Day 85

Even with her all-time high fever last night, the results that one of the new lumens is growing bacteria, and a few sores in her mouths, today was a good day. She had a PCA started yesterday. This is a personally controlled analgesia devise. It gives a low constant dose of pain control medication with the ability to deliver a bolus(a higher dose) every 15 minutes. This has seemed to be a wonderful move for her. She rests better. She isn't getting those high pain levels, and she is brighter-eyed. She actually ate a good amount of food for her. She was alert more of the day with many-a-smile today. The best news of the day was the results of the lumbar puncture revealed that the viral brain infection is at the lowest it has been since it was found. With another week to treat it before the new cells go in, it is expected to be even lower. This gives us a good start for the new cells to take over anywhere from 2-4 weeks later. They have started treatment for the bacteria growing in the line, so pray this is killed before the transplant and stays gone. The treatment for this particular bacteria is an antibiotic that suppresses the bone marrow. The transplant is moving forward on schedule. We move to a transplant room over the weekend. Chemo starts tomorrow. She is a bit nervous about feeling sick, so this is something you can pray for. They do an excellent job of administering pre-meds, but one never knows how one will respond. We found out today that our donor is a young man(around 20). I am so grateful that he is going through such a procedure. He will be in pain, and need to stay overnight in the hospital. We wrote him an anonymous letter today that will be delivered to him on Friday. After one year, if he agrees, we can communicate with each other. Pray now, that God's timing for this will be amazing. All in all, we felt peaceful and happy today. Even with the bad news, it felt positive. We could say that our peace was an encompassing gift independent of our circumstances given by God. May we all rest as peaceful tonight. Remember that Kelly's night is our day, so pray for her peaceful night for tomorrow morning. Thank you Jesus!
Love,
Mom