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We all went to the doc today will Allyson.  Nurse Gina took blood from her PICC line.  She was impressed with how well it works (thankfully!).  Dr. Rob was there.  This is the first time we’ve seen him in two weeks because he’s been on vacation or wasn’t in the office.  He looked at Ally’s incision - looks good, and he was able to take out her stitches.  Ally did really well with that.  What she didn’t like was being held down in order for them to be taken out.  As soon as he started, she was fine and actually watched Dr. Rob take them out.

News on her new port…Dr. Rob would like to put the new port in the first week of August.  This was our only week to get to New Orleans, so we will not be able to go.  We were going to try to squeeze it in between chemo treatments, but now that we have to put the port back in, there is just no way we’ll be able to do it.  - We were hoping to get down to see Brad’s grandparents…we also wanted his brother’s family and everyone else to meet Benjamin.  That will now have to wait.

Allyson went to school today for OT and PT.  Her PT session went pretty well, but not as well as yesterday.  For whatever reason, she wasn’t interested in doing her OT.  It was frustrating for me that she wouldn’t participate in what Ms. Susan was asking her to do.

We went to Target after her therapy sessions.  She fell asleep as soon as we pulled up and slept in her stroller the entire time we were there.

Benjamin had another good day at Tita’s.  The little girl across the street, Sophia, goes to Tita’s as well.  Benjamin spent the last two days following her around ;-).  Sophia is a cutie pie, so he has good taste:-).   He is always so excited to see me when I pick him up.  He runs to the door with the biggest grin on his face…I love it.

No appointments tomorrow, thankfully.

Benjamin…I didn’t forget this day, I just forgot to put this in a post…July 7 marks one year to the day we received our referral for Benjamin.  In some respects, it is very hard to imagine that was one year ago.  It feels like he’s been in our family much longer than the almost nine months we’ve had him.  - He is very much like his daddy…it’s kind of scary!  We are lucky to have this little boy in our lives!

Allyson had a good day today.  We were able to go up to United Services so Ally could get a session of speech therapy in as well as a session of physical therapy.  She had two great sessions!  She worked really had for Ms. Sherry, the PT.  She is trying to re-strengthen Ally’s little legs.  We’ve had to go back to some of the same exercises we did more than a year ago.  Watching Ally work today made me a little sad.  Her legs still do not have the strength they once had.  She has just enough strength to get up the stairs one at a time, but she needs to hold onto someone’s had.  She must have walked up and down five stairs at least ten times today…It is hard to have to take two steps back in her physical therapy, but what can we do?  She plugs right along…she doesn’t know the difference!

Tomorrow Ally gets to see Ms. Susan for OT and Ms. Sherry again for another session of PT.  I hope she has a good day and works well for them.

We went in to see Dr. Bob today.  He looked at Ally’s incision where her port was taken out…looks good!   The stitches have to come out on Saturday…Dr. Rob is back from vacation so he gets to do the dirty work.  No word yet on when the new port will be put in, but Dr. Bob thought it would be before the end of the month.  (I wish it was before next weekend because we have that is another backpack weekend.)

Allyson did really well when the nurse (nurses because it took more than one) took the dressing off her arm (LOTs of tape…dreaded tape!).  Nurse Jamie had to hold onto Allyson’s arm so she wouldn’t bend it, and Nurse Tish changed the dressing.  I got to hold her in my lap and keep her from squirming too much.  - She really didn’t do too badly.  I thought it was going to be a wrestling match, but she was WAYYY calmer than I thought she’d be.  (She always surprises me.)

Well, Allyson got out of the hospital Tuesday evening.  She has been doing really well ever since we brought her home.  She had a couple of nights of restless sleep.  We think her tummy was upset because of all the medication she’s been taking.  We gave her some anti-nausea medication last night before she went to bed and that seemed to help, thankfully.

We have been infusing Allyson’s medication through her IV PICC line four times a day.  The first few nights she was home, we had to get up at 3a.m. to infuse her with one of her meds.  After a certain blood test was run, we were able to gradually adjust the time for that dose to 7a.m., a much more reasonable time of day!

Allyson has been a real trooper through all of this.

We saw Dr. Bob on Saturday.  He looked at her incision where the port was removed.  He was very pleased with how well it is healing.  He said it looks better than he anticipated it would look!  Good news!  I asked if he thinks we’ll have the new port in before the end of the month.  He thought we would.  I was happy to hear that.  The sooner they get the new one in the better.  I can’t wait to get this PICC line out.  Having those “pig tales” hanging out of her arm makes me very nervous.  We can’t let anything happen to that PICC line until we get the new port in.

Benjamin is such a little cutie!  He LOVES Allyson.  When he sees her, he just lights up and gets all excited.  When he can’t find her, he yells, “AH-leee!  Ah-leee!”  It is absolutely adorable!  She loves him as much as he loves her.  She hates it when he has to go upstairs for his naps.  We let her go up to his room when it is time to get him out of bed.  She sits at the bottom of the stairs waiting and waiting to go upstairs to get him. - Tonight we had ice cream.  He loved it and kept asking for MORE, MORE! - He’s become a big “mama’s boy” as of late.  He is always right under my feet if I’m around.

This week we continue more IV medication for Allyson.  Right now, the last of it is scheduled for Thursday.  We go into the doc’s office on Tuesday to have the dressing changed on her arm where the PICC line is - not looking forward to that visit at all…