Quick update....

Ricky had his bandages removed yesterday while we were at Dana Farber. The doctors thought he looked excellent! The incision is easily a foot long along his frontal lobe, but healing well and his hair is growing back. He hasn’t needed any pain medicine for the last three days. He gained a few pounds, up to 57.5 lbs, his highest weight ever. He is cleared for take off; we are going to Florida Sunday! He went to school today wearing a baseball cap, but he went back to school. He continues to amaze me.

As to treatment options, there are three different plans that are being considered. One involves a single drug, one uses two, and the last one is a five drug cocktail. It will be awhile before we select one, as his platelets need to be over 100,000 before any of them can be started. Yesterday they were at 80,000. That’s not a bad number, as he’s been as low as 3,000, but before we started treatments last Spring, he had 543,000.

All three plans are experimental, and all three are unproven and have fairly high risks of side effects. We’re hoping to shrink what is left of the tumor cells, as it’s doubtful we can get rid of them altogether, as the tumor is just so aggressive. It’s learned to get around heavy radiation (seven weeks worth, six weeks is the normal plan) and heavy chemotherapy (Temador and CCNU), and it grew back very quickly so we’re in a pretty tough spot. It’s not hopeless, but it’s not going to be a cakewalk. The doctors feel pretty strongly that there is still some tumor remaining after the surgery. With these tumors, there are almost always cells left behind. It only takes one to start things up again.

Next MRI will be in a couple of weeks as we start treatment, we’ll know better then where we stand. Meanwhile we are looking forward to some sun and fun for a few days during school vacation next week.

Thank you for caring and your prayers.