Round 3 begins…

Carter's surprise guest...Mickey Mouse!

Well, Carter had a great night sleep, and woke up at 7am ready for his morning walk (we wish Dad slept as well as the little guy). Mom and Grandma came to the hospital to see Dad and Carter around 11am. At about 11:30am the nurse came in and told us Carter’s counts are high enough that he will begin treatment today. So, bring it on Round 3!! They had to hydrate him for 4 hours, then give an anti-nausea drug, and then begin his 4 hour chemo drip. He should be finished by 8:30pm and will hopefully sleep okay through the night. This is the chemo drug that usually Carter gets sick from about 3-4 times through the night. His appetite really goes down these first few days, so we made sure he had all his goodies earlier today (pasta with alfredo sauce and beans, rice and guacamole). Unfortunately, as of 9:30 pm Carter has vomitted twice...once on Dad.

One advantage of having your children’s hospital near Disneyland is that you get all sorts of special visitors. Last week, Carter got to see three pirates from the movie “Pirates of the Caribbean”. And today, Mickey Mouse came to Carter’s room and brought him a Mickey Mouse Pirate. Carter was being shy while Mickey was visiting, but as soon as he left Carter was so excited telling the nurse that Mickey just came in. I think it was the highlight of his day.

We waited around for hours hoping to see the oncologist to find out CT scan results. Finally, around 4pm the doctor came in. He told us there is significant reduction in the overall size if the tumor. There is still some tumor on the right side, but overall the tumor mass is much smaller. The CT scan wouldn’t necessarily show dead tumor versus living tumor, so hopefully the right side is dead tumor (Mom just being hopeful). The AFP counts are so dramatic that this is indicative of the tumor being smaller as well. The oncologist said this is great and things are looking very good for Carter. UCLA still wants to do another MRI after Round 3, so we may be going up there again in about 2.5 weeks. This will be very telling because an MRI is a better scan and can provide more information, and this will be reviewed by the surgeons who are the ones to make the surgical call. Our hope is the tumor reduces to ONLY the left side, making a resection (not transplant) our course for surgery. So, lots of SHRINK, SHRINK, SHRINKING the next 3 weeks!!...especially on that right side and mid section!!!

Our courage and strength comes directly from Carter! He is amazing and we are staying as optimistic as possible because there is no other way to be! Thank you again to all our friends and Carter’s supporters! Words of inspiration are so powerful and Matt and I can only hope to be as good of friends and people as you all are!!