We are back from the appointments with the radiation oncologist and pediatric neuro-oncologist at Mayo. Overall, we are right back to where we were before the visit. The radiation oncologist (who, naturally, advocates for radiation), said that in the 20 cases of pediatric supratentorial cortical ependymoma that Mayo has seen over the past 20 years, …
Category Archives: General
Jude’s Quote of the Day
Jude says the cutest things and I wish I had him recorded 24/7 since he’s so entertaining. This morning, I was giving him a hard time for not putting his cup in the sink and straw in the garbage can after drinking his Kool-Aid/medicine last night before bed. He said, “One of the bad things …
Asher Walks!
Asher is taking a page from Levi’s book and is taking steps at 10 months. He’s been table walking for 2 months now, but has been getting braver and stepping out. Where’d my baby go? He’s also working on his 4th tooth. The top 2 teeth are large and quite cute. One person thinks he …
Bring Jude to Work Day
Jude always begs me to take him to work (Levi too — he says “I too, I too, I too” whenever I leave for work). I decided today would be a good day for Jude to join me at work for a couple hours since Andy and the boys picked me up in the afternoon for …
Beautiful Night
Tonight was a perfect night. Â There was a breeze to keep the pesky mosquitoes away. Â The boys and I spent the night outside. Â Asher can stand unassisted for about 30 seconds at a time and then he slowly falls to his butt. Â I was really impressed tonight with Asher’s ball skills. Â Jude and I were …
Everything is Coming Together
Although I would prefer that God just spoke audibly to us about how to treat Jude, in His providence, it appears that everything is coming together to give us all the information we need to make the best decision possible for Jude. Â First, there was the timing of the HopeKids brain tumor family picnic where …
The Meanest Doctor Ever
Today Jude had a physical therapy evaluation (to get a baseline on gross motor skills in case we do radiation). It turns out that his gross motor skills are well above average for his age so radiation shouldn’t be a concern to those skills. He can’t really skip, but admittedly, I’ve never taught him how. …
2nd Opinion in the Works
Yesterday we spent the day at a HopeKids event — a brain tumor family picnic. It was awesome. They had a human-sized hampster ball for the kids to run in, a video game van, booger wars, etc. Jude even got to play football with Adam Weber, one of the quarterbacks for the Denver Broncos. I think …
Not Much Closer to a Decision
I’m currently 70/30 in favor of waiting and seeing (no radiation) and Andy is now 55/45 in favor of radiation. We’ve got an appointment set for July 3rd in Indiana for Jude’s radiation mask fitting and simulation. Andy and I have set a deadline to decide by the end of this coming week since we’d …
To Radiate or Not to Radiate — That is the Question
I’ve been agonizing over whether do pursue radiation. Here are my own arguments for waiting and seeing (not radiating) and for radiating now.  I’m now 70/30 against radiation. I think Andy is 60/40 in favor of radiation. If we plug our nose and jump, which way should we go? Wait and See (Do not Radiate Unless it …
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