Home Again

Sorry for the missing post yesterday - I had no energy left last night after getting beat so badly and so many times by William in our MarioKart challenge. But I got him back in Connect 4 today.

William was discharged from the hospital in the late afternoon today. He has a mild case of pneumonia and will be on antibiotics for 4 more days. The main thing the doctors want him to focus on over the next few days is eating (critical with his high dose chemotherapy). We'll be hoping that he likes carnation instant breakfast a few times a day, that being back home stirs his appetite, and we'll be offering ice cream with every meal (hopefully I can resist, but if he needs an example...).

Before leaving the hospital this afternoon, William was interviewed for an episode of the PBS show Healing Quest. It seems to be kind of an alternative medicine show and they are doing a story on the dogs in the hospital and how they are helping the kids. Dad and Grandma were even interviewed, but William and Millie were the stars. William even put on his Yoda shirt for the occasion. It was a great way to end the hospital stay. They told us the show would be aired later this year - we'll let folks know when we know anything more than that.

We headed straight from the hospital to the Esquire theater downtown to go see Toy Story 3 in 3D IMAX. Good times! And William enjoyed his longest walk in weeks - on the state capitol grounds.

Friday we're off to San Francisco for a consult with UCSF Children's hospital regarding the stem cell harvesting and bone marrow transplant. Then Monday William gets another bone marrow biopsy to see if his marrow is clear of the tumor cells (if so he'll be having his stem cells harvested in about 2 weeks), and then starts his 2nd cycle of chemotherapy in the hospital for 4 or 5 days. Julie will be coming back Friday night from the beach and the rest of the boys will be going to Grandma and Grandpa Bennion's house for a while we navigate the next couple rounds of chemo and stem cell harvest, and trying to keep Will out of the hospital in between (didn't do so well with that over the last week or so).

I can't thank you all enough for your love and prayers. If you'd like something specific to pray for, please pray for Will to regain his appetite and for Will's bone marrow to be clear of the tumor cells on Monday. (If that's not enough for you, you could also pray for Julie's safe return so you don't have to keep reading my posts...) We'll see if we can get another post from William with the perspectives from the front line, and hopefully we'll do a better job of getting some pictures up soon.