Wednesday, April 02, 2003

Here we go...

Yet another mass/generic mailing which I depise but find immensely
helpful; will probably feel the need to apologize at the start of everyone of these all year long.....

Met with the oncologist today and we finally have the official diganosis:
Desmoplastic Small Round Cell tumor/sarcoma. If we did nothing to treat
it, Jade would more than likely die within six months. Statistics (for
what they're worth) say one in ten has a chance of surviving the treatment and living. Desmoplastic small round cell sarcoma is related to Ewing's which
is a form of osteosarcoma and while this isn't in Jade's bone yet, they
will do tests to confirm this. In the next 48 to 96 hours he will have another
CT scan, bone scan and bone biopsy along with having a port/catheter put into his clavical for the chemo. Chemo will more than likely start next
Tues the 8th or Weds the 9th latest. The desmoplastic part of the sarcoma is slow growing but the blue small round cell part of it is EXTREMELY
aggressive.

Our oncologist says Jade will be given lethal doses of chemo to kill
almost everything in his body and then be given back stem cells they will harvest from him to help everything grow healthy again. At this point treatment
will be as follows: three rounds of chemo, harvest stem cells, second
round of chemo, exploratory surgery to see if any nodules are left, possible
more chemo followed by the transplant of his stem cells. If he has to have a
second round of transplant they will check with his siblings about being
donors but that's a good few months down the line. If this has spread to
his bones, this chemo regimen will take care of it.

Treatment is possible but this is kind of an all or nothing situation.
Jade remains more optimistic and positive than I do. I do believe everything
will be ok and the fact that we at least have some hope of it being cured
is more and better news than we had two weeks ago. We believe we have
already benefitted from the faith, prayers and fasting from all our
friends, family and neighbors and will continue to rely on that support.

We are a jumble of emotions tonight. We really were excited about having
six weeks to get life back on track before this next
hurricane/tornado/train wreck hit, but I guess not. Suddently the thought of starting chemo in less than a week is very overwhelming. We have confidence in our doctors and believe God is very aware of us and will help us through regardless the outcome.

I'll try to keep you posted with how things go. We are so lucky to have the love and support of many people. How do people get through this without
the help of all of you?!

Thanks for everything.....

Much love and faith.....Tanya and co.