It's been two months since the last update. Noah has been healthy. People have been asking about a particularly "exciting" event from yesterday, so this is as good a time as any to recap.
First, you might have caught Mayumi's Facebook post that Noah got into an accident yesterday. He was riding his bike home after fishing in the neighborhood across from ours. He was running late as it was already dusk and went through a busy 4-way stop probably less carefully than advisable. He got halfway across and met a car making a right turn. Witnesses said he flew up in the air and hit the driver's windshield.
The way we found out was that Mayumi called his watch to tell him to get home. He answered and said he got in an accident, and a witness also got on and said 911 was on the way. Talk about a mother's intuition, calling 30 seconds after the accident! Mayumi and I got over there a few minutes later, and I mentioned it looked like every police officer and fireman in the tri-state area was present. Pretty quickly we could see that Noah seemed to be mostly okay, but it was hard to tell in all the chaos. He was adamant he was fine, but a police officer was appropriately stabilizing his neck until EMTs could arrive.
An ambulance took Noah and Mayumi down to Peyton Manning Children's Hospital ER for more testing. Once there he was hooked up to an IV, got a bunch of blood draws, x-rays, and a CT scan. There was never really anything suggesting he had anything serious going on, but given the flying-through-the-air-into-the-windshield thing, it was best to check. He spent about 6 hours in the hospital and all the checks came back clean. He took it all in stride and, if anything, his vibe was one of annoyance at how long he had to wear a neck brace.
Frequent readers will remember that Peyton Manning Children's Hospital is where he spent months being treated for leukemia, which is the reason this blog exists. It was kind of surreal being back in this place. Like I said, I think our worst fears were mostly allayed once we were able to see him moving his legs and talking and such at the accident site. It probably goes without saying that any parent rushing to a bike-vs.-car accident is going to be a bit rattled. And I certainly was. There was also some of the same helplessness and fear of the unknown we felt when we first learned of his cancer diagnosis. I think I'm probably describing a touch of PTSD.
All I can say is we're incredibly thankful that, so far, he seems to have come out of this unscathed. He's got bruises and scrapes and some soreness, but nothing more than a typical kid would have after wiping out on a bike without hitting a car. He told me today there's a little soreness in his neck, but he's just sure it's due to having to wear that uncomfortable neck brace for sooooo long ha. Thanks to all the first responders, witnesses, and healthcare staff who jumped into action. One really cool thing about going to the same hospital is that one of his oncology nurses tracked him down and paid him a visit...and gave him a well-deserved hard time about not staying away from the place!
On to the "other" medical stuff. We're on an every-two-months schedule for labs now and wouldn't have had them until next Thursday. However, last night's adventure resulted in getting all kinds of labs early. They are solid. Hemoglobin is at 12.2. It had been in the 13s, so I wouldn't mind it being a bit higher, but it's still in the normal range and these things can bounce around. Platelets normal at 274. The most notable change is in ANC, which jumped from 1,581 in September to 2,508 yesterday. We'll talk to the doctor next week, but I believe this is a normal level for an 11-year-old boy.
This all tracks clinically, as he seems to have gained strength these last couple months. Cross country wasn't easy, but his times improved steadily, and his 3K time dropped four minutes by the end. The start of the season was more of a "can he get through this without walking?" whereas by the end he was finishing strong. It was so nice having him back being part of a team and fun to have the boys together at practice. He had a great attitude, and the program gave him the Spirit Award for his age group.
Another big milestone is that, as of October 14th, Noah has been in remission for one year. As noted in a previous post, the probabilities for relapse are front-loaded, so the risk decreases the further we get from remission. There's never a guarantee, and chemotherapy itself often leads to other health issues. We'll do the best we can to monitor for those sorts of things, but it's not worth dwelling on them.
One thing this one-year anniversary did allow us to do was get genetic counseling and testing. The gist is they look at family history and test 30 or so genes for mutations that might suggest a genetic reason for the leukemia and/or for an increased chance of relapse. While we do have a lot of cancers in the family (sadly, most families do), none are actually known to be notably correlated with AML. More importantly, no mutations were found in any of those genes in Noah's sample. This is great news for Noah. That's not to say he couldn't have a mutation they don't test for, but it rules out the well-known candidates.
We're still mostly left with no answer to why he got AML, but the prevailing theory is "bad luck." That's both comforting and confounding, but as we understand it, the vast majority of pediatric cases of cancer are not caused by external forces. As much as we'd like to point to some clear reason (e.g., pesticides), the more likely explanation is that a blood-forming cell in his bone marrow picked up some random mutations and then replicated and replicated and replicated. And that's it. This is cancer in a nutshell. Of course, there are plenty of environmental factors that increase cancer risk in general, but it still often comes down to a roll of the dice. Hopefully someday we can figure out how to stop that.
Some additional news and notes:
- I called out a few things that would be happening in September for Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Noah's doctor, Dr. Razzouk, received a $100,000 Hyundai Impact Grant to support pediatric cancer research, treatment, and care at Peyton Manning Children's Hospital. Noah spoke at the event, and there are some pictures from that below.
- We walked with our neighbors in the Blood Cancer United Light the Night walk. It was a fun night. We love our neighbors, and it was a moving experience being together with cancer survivors and remembering those we've lost after battling so hard. Pictures are below, including one of Noah in the circle of survivors.
- Noah got to be the Peyton Manning Children's Hospital Honorary Ball Kid for an Indiana Fever game. We got great seats and Noah got to go on the court during warmups and get a picture with Sophie Cunningham.
- Noah got to be a Patient Ambassador for the 2nd annual Peyton Manning Children's Hospital Homecoming Celebration at Lucas Oil Stadium. It was a fun event with lots of games, great food, and inspiring stories.
- He's been really into fishing lately, and his Uncle Mark hooked him up with some upgrades. You can see in the pictures below that he was pretty excited. Clearly, he needs to be more careful heading to and from the pond!
And with that, I'll leave you with a smattering of random pictures from the last couple months. We love you all and over and out.
