One week down…

Eloise has pretty much finished her first set of high dose chemotherapy (she’s received all 5 drugs this week, and will just repeat one of them a couple more times over various days). The full cycle is 21-28 days, but some are ‘rest days’ where other drugs to counteract the chemo are given. She has been an absolute star, taking everything in her stride and has been very obliging to all the nurses with all their routine checks.

Thankfully Eloise has so far shown little symptoms of the immediate side effects of the chemo. Despite being tethered to “stickman” (pumping fluids and chemotherapy into her 24/7), she has continued to walk around the ward, play in the playroom and go outside in the garden everyday. What a hero.

However, we know that some of the side effects (such as potential nerve pain, the loss of her beautiful blonde hair and ulcers and a sore mouth) will only happen in the coming week(s).

Eloise has lost some of her appetite and, as result, has had a NG tube (tube running from her nose to her stomach) fitted so that we can provide her additional food to supplement her intake.

The biggest news of this week though is Eloise’s lumber puncture results, which showed that there is currently no sign that the cancer has spread from the tumour into her spinal fluid. Whilst this was expected (90% of Embryonal tumours don’t spread) – statistics have not been our friend on the journey so far and this is a big relief and one result to be hugely thankful for.

As a small, but important, aside – we have both also been given the first dose of the Covid vaccine – which we are very thankful for too!

For those that pray:

• Praise that the cancer has not spread beyond the one tumour
• Praise that Eloise has reacted really well to a tough week, been incredibly resilient and continued to be a charmer and delight
• Please pray for protection from the side effects of the chemo in the coming week(s)
• Please pray that Eloise doesn’t get too tired and can sleep well. (Eloise is on a shared ward, which has made sleep more challenging at times, plus she needs waking every two hours for observations/nappy change due to all the fluids and chemo)
• Prayers of praise that we (Pete and Mel individually) have each had a great day with Anna this weekend
• Please keep praying that the chemo will work and dramatically shrink the tumour – we have very limited options available if the chemo doesn’t
• Please ultimately pray for the total obliteration of the tumour! With the odds as they are, we are needing a miracle