Chad's Graduation

Chad’s parents, two sisters and brother came for his Graduation. It was such a blur to look back at since I was just going through shock of the results of Payton’s MRI. We were so grateful to have them come and we did have a good time. We enjoyed going to dinner, playing Wii, Savannah enjoyed painting her nails with Aunt Tonya and Payton enjoyed having Stacy dress him up with an eye patch while Jared played pirates with him. It was great to get everyone together since Chad was not able to go back this past summer. We love having family come visit us since it gets lonely being in Texas without any family. I am so proud of Chad for graduating. It has been a real ordeal and setback having Payton being diagnosed with cancer right in the middle of him returning back to school. I am super proud of all of my family for getting through these tough, but good 7 years. Has it really been 7 years? Wow. It is hard to believe that we moved her just before Savannah’s 2nd Birthday.

Payton had his 21 month A/T scans this past Thursday. I had an appointment to meet with Dr. Bowman on Friday at 8:30. I could see that something was wrong when Dr. Bowman arrived in the room. He was avoiding my questions when asking him what the results of the scans were. After looking over Payton I was told they found an 8 mm hyper enhancing mass in Payton’s liver. Apparently they noticed the mass back in Sept 2009 where it measured 5.9 mm, but never said anything at the time. It is now a concern since it is growing in size. I felt like someone had sucked all of the air right out of me. I could hardly breathe and immediately broke down, asking many questions. Dr. Bowman said that it is either cancer or a hemangioma which is a noncancerous liver mass He said that he would need to get with Dr. Miller Payton’s previous surgeon and we would do one of two things…. 1) Try to open him up to remove the mass or 2) Watch it closely and see what happens. Dr. Bowman said that he would call me later after consulting with Dr. Miller and let us know their decision. I immediately called Chad; he immediately knew something was wrong by the tone in my voice. I lost it. I told Chad that I didn’t want to lose Payton. I cried the whole way home. It was a long day waiting for Dr. Bowman’s call and finally around 8:20 p.m. he made the call. He said that after consulting with Dr. Miller they have decided to wait on the surgery. He said to bring in Payton for an Ultra Sound on Tuesday with hopes of getting a better view of this. At this point we will follow up with more frequent visits and there is a possibility of ablating or zapping this mass and wait to see if it comes back. He said that because of Payton’s previous histology that we would have to watch him really close. Our hearts are broken and we are scared for our little guy. This was unexpected sudden news and our worst nightmare to say the least. The scary part is when Payton’s original Right Kidney was re-moved, he had lobes which extended up into his liver and they took a piece of his liver to biopsy it to make sure there were no signs of cancer. The test did show up negative. We are so concerned for our little guy and hurt. We are trying to stay optimistic and have faith that our little guy will be ok, that we will get the opportunity to watch him grow up. We are due to go on our Make a Which Trip to Disney World this coming Thursday. Dr. Bowman has approved for us to still go. But we are saddened to go with this bad news. We want to thank all of you for your love, prayers and concern. I will try to get better with my updates.

Payton's Make A Wish Christmas Party

Here are some pictures from Payon’s Wish-With-Wings Christmas party. The kids were so excited to walk up and see a Herbie car. The Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders were there along with Santa, Ms. Clause and other Christmas characters. Payton was so excited to see Batman’s car pull up, that he hardly even blinked his eyes. He couldn’t believe that Batman had come to the party. We had a great lunch and the kids received nice gifts from Santa. It was so neat and I am really amazed at all the hard work that goes into putting this fun party together.

Halloween Day

The kids had a ton of fun dressing up for Halloween this year. Savannah was a High School Musical Cheerleader and Payton couldn’t decided if he wanted to be Batman or Spiderman, so he decided to be Batman for Ms. Becki’s party and Spiderman to go trick-or-treating. We got takeout from Pei Wei to start our evening. The kids could hardly eat since they were so excited for the night. We took the kids to our local church where they had a trunk-or-treat. They were both excited since they both got a lot of candy. Afterwards we went trick-or-treating around the neighborhood with Ms. Becki and her girls. We hit a couple of houses that were really scary and Payton decided that trick-or-treating is just too scary for him. One house had a mummy standing by the basketball hoop and you thought he was just a dummy until he came walking out. The house that Payton decided he had, had enough at was a guy that was in his garage acting out that he was chopping up bodies and then putting them in the freezer. I have to admit that it was pretty scary. I had to call Chad to come pick up Payton since it was a bit too much for him. Payton is funny since he likes to be scared, but then he doesn’t. After the mummy came out and scared him and then went back to his spot, Payton would creep up to him and say boo and try to scare him back. Payton thought that he was so tough being in his Spiderman costume. He was ok until the mummy then started coming back at him again. The following Monday was school and Payton went in and told Mrs. Robertson “Halloween is just too scary for me.” He has since talked about Halloween for weeks he liked it and yet it might have been a little much. He keeps asking when Halloween is next since he cannot wait for next year.

Halloween Fun!

Every day is a new exciting adventure with Payton. He always keeps us laughing in our home and there is never a dull moment with him around. Last week Payton’s Pre K teacher Mrs. Robertson asked him to do his work; Payton’s response was “Mrs. Robertson, my brain just fell all the way down all the way to my toes and I am just too tired to get it back, I cannot do my work today.” Mrs. Robertson said that Payton keeps the class alive and laughing every day. Payton is so full of energy and is such a joy to have around. He is the one thing that continually makes me smile every day. Payton is doing well in school and has really come a long way in just 9 short weeks. I am so grateful that we have our little guy.

Payton’s Halloween Party was today. He had so much fun playing games and spending time with his friends. Payton has changed what he has wanted to be for Halloween at least a dozen times. It has gone from wanting to be a Tiger, to Superman, to Spiderman, to a Ghost to Batman. It is great watching him get so excited for Halloween this year.

Payton's Results...

Payton’s 18 month MRI and CT Scans were both clean with no evidence of disease. I am feeling blessed and extremely grateful. Dr. Heym said that Payton’s MRI showed that he should be having a bowel obstruction. We are hoping that he just swallowed a significant amount of air prior to the scans and that it’s not a sign that he is in the early stage of an obstruction. Dr. Heym said to watch him closely and wait and see. It’s a little scary since I know the radiation and chemo that Payton received can cause these obstructions.

It’s been a long couple days of waiting but we are so grateful for the great news.

Payton's 18 month scans...

Today was Payton’s 18 month scans. We were scheduled at 6 a.m. (the first scan for the day). I was really hopeful that meant that we would be in and out quickly. Payton was able to do his CT scan without sedation and was a little scared at first, but did a great job. Payton did well going under sedation. He received his “giggle juice” and they actually waited long enough that it worked well when the anesthesiologist arrived to put him under. Usually Payton panics, but today he wasn’t nearly as nervous. In the past, I don’t think they have waited long enough; so now I will be sure they give him at least 20 minutes to allow it to kick in. He was done with both his CT and MRI by 9:30. It was a little harder than usual for Payton to come out of anesthesia. I was getting excited in hopes we could get out early and about 10:00 when we moved him to the wagon to take him to the car he starting throwing up. The anesthesiologist decided to keep us a couple more hours so they could monitor him and give him some anti-nausea meds. Payton spent most of his afternoon trying to regain his appetite and strength and finally this evening he is back to himself.

Our H/O appointment is tomorrow at 8:30 and we are really anxious to get good news about his results. They also did numerous tests on his blood work today, so we should find out the results from those as well. Now the question is if I can sleep tonight? Off to try.