All Is Well With Our Souls

Steven's scans were clear. Jacob's good wishes came true, our prayers were answered and he got to get his IV out.

I don't usually dream, but last night my dreams were vivid-- tortured, sad, twisted, full of friends and children we've met fighting against unrelenting monsters that pursued them relentlessly. I woke with fear in the pit of my stomach.

This is the faithless part of me that I wish I could suppress. Steven confided to me this evening that even he was worried this time, he said the appointments and the travel had gone too smoothly and he kept expecting that there was some price to pay.

I guess he really is his mother's son, this is a part of me I never wished to pass on.

The day started with the endocrine clinic, a blood draw followed by a microscopic examination of the parts of his body associated with reproduction. They go in there with rulers and beads while I avert my eyes and think of what a good sport he is to put up with all of this.

Then we saw Dr. Gajjar, who gave us the results we've been praying for.

The endocrine tests revealed that his thyroid levels might be out of whack, we'll hear more tomorrow.

The ENT tried to unclog the wax in his little ear so that hopefully tomorrow we can get a good hearing test.

Steven, Nicholas and Jaryd

We met another family from our pediatric brain tumor support group mailing list, Nicholas, who was diagnosed with a brain tumor when he was four and his brother Jaryd, mom Amy and grandmother Jalena.

They live nearby and drove into town and we went to eat at the Spaghetti Warehouse. The boys all hit it off and had a great evening playing video games after they ate dinner.

We are just so thankful, for friends and family and people who understand and who care, and everything. Everything.

- Kathleen

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p.s. It has been quite the process for me to make this update. Apparently St. Jude's IT department was hard at work yesterday making changes in their network, the net result and unintended consequence was that I can no longer send email or make posts to Steven's website.

Hopefully they will work out the kinks and end up with a rational solution that won't require me to use my cell phone to send email updates.

I believe they are attempting to stop some of the late night internet activity by parents and older patients that I personally observed taking place on St. Jude computers in the wee hours when I was wandering the halls of the hospital, sleepless, during Steven's chemo.

Tragedy alone does not a virtuous person make.