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Consider the Blessings
Ashtyn looks so much better than a week ago. She isn’t nearly as sick, however she still feels crummy. Of course she does. I have no idea what it feels like to have no white blood cells, low platelets, and have a body that is recovering from chemo. Her throat and mouth continue to hurt. Swallowing is…
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Ashtyn’s Army
Ms. Fricker, one of Ashtyn’s teachers at Canyonview Elementary school, commented “Know the saying ‘it takes a village to raise a child?’ Well, it takes an army to kick cancer’s butt out of that village. Help show Ashtyn she has an amazing army behind her. She is a tough little girl and is fighting one…
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Perspective
Ashtyn and I have different perspectives of time. We have been in the hospital for 27 days and it has gone by very fast for me. There is not a moment of boredom where I can kick up my feet and wonder what I should do with my time. There is always something to do.…
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She Chose This
Ashtyn and I are spending our 25th night in the hospital. She is no longer being kept awake by nausea, vomiting, coughing, mucous, diarrhea, bloody noses, restroom runs every two hours, shortness of breath with fluid in her lungs, or an extremely swollen mouth. She isn’t suffering from a high temperature, high heart rate, or high respiratory rate. For…
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Getting Back to “Normal”
The doctors came to Ashtyn’s room this morning, as they always do, to discuss the plan of the day. What are the concerns? How is her status? What changes need to be made? Everyone was pleased with how well she is doing and noticed her huge improvement. No changes were made. Stay the course. For…
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This Kind Can Come Forth By Nothing, But By Prayer and Fasting
My last post was written two nights ago. Ashtyn’s health had been getting progressively worse with each day. By Tuesday night she was on the verge of having high risk surgery to remove her appendix. Diarrhea and vomiting seemed to be occurring every couple of hours. She had lower lobe pneumonia with an increased respiratory rate and oxygen needs.…
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Relying On What I Know
Ashtyn has had a temperature for over six days which is concerning the doctors. Each lab work that has been done continues to show no signs of infection. At noon she had a CT scan to discover whether or no
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The Routine
I suppose Ashtyn and I are getting into a routine, though it is an unpredictable, unplanned routine that we take minute by minute. Nausea and pain is constantly on our minds. “Where’s the barf bag?” is a question she commonly asks. It’s like her security blanket, whether she is going to throw up into it…
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Stay Positive
Saturday night… I mean Sunday morning I went to bed at 6 am, after a busy night helping Ashtyn. At 7:00 am I woke up to about 10 different medical staff surrounding Ashtyn’s bed moving very quickly. I could sense there was worry in the air. As I watched the organized commotion, I gathered that…
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On The Bright Side
2/17/13 MIDNIGHT I’m not going to lie to you or sugarcoat it. I am a “tell it how it is” person. Ashtyn’s physical body has had a rough couple of days. Chemotherapy wipes out cancer cells, but in doing so it wipes out other cells as well. (Her red blood cells that carry oxygen from…