Naaman's Journal

We hope you are home celebrating (or will be off work soon).  We are so grateful for many things, and being home and healthy-ish for this July 4th is awesome! Wolverine pose Check out Cheeky’s summer haircut! Clinic this week was not very pleasant, but the bottomline is that his liver enzymes are looking safe and chemo will continue for now.  No doses increased, just to be careful.   Happy Independence Day, Team Naaman!

Hello, Team Naaman. Hope you are keeping cool. It’s a bit of a muggy heat wave here and we are grateful for central air to escape when we need! Cheeky loves to be outside, but tends to be hot (or cold) when it doesn’t make sense to us.  Don’t be surprised if you spot him on an 80 degree day in a long-sleeve shirt! Last Wednesday, he went to clinic to check his liver enzymes,

Little Cheeky doubled down on appointments today. This morning he had a blood draw at the Yale collection location close to our house, which was a great time-saver, but the counts came back within a few hours showing his liver enzymes were continuing to rise quite high.  In addition, he’s been quite  an aggressive beast, highly irritable, and sleeping more.  The team wanted to see him to test for a few more viruses and to

Counts (for chemo) were all good to start! The gang’s all here, waiting for Naaman to wake up! Naaman fared better fasting than we imagined (Amen) but had low blood sugar when we got to clinic.  He got some sugars to boost him up and all other counts needed looked good (ANC, hemoglobin, platelets).  As always, he needed oxygen during the LP.  His daily inhaler is helping, though, because he had less trouble breathing than

He can have all the snacks he wants after that! Poor little bud had his third (or fourth, I lost track) COVID test today at a drive-through testing site in New Haven. It’s never good but he was particularly angry at this one.  He called the nurse a “stupid blockhead” which is about the nastiest thing he knows how to say, so you know he was mad! He got to watch Bambi on the tablet,

Hi, Team Naaman.  It’s been quiet on the blog but no news is good news sometimes, right?  Physical Therapy at home For the time being Naaman will participate in therapy sessions at home.  Teletherapy with a three year-old is about as interesting as you imagine, but our PT is really engaging. Hershey kisses and an enthusiastic big sister also help. Cycle Five starting soon On Thursday, Naaman is scheduled to start Cycle Five of long-term

Happy Memorial Day Weekend, Team Naaman. Before you’re alarmed by the post title, rest assured this was a planned visit with the pulmonary doctor.  Cheeky’s had a string of respiratory issues from respiratory distress during sedation to these little cold viruses turning into ER trips for oxygen.  The visit went really well and the pulmonary specialist says he’s got mild asthma. All we need to do is continue his daily inhaler and follow up in a

In case you missed it, May the Fourth be with you. Leia and Han enjoyed a day of Star Wars foods and game and movies.  Why have tater tots when you can have Vader’s taters? (Yes, superfans, our Leia and Han got their own light sabers.) Chemo in clinic Thursday While Naaman has daily oral chemo at home, he still has IV chemo monthly in clinic.  Things went very smoothly and we were there just