Jo was given five days of Freedom on Tuesday and she's made good use of it (except Weds nite when we went to the ER ... and that was good use, too, on the one hand). We picked up Ciera on Weds afternoon (she's such a good little 'ppplllleeeeeeeese?' beggar ;o) and she was to spend the night. A little mishap w/Jo caused Jo's PICC to bleed and, since it was under the tegaderm bandage, I couldn't tell where the blood was coming from, so off we went to the ER at the beginning of our snow and ice that was falling. As Jo said, it was the easiest trip to the ER we've ever had, but b/c of that, we were there for a long time just to have them tell us it was the skin that was torn and the PICC was fine (since she wasn't having chest pain, they took their time getting to us). By this time, the blood had come out under the tegaderm where the tubes are and was it was also drying under the tegaderm; plus, they had pulled the top part of the bandage loose in order to look at the 'tear'. They said, "It's okay; just a skin tear. You can go on home now and follow up with your doctor at your Friday appointment." I said, "Well, couldn't you clean that up and put a new bandage on it?" The nurse looked at Jo and said, "Would that make you feel better?" Jo said, "Well, yeah, actually it really would." I'm sure she felt like saying, "Duh!" The snow was really coming down when we left, but there wasn't a lot of traffic and we took it easy getting back. Dan had come over to get Ciera but had stayed to talk to Gary and he called to see what was happening. I told him we should be leaving soon so he stayed and Ciera got to stay with Jo after all. We took her home late Thursday b/c of Jo's appt on Friday (which was changed to later in the day after all), then picked her up again late Friday afternoon. She stayed w/us until Saturday afternoon ... Jo went to Kara's and met up with her cousin, Tara and Tara's husband, Joel, and spent the afternoon with them; then Saturday night, she went out to dinner with her 'adopted' sister, Sharah (yep! Kara, Tara & Sharah all in the same afternoon!) She came home last night saying she'd had one of her best days ever! (Thanks, everyone!!!) Today, she went with her brother, Andrew, to her dad's to watch the best ever football game with her dad's family, so I'm sure she's going to have another great day (unless the Bears lose, then that will be a bit of a downer for her ... she has her nails painted in alternate blue and orange, wearing an orange long-sleeved tee with a Bears short-sleeve tee over that, blue pants & socks ... no one will ever know she's pulling for the Bears, will they?)

On Friday, we went to the clinic for the dreaded "play with the PICC" session; however, God in his goodness stepped in and the tech got blood from the PICC (both lines) on the first tries. We wonder if the 'pull' on the tubes on Weds night didn't loosen whatever was keeping the PICC from producing. The tech gave me saline flushes and heparin flushes for yesterday and today in the hopes that will keep them open for the chemo tomorrow. Once again, we don't have a time to be there. Our instructions were to do what we always do. But, this time I will CALL the hospital before we go down there to see if they are expecting us and, if so, what time (and if not, what time). If they aren't ready for us, Jo can wait here better than she can down there.

I did the research (through almost 2200 pages) regarding the doxyrubicin. Dr. Godwin was right; according to the nursing notes and the list of medications on each visit, Jo had two rounds of ifosphomide where she did NOT have doxyrubicin. In reviewing everything, it appears that the seventh round of chemo was only doxyrubicin, but we didn't do that round. We believe that the reason we were told she could have only one more dose then she'd be at her lifetime max is b/c with the 7th round, she would have had 750 mg and the avg lifetime max is 880. Since we didn't have the last round, we believed she could only have one more round. We think what Dr. Godwin did was the Body Surface Area calculation for Jo, which at her age, wt and height would be 1188 mg. She's already had 600 mg, so that would leave her 588 mg and (continuing at the 150 per session that she had previously) would leave 3.92 doses; ergo, his saying she could have 3 more sessions of doxyrubicin. We should see him at the hospital in the morning and we'll give him the info we've collected and discuss it with him further (he'll be glad he was right and we were wrong :o)... dr's are like that, don'tcha know).

I don't know that we will have access to a computer in the hospital, but Kara will know what is going on; hopefully, her schedule will allow her to drop a note here. She will be much better at providing information in a more concise manner, I'm sure ;o) Thanks again to all of you for your prayers, assistance and kind thoughts. God is great and God is good ... Always!

Take care & God bless. Our prayer today is for courage tomorrow and the rest of the days of this round of chemo ... Our verse to remember is Deuteronomy 31:6 "Be strong and of good courage, do not fear or be afraid, for the Lord your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you."