The Results Are In!

And everything is good-- Thank God.

Steven went in for his lumbar puncture this morning. First to his clinic where they applied Elomax (numbing creme) to his backside, then we waited half an hour for it to take effect.

Then to the procedure room. They had to unwrap Steven's IV hand, but he couldn't stand to look at the IV, so he asked for Angie, our Child Life buddy. She came in and talked to him a little about what scares him so much about IV's, then chatted with him about more pleasant topics.

It worked great. They started his general anesthetic and Steven fell asleep while talking to Angie.

The procedure is that they stick a needle into his spinal cord and then let the spinal fluid drip into a collection container of some sort. The spinal fluid is tested for cancer cells.

They took his IV out while he was still groggy enough not to remember them doing it.

Steven drew a picture of Angie with a bird beak making bird sounds, then presented it to her. The bird sounds are because Angie makes fake ocean and bird sounds while Steven is getting his IV in and the other nurses say she sounds terrible.

We finished up Steven's eye exam, they seemed to think all was well. We went back to Steven's clinic for results.

All was clear. The MRI where Steven moved his head didn't need repeating, they said they could see well enough to say that there is no recurrence of his cancer.

We left the hospital and drove to visit a friend that we met at the church we attend in Memphis.

Then back to Grizzlies House to meet Jake and Stephanie for dinner. We had a car, so we drove downtown and ate at Huey's, a burger place with a cork ceiling. They hand out little jars of toothpicks and a straw so you can blow the toothpicks into the cork ceiling and try to get them to stick.

At Grizzlies House after dinner, Jake and Steven played air hockey and video games. Jake's lumbar puncture is tomorrow, his brain and spinal MRI results were good. He flies home to Kansas City tomorrow night.

We can't wait to get home.

- Kathleen