Our family has always counted sleeps instead of days. We taught our children this at a young age. It always seemed to make the time go by faster.
We’re now at six more sleeps to our preliminary appointment at Texas Children’s in Houston and the days seem even longer than ever. Even saying “six more sleeps” to La Petite Belle doesn’t make it shorter.
However, I am beyond thankful for answers and actual confirmed dates and appointments.
Let’s start with where I last left off. A lot has happened since I last posted.
We sold our house.
We moved.
We are living with my parents in a three-bedroom house, where one of us has to get the couch or floor or go to a friend’s house. {y’all … it’s snug in this house with six people. And four dogs, mind you … FOUR dogs … that’s a post for another day.}
We got a confirmed hospital admittance date and transplant date.
There have been many emotions throughout the week as we’ve tried to get semi-settled in before we leave again. Beau was more emotional than I was about the house. I thought I would be more of a crybaby about it, but I didn’t shed a tear. Not even one. I just didn’t have time. I didn’t allow the thought of leaving and the sentiments of the home occupy a spot in my brain. There’s just no time nor space left. I know … I’ll probably need therapy later, but, for now I won’t be thinking about it.
The best news of the week was that the donor was medically cleared for the transplant, which allowed us to have our dates set.
We do have six more sleeps until we leave for a few days. On this visit, La Petite Belle will have all her preliminary doctors’ visits … cardiologist, pulmonologist, and other office visits and scans.
We will return home for another week before having to head back for a third bone marrow biopsy. For this, we’ll only be gone two days.
Then, return home again for just a couple more days before, once again, heading back for one last appointment before admittance. With that said, our official “last day” here at home will be Thursday, July 30th, and our official admittance date is Sunday, August 2nd.
In between all these dates, we’ll be seeing our doctor here and … you guessed it … getting counts checked and getting transfusions.
This whole waiting period is similar to that of when I was 9 months pregnant (actually more pregnant than that … late babies, ya’ know) and people kept asking me when I was going to have “that baby”. Just so happened that “that baby” was La Petite Belle. Doctors gave me a due date of September 16th and she came October 6th. Uh …. yeah. So OVER 9 months pregnant and ginormous! All you late-delivering moms know how that feels … you hate to disappoint everyone. You just want to stay home so you don’t have to answer any more questions about when that baby is due or how you’re feeling.
I feel like I’m disappointing people when they see us still here. I think many people don’t understand the complexity of this process nor the time frame.
If all the dates go as planned, the EARLIEST we should be home will be some time around Thanksgiving. That’s, of course, what we’re hoping for. I’d like nothing better than to be home for Thanksgiving with so many things to be thankful for.
We’re spending the days we have here prepping for our stay there.
My brave girl decided she would go ahead and chop her hair off. She’s also been doing some reading herself about her treatment and knows that she’s faced with losing her hair. She read that it was easier to cope with hair loss if you cut it beforehand.
Her hair has always been important to her. It’s always been long and beautiful. So, to see her take the initiative to cut it and not just hold onto it for dear life made me proud.
And, she wanted to donate it. We looked into several options and choose the Pantene Beautiful Lengths program because they give (a.k.a. … free wigs) wigs to women battling cancer. Some organizations make people pay for their wigs. Pantene also takes shorter lengths. La Petite Belle cut off eight inches. Some others require twelve. Knowing that the hair is going to some woman who will have lost her hair helps with the loss of her own.
Two eight-inch ponytails ready for action …
The new do … So cute!
Six more sleeps … six more sleeps … and then on to the next countdown.
Thanks for the continued prayers and support.
If you would like to support Katie’s (aka La Petite Belle) journey to healing financially, you can find more information here – www.gofundme.com/Katieg. All money goes toward medical bills and expenses.
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