ALL about Caleb

I can't believe it is now Day 21. He's a "Wednesday" kid. Wednesdays are when he gets his IV push of the vessicant Vincristine. That's the one that's making him lose his hair. At the doctor's office a CBC (complete blood count for those of you that don't watch ER)was done & we got good news. His White Blood Count is up, specifically the granulocytes at 65% and his hemoglobin is stable at 8.9 and his platelets are way up to 102 compared to 45 last Wednesday. This is a dramatic difference from when he was first diagnosed 3 weeks ago. The word devastated takes on a whole new meaning when you are the one using it. On March 21 my twins turned 3. The day before I had a small birthday party with immediate family & rented a castle bounce. I knew something was wrong when my son only jumped for a little bit before falling lightly. He claimed that he had hurt his arm & the rest of the time just wanted to sit inside of the castle bounce. This seemed to ruin the rest of his afternoon. He had been pale the past couple of days but I thought it was because he was sick the month before with an ear infection & two weeks after that with strep throat. I thought maybe one of the infections came back. My mother advised me to go to primary care that evening but I decided to wait & go see a pediatrician the next day. I figured, if he's sick what's one more day (I really dislike primary care with a passion only because all last year the twins were sick with ear infections almost consistently every month & although it wasn't always so, they seemed to always get their ear infections on Friday nights/Saturday mornings which meant I spent ALOT of time waiting & waiting & waiting.) So anyway, the next day we were unable to make an appointment with his regular pedi & because of insurance changes I tried a different doctor's office. I asked for him to be checked for anemia & a full blood count. I stressed something was wrong. In the back of my head the word leukemia was haunting me but anemia sounded alot better. I knew a symptom of leukemia was bruising but the ones he had were so light that I only briefly entertained the possibility when I had initially seen them a few weeks ago. I was told I would get a call the next day for results from some of the tests & a few days after that for results of the other tests. I ended up getting a call a few hours later. It was 7:30 & I was at bingo with my sister-in-law, grandmother & aunt. The nurse specialist identified herself. When she asked if I was sitting down I knew immediately why she was calling. She told me she spoke with a pediatric hematologist in San Antonio whom she had mentioned earlier during our visit & said that he needed us to go to Methodist Children's Hospital immediately. I asked her if leukemia was suspected & she said yes. Talk about scary. That's 2 1/2 hours away. Two & a half hours to absorb what's going on. Not sure about how far along the cancer was. Wondering if my child would make it through the night. Crying until I was all cried out & then crying some more wishing I had taken him in sooner. I tell people I did all my mourning then. But I haven't questioned it. I remember a eulogy given at a funeral a few years ago & the eulogist saying it was not her place to question why. I found that so profound that it has stayed with me through this day.