It's a sunny and windy Friday morning here in Roch and I am finding a few minutes to relax. Starting my day with coffee and live tennis from Paris - the French Open men's semifinals. Going to root hard for Roger Federer today, but it's a long shot...
Thursday was eventful as Erin graduated from 5th grade at Bamber Valley. It's the only elementary school our kids ever attended and since Shannon started kindergarten there in the fall of 2003, it's been a big part of our lives. There were plenty of tears shed during the ceremony. Some were shed for Erin reaching this milestone, but emotions got the best of us when one of the 5th grade speakers, a neighbor of ours, talked about Shannon and her fight. Many of these families are connected to us one way or another and there was a round of applause from the parents and students who acknowledged our battle. Erin's classmates surrounded her for support as she cried. My first instinct was to feel badly for Erin - this was her day and the celebration was supposed to be about her. But, the reality is that when Erin or any of us looks back on this stage of our lives, it will always be intertwined with Shannon's health. We cannot pretend it isn't so ...
The rest of the celebration was more light-hearted as we ate lunch outside with Erin and her pals and their families. Nothing more need to be said about what had transpired. Erin has good friends and her friends have good families.
We didn't have our normal Thursday of appointments as we had adjusted our schedule to accommodate the graduation and Shannon's finals schedule. We did manage to do bloodwork and see all of our doctors over the course of a couple of afternoons this week. Nothing but positive reports - bloodwork looks good and by all accounts, Shannon has tolerated the treatment incredibly well.
So now we've reached a milestone day - the last healing session. Radiation will end today at about 1:20pm when Shannon rings the bell at Desk R to signal the completion of treatment. I find myself feeling conflicted. Proud that she has been so strong and hardly ever complained about this hand she's been dealt. She just battled through it every day, usually with a smile on her face.
But, I also feel sad and scared. Scared about the unknown. At least for the last 6 weeks we felt like we were doing something, taking action, talking daily with Jacque and Janelle and working our way through it. I'm sad that we won't have that daily support. After today, we will return for a set of follow up appointments next week and then take three weeks off from appointments and doctors as Shannon rests and recovers and the chemo and radiation continue to work on the tumor. We will return the first week of July for a follow up MRI and get our first look at how effective the treatment was at shrinking the tumor. The first week of July will also begin the maintenance phase of chemotherapy: strong doses of Temodar daily for 5 days, then 23 days off. That's the plan going forward to try and keep the tumor at bay.
So, wherever you are at 1:20pm today, have a good thought for our girl. The bell will be ringing, and my guess is, Shannon will be smiling ...
