Apple juice

Well I will never look at apple juice the same again. At the moment Jillian's potassium is very low from one of the chemos she has been taking. In order for us to get her potassium up they have prescribed her a supplement that can be mixed with apple juice. She does pretty well with the taste but the amount she has to drink is EXHAUSTING! It has to be diluted and mixed with at least 6 ounces of juice. Now this sounds like a simple task but when you are dealing with a child who is doped up with many different meds and chemo then you may understand the difficulty of getting her to drink an ounce of anything. Instead of sitting there and trying to make her drink the stuff from a straw I decided to just use a syringe and give her the apple juice like I would any other medication. Like I say she does well with the taste and keeps it down but having to fight with her every single time she has to take a dose is so mentally draining! We are hoping that her potassium level will go up by tonight so she does not have to take this again tomorrow. Other than this issue she is tolerating all her other meds great. Her CBC came back today and her numbers look amazing. He ANC jumped 1000 points and she is at about 1800. Her white blood count went up as well. If we were at home with these numbers we would be super stoked but being here and undergoing chemo I was a little discouraged. You always have that thought that if her numbers are good then the chemo must not be working. We discussed this concern with the oncologist and he said that was not the case. He was able to put my mind at ease for the moment but I am still secretly hoping to see some changes in her numbers. We will see.

Daniel and William got to come and hang out with us today. They were able to get their blood drawn for bone marrow testing. We should be getting the results back from that soon. Prayers prayers prayers! Daniel said William did HORRIBLE during the blood draw. I think they needed four people to hold him down! Wouldn't have guessed that when he came strutting back into Jill's room after he was done. All bandaged up and everything. He looked like he had accomplished something and was proud of himself. He was really funny. I'm glad he is Jillian's big brother. If jilly needs a transplant then he will be the one to be able to do that for her. What an amazing gift he can give her.

Jill was still not herself today. Even getting to see her dad didn't change much of her mood. She's sick and man is it showing this week. I keep telling myself its only a few more days and then she will be back to her normal self. Can't help but feel a bit selfish wanting her back. It hurts to see her the way she is when I know how amazing and full of life she normally is. Only a few more days of this!!

We have been working on her smash book a lot here. I love the fact that there's not rhyme or reason for this book. We can do what ever we want and make it as messy and tacky as we like and it still is super cool. I wanted to post some pictures of a few pages we have finished so everyone can get an idea of what we are making. She's having fun taking pictures of whatever she wants. We still have a lot more to do!!

Oh yea. Jillian wanted to send a big HI to JIMMY! She received his note today and his picture he drew her and will be responding to him very soon! Thanks so much. It really put a smile on her face!