Hi all – The last 24 hours was a whirlwind. Last night, Sally was as jolly as could be. She was smiley and playful, I put her down on the bathmat so I could, well, use the potty. She just sat there playing with a stool and one of William’s socks he left in there for a half an hour having a blast. It was nice to see.

Aren’t all kids this happy playing with a sock?

Nicole put her down for bed and we got to hang out and have a drink together and catch up on things, unwinding after a long week. Sally woke up and was fussy, Nicole went and laid with her for awhile and I relieved her for a bit so she could get ready for bed. A half an hour later, Sally threw up, so we had to scramble and change the sheets and her pajamas.

She woke up the next morning not herself. She felt warm and was at 99.5, just below the 100.1 she has to be before we call it into MSK. Nicole went to work and I waited a bit, she was 100.2 in one ear and 99.5 in the other. 30 minutes later she was 100.8 in both ears. Called it in, and was told to bring her in to get checked out. I spent the next half an hour gathering all the stuff I’d need to bring, luckily Cindy was here this weekend to stay with the boys. I get everything set and run out to get the car…

The car won’t start.

I tried a few things, the power locks and everything were working so assumed it wasn’t the battery. I figured I’d have to take a cab, but wasn’t sure how I’d work out the car seat and bringing with me, as I already had Sally, the stroller, and several bags. I randomly gave our new friend Kristen from Bay Ridge Cares a call as a hail mary and she was luckily available to give us a ride ASAP, already having a car seat in her car. Thank God.

Thank God Kristen was available and had a car seat.

We arrived and Kristen dropped us off, I got Sally upstairs and Adrianne, one of our primary in-patient nurses who I was just chatting with on Thursday, came by when she heard Sally was there. She took her temp which had climbed to 101. When Sally gets a fever, she has to have cultures taken to check several potential causes.

They take lots of blood when Sally has a fever.

The doctor came and checked out Sally, and discovered that her right ear was infected. She said as long as she wasn’t neutropenic and all of her other tests came back negative we’d likely just be given an antibiotic and then we could head home. Awhile later some of her blood tests came back and were very surprised that Sally’s WBC (white blood cells) had dropped from 3.3 on Thursday to 1.2 from the last round of chemo. Nicole and I weren’t expecting her counts to drop that much as she’s had these treatments before, and especially that fast. This is likely why she got the infection, as her immune system is very weak right now.

Finding out her blood counts have dropped causing an ear infection.

Luckily, her ABS (virus killing portion of WBCs) was a .8. If it had been under a .5 they would have admitted us. Sally is likely heading in that direction so we are also VERY lucky we brought her in right away and got out of there before her counts dropped any further as we could have been stuck there for days until her counts recovered.

Sally got some Tylenol and her antibiotic, sleeping through a chunk of it.

Sleeping through her antibiotic.

Ariane, one of our first roommates who came all the way from Singapore for treatment for Leukemia and just got released after a bone marrow transplant, was in for a checkup and got to see “Baby Sally” which made her smile. I got to talk to her mom Mariam for awhile  who I often exchange emails with about the different emotions we go through with all of this. She was randomly telling me about how Ariane named her IV pole that she used for the last month Maximus and thought of it as her horse. As she told the story she looked down at the pole in Sally’s room and saw a Dora the Explorer sticker on it and realized it was the same pole! Such a funny coincidence.  Miriam, like Nicole and I, intends to make raising awareness about pediatric cancer a part of her life once we get through this.

Behold, Maximus!

The doctor came in and gave me a prescription for an antibiotic (3x day for 10 days, ugh, ANOTHER medicine) and told us to get out of there, which Sally smiled when I put her in her stroller knowing we were going home. Honestly, of all the things it could have been, an ear infection is one of the more welcome as it’s a normal issue all of our kids have had.

Let’s get the heck outa here!

Nicole said she wasn’t going to be able to get us until much later with my sister’s car, but luckily, our new friend John, also from Bay Ridge Cares, saw my Facebook post about not having a car and being at the hospital and offered to come in and pick us up. First, he tried to go see if he could jumpstart our car but confirmed it was likely the starter and not the battery (so now I have to figure out how to get it towed to a garage on a holiday weekend). Sally and I headed out to wait for him, however John got stuck in a ton of traffic so had to feed her through her feeding tube out on the sidewalk, which got several stares from people walking by. Although after that drew their attention, they realized how cute Sally was and could hear them remark on her cheeks as they walked away.

Waiting for John in front of MSK.

Feeding Sally through her g tube on the street.

John finally reached us and fought through traffic to get us home, and we arrived right after Nicole got home from work. A few hours later, we came full circle as Sally was back to her happy self. We were playing on our bed while Nicole finished dinner and she was totally cracking up pulling my sunglasses off my face. Here’s a quick video if you want to hear that beautiful sound of her cracking up over and over: Video

So with Sally being on the verge of neutropenic, we have to take some extra precautions the next few days like keeping her a bit more isolated and watching out for any other symptoms. Hopefully the antibiotic will fight most things off to could crop up. Other than that, looking forward to hopefully enjoying a quiet family day tomorrow.

Please keep Sally in your thoughts and prayers.

Matt