I talked to Kevin, Braeden's daddy yesterday. He said that they were given two 8 hour passes to leave the hospital over the weekend. They took their family and went to some parks near the city and on some walking trails down town. They spent time in the woods and throwing stones in the river with the kids. Braeden was looking forward to a trip to "Mcdonows." Cute.
One of the days there were people jogging down this paved trail and it turned out these people were on a 100 mile Cancer fund raiser run. They actually talked to an older man who had just finished the 100 miles. They introduced Braeden to him and told him their story. His eyes teared up and he said, "He is exactly why I do this." The people from the group invited them to come to their picnic as an example of the children with Cancer that they were working to help but Kevin and Dawn decided they couldn't join them because of Braeden's immunity problem. They felt that God had lined them up with their pass that day and pointed them to this location so they could meet with these wonderful people.
Braeden's numbers (whatever that means) have come up well enough so they are harvesting some of his stem cells yesterday. It sounds like a dyalysis type of machine in that the blood is drawn and the stem cells removed from his blood. It normally takes from 1-3 hours. Then when the strong Chemo is given again, they can put some of the stem cells back to help his system recoup.
Braeden and Dawn went home yesterday. Then he goes back in for Chemo #3 on July 2 if everything goes as scheduled. As far as they know, he will have a total of 6 treatments prior to the surgery to remove the tumor.
Pray for Dawn especially as she is kind of trapped to stay with Braeden all the time. It must be hard on Ian and Eliana too even though they are getting to do lots of "sleepovers" and have special experiences during this time. I'm sure Kevin is torn by all the various needs of his little family and his job.
