coop stopped for a picture.

Cooper picked out this ornament and it fits the time perfectly.  It is a picture of a little bald cancer kid holding up an IV pole saying "I Survived!".  A perfect way to end this year and celebrate Christmas.

Day 4 of Cycle 14

Cooper had some very special visitors today, some of the Utah Jazz Basketball team and dancers.  We had Jamal Tinsley #6 and Devin Harris #5 come to Cooper's room and gave him a couple of signed basketballs.  Then we went on a walk to let Coop dribble the ball up and down the hall and ran into Alec Burks #10 and Gordon Hayward #20 who are in the picture below.  

Believe in Miracles

This Christmas tree says Believe in Miracles and we thought we should take a picture in front of it.  Right now he has a fever of 101.5.  They started cultures again and Rocephin.  Hopefully he doesn't have any more.

Day 3 of Cycle 14

Cooper has had a good day.  We can hardly keep him in the room long enough for the chemotherapy and nausea medications.  He likes to be out in the halls or in the toy room.  Every time we come back there seems to be a present on his bed.  Last night Build A Bear brought a present for all of the kids.  His bear is dressed in pirate costume.  He loves it. One of his cancer buddies Tyson also came and gave him a Toy Story coloring set.  He also received some candy and a loaf of bread with oranges from a past cancer mom who has been where we are. 

Then today when we returned from the toy room and he had a big bag on his bed with tons of stuff; watches, books, motorcycles, jets, candy, legos and many more things.  This present is from the military.  There are so many people who are very generous, especially with these sweet little kids fighting cancer. 

Day 2 of Cycle 14

The second day was a good day.  Cooper has a little friend named Boo who was diagnosed with brain cancer that had spread to his spine.  After a lot of horrible chemotherapy and intense radiation they had scans last week and found out today that he is clear, he is in remission.  Hooray for Boo!  Here are some pictures from our day.

Admitted to Primary Childrens for Cycle 14 - The Final Cycle!

Cooper was admitted today for his final (5 day) cycle of chemotherapy.  He has a fever that has continued for more than 1 hour so they are doing cultures and antibiotics but he seems to feel just fine.  We have already been on a walk and he has made a christmas tree.  Here are a few pictures from day 1.

Notice on this last picture that Coop is getting a ride on his IV pole.  He knows how to have a good time.

Cycle 13 December 5th - 6th

Cooper went for Cycle 13.  A blood test determines whether he can go for more chemotherapy or not.  His ANC and platelets were a little low but they wanted him anyway and so we went.  He seemed to do well.  We just got home and he is happy.  Only time will tell if he will recovery quickly from this cycle.  Lets hope for the best.  If he does recover well they plan to have him back for his last 5 day cycle on December 19th-23rd.  Hopefully he doesn't get a fever so we can be home on Christmas. 

After recovering from the last cycle of chemo he will have 2 weeks before a pelvic CT, MRI, PET scan and chest CT to make sure the cancer hasn't metastisized.  If all is good and scans are clear they will schedule a surgery to remove his central line power port.  He will be thrilled to get this out.  The plan after that will be scans and blood work every 3 months for 3 years, then every 6 months for 2 more years.  If there hasn't been a sign of cancer after 2 years of scans the chance of it coming back goes down dramatically. 

Chemo has been rescheduled again!

Each of Cooper's cycles are suppose to be 14 days apart including the days he gets the chemo.  To make the 14 day cycle he should have been back on November 21st.  His ANC and platelets have been really low and slow to recover this time.  Salt Lake was hoping to have him back tomorrow on November 30th but his counts are still too low.  Now we are hoping for Monday December 5th.  If he gets admitted that day this will be the longest he has ever been inbetween cycles, 28 days total.  Wow, poor little guy is wearing down.  Right now he feels good though so we will enjoy the time we have at home.  Cooper and his dad decided to make Family Home Evening treats last night.  Here they are making brownies.

Cooper is feeling good!

Cooper is finally feeling better.  We decided to make the most of a Saturday and we drove to Logan and then ended in Preston to see the light parade and fireworks.  It was a great day!

Discharged on Antibiotics

Cooper had a 3 day hospital stay at Portneuf to help recover from Cycle 12 (11/14-11/16).  Then over the last 10 days (11/14-11/25) he has had a total of 6 transfusions, 2 red blood and 4 platelets.  It seems like we were at Portneuf every other day after being discharged for the transfusions.

Here are some pictures from the last 13 days of recovery. Some are in the hospital and some are at home.

Cooper ended up staying on those antibiotics from 11/14 through 11/25.  Way too many days for me to play home nurse.  He was okay having me give them for the first 4-5 days but then it got old, for both of us.  If we look at the positive at least we were home!

 Cooper loves Christmas time.  He is wearing a reindeer headband and getting ready to watch a movie.

 Here is Cooper in a box being silly.

 Here we are decorating our house for Christmas.  What a fun time of year.

 Cooper is taking down his older brother Ike in this picture.  He has tons of fun playing with his brothers and sister.

Korbie decided to make little buddies and took some clothes and filled them with stuffing and gave them a head.  Cooper carried his little buddy around for a couple of days.  He even took him to Thanksgiving dinner.