Day 1 - May 16

So we had a busy day today. Sam got a blood transfusion at 4am and then we didn't sleep much after that. He had a lumbar puncture (spinal tap) at 11:45 and they started a chemotherapy treatment by placing chemo into his spinal column.



At 1:00pm Dr. Bond spent 90 minutes with Debbie and I and explained the disease and the treatment Sam will need to go through if he is to get better. At 5:00pm they started his first two chemotherapy drugs.



Sam has Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia / Sub Group "B", or what they refer to commonly as A.L.L. You can google it and find out just about everything they know about this cancer but the basic stuff is that Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is a cancer of the white blood cells, the cells in the body that normally fight infections.



There are two main types of white blood cells-lymphoid cells and myeloid cells. ALL affects lymphoid cells. Leukemia cells are abnormal cells that cannot do what normal blood cells do. The abnormal cells are immature white blood cells that cannot help the body fight infections. For this reason, children with ALL often get infections and have fevers.



ALL is also called acute lymphocytic leukemia. It is the most common leukemia in children. 1 in 29,000 children develop A.L.L. Of childhood leukemia's, A.L.L. is probably the most treatable. Worldwide, doctors have spent 30 years perfecting the 'art' of treating this disease. However, there can be many complicating factors along the way.



Sam's treatment will go something like this:



1. Induction Stage: 4 weeks - Intense chemotherapy with 5 different drugs to wipe out 99% of the cancerous cells and put Sam's cancer into remission. He will receive chemotherapy through a V.A.D (vascular access device) which they will place under his skin in his chest and allows the nurses and doctors to quickly access his veins without starting an IV or poking him for blood tests (which they will need to do constantly throughout). Today he recieved his first chemo through an IV. Tomorrow morning he will have a 1 hour surgery to insert the VAD into his chest.The side effects for these drugs are severe. You can look them up if you want to but I don't think you want to... the biggest risk is for infection and so all sick people or potentially sick people must stay away from Sam for the 7 months he receives treatment so that he can survive with such a weakened immune system. We're trying to figure out how we're going to do this but we are committed to making this treatment as successful as possible with as little risk to infection as possible so we're trying to think about the best way for us to do this.



2. Consolidation Stage: 8 weeks - More intense chemotherapy with more drugs, spread out further.


3. Interim Maintenance: 8 weeks - Less intense chemotherapy to give Sam's body a chance to somewhat recover from the bombardment of the first 16 weeks.

4. Delayed Intensification Stage: 8 weeks - Another round of very intense chemotherapy to destroy the last few surviving cells from the first two stages.



5. Maintenance Stage: 2 years, 5 months - Mostly oral chemotherapy and Sam can return to normal activities but must get regular tests throughout this period. He will be placed on antibiotics for the entire three year treatment schedule. We haven't figured it all out yet as far as how we're going to do "life" with our family with the above schedule.



It won't be easy, that's for sure. We've certainly heard from just a ton of people who have offered to help us and to be honest, I don't think we'll be able to do this without help. Debbie and I both agreed that we need to have the support of people who can help us do this. Much of the treatments will happen in Vancouver Children's Hospital.



It's hard to believe that Katelyn will have been a year out of high school when Sam complete's his treatment in 2011.



This really is like climbing Everest.