Well today has been pretty good.  I had said before how much we dread coming back to the hospital and having to stay in the hospital room on 5100, but now I am excited about being in the hospital room in a bed on 5100.  That’s right in a bed, last nights bed was in a chair bent over on Chance’s bed in which sleeping wasn’t allowed.  We got out of the PICU about 3:00, and Chance is doing well.  Our schedule is chemo tomorrow, stem-cells on Monday and hopefully home on Tuesday.  I just hope that he doesn’t get a fever this round, but if he does we will deal with it and go on.  Several family members on both sides had come down to support us during this stay in the PICU, we really appreciated that.  We have also received several calls, emails, and well wishes, and those were also much appreciated.  We met another little girl on the same protocol as us tonight, hers had come back and they were trying something else.  We still believe in complete healing in Chance from God and we know that he is in his hands.  I think God let us go to the PICU just so that we would understand how lucky we were in 5100.  Tonight I am thankful for my nice fold out chair it is well, AWESOME.  Talk to you tomorrow.  Sorry so short, but very tired.

            Love,                                     

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

           Well as a lot of you know from telephone calls, text messaging, or just talking to people; today hasn’t been one of our better days.  As I have updated earlier the problems we are having with Chance’s vitals has landed us back in the PICU here at Duke.  We got in here about 10:00.  The have him on a drip to cause him to lose some of his fluid.  His kidneys were not working exactly right, but now things are getting back to normal.  All of his labs are coming back OK right now.  His blood pressure is a little low, but this may be from where he is sleeping.  His heart rate is lower than from earlier, which is good.  His temperature has kind of gotten more normal as well.  After receiving the drip he started losing the fluid which is good, but he still has a ways to go. 

            Our nurses I can’t say enough of on 5100.  They are so great, I saw them before they headed out tonight and they were so supportive.  You just don’t know how much those girls mean to us.  I know they have some rule that they can’t become friends with the parents or the kids, but the way I see it, I am paying Duke, which is paying them. Duke wouldn’t be able to pay them if it wasn’t for us, and if we want to have friends that we care about and that we are going to spend 8 months of our lives with then we are going to act like friends, but like I said before the girls are so special to us.

            The PICU is a different story, the nurses are nice, but the surrounding is awful.  We have had 2 codes while we were here with one of them being in our room.  We are not allowed to sleep with Chance, eat or drink in here.  Now my outlook is Home is Great/ Apartment is Nice/ Hospital is Good/ and PICU is terrible.  I think God made us get to this point so that I wouldn’t mind staying in a normal hospital room as bad.  This has happened for a reason and maybe it was for me to be thankful for that nice fold out chair. 

            Well I better get off here and see how long I can stay awake.  Chance is asleep and doing well.  Thank you everyone for praying today, we still are not sure exactly where we sit, but Dr. G. was positive about it, so push on.  I had several good emails today of encouraging words, the one I liked the best was that we are in the valley and it won’t be long before we get back on top of that mountain.  Boy won’t the view be pretty then.  Sunny Days Ahead (thanks Danny)

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

            P.S.      We did hate to miss Destiny’s birthday, but good times are to come.  Don’t let rumors get started about different things.  If you hear something check the web I will update frequently in days like today.  Thank you for supporting us and our family.

           Just wanted to update everyone and let you know how we are doing.  It is about 11:30 and we are sitting in the PICU.  We got transferred here about 1 hour ago.  The situation we are dealing with is Chance’s heart rate is high, and his temp is still sitting around 102, the blood pressure is starting to be more normal.  He is retaining fluid causing his heart to pump a lot and causing his face to be puffy.  Dr. G. didn’t think this was a serious issue yet, he has seen it before.  We may have to drop the drug that did this to him.  It prevents kidney damage and hearing loss, so that is something we will look at down the road.  Right now our main concern is to get his vitals stable and get back to 5100.  Mrs. Stephanie was so good to us over the last few days; all of the nurses there are super.  Until I receive more news that is where we sit.  This is not where we want to be or where Chance wants to be, but it is best for him right now.  Like Desirae said, there is a purpose for everything it is part of God’s plan.  We are really missing Destiny on her birthday, but we will be a normal family soon.  Please keep the prayers going and thank you for everything.

            Love,                                                  

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

             2^nd update.  It is about 4:00 a.m. and Chance’s temperature has come down some, they just took it and it was 101.3, so that is better.  He has slept pretty well, the temp. is still believed to come from the drug on Monday.  The doctor came in a little while ago and said they were going to give him a protein ad also something to make him go to the bathroom a little more.  He is retaining some fluid which is caused by the drug on Monday as well.  His heart rate seems to be up some to.  The reason I am writing is for when you read this in the morning I ask for you to take a few minutes and pray that this will all improve.  This has gotten us like I said earlier worried some and scared, but we know God is in control and that he is going to let this situation work out. JUST PRAY!

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

P.S.   We are not at a high level of concern right now, but we just don’t know why he has the low blood pressure, high temp., and the high heart rate, hopefully no infection just because of the drug on Monday.

            Another rough day, we are struggling right now.  Chance woke up at 3:00 this morning in a great mood ready to play wanting Destiny and Nana to come over and play.  It was hard for us to explain to him that it was the middle of the night.  We tried to send him out and let him help the nurses the rest of the night.  We started his chemo about 10:00; it took an hour and went well.  Like I have said before this round has really hit him hard.  As the day went on he didn’t feel like doing anything.  He got sick 4 times today so that was a lot better, but he picked his fever back up again this afternoon.  It got up to 104, so we don’t know what the deal is.  They have tested his blood and everything is negative.  We took some Tylenol and it went down then in about 2 hours it was back up to 104 again.  They just took it and it was 104.3 and has had Tylenol for about 30 min.  Once again they don’t know what is causing this, it is worrying us.  He just seems to be so uncomfortable and he keeps asking to go outside, but we just can’t until his temp comes down. 

            This has gotten us to a point of several prayers today, it has step us back once again to remember who got us to this point of our journey and that is GOD.  He just keeps crying to go outside; he wants to get out of his room so bad.  This has been such a tough day, but you know God is Great and he is healing Chance.  We are one more day closer and don’t think this challenge is going to set us back.  I am worried, I have cried, but Chance is determined and we are too.  Tonight I started wondering and thinking about the future, then get my focus back ONE DAY AT A TIME!  Our nurse today was so great, because I can see she cares.  Her name is Stephanie and she has been very special to us.  Just pray that the fever will hit the road.  Tomorrow we do another day of chemo just like today, the one that causes the fever is the prevented of hearing loss we took on Monday, we don’t have it again until next round.  Before I finish I can remember my college coach (Joe Davis) saying bow up and show some backbone.  I didn’t realize it then, but man he meant so much to me.  Thank you for the support and pray for the fevers and the sickness to go away.  The lady just came in to take the temperature and it is 102.8, we are getting there, Thank You God!

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

TOMORROW IS DESTINY’S BIRTHDAY! THANK YOU LORD FOR OUR BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER AND OUR BEAUTIFUL FAMILY!

2 YEARS OLD!!!!!!

Today has been very difficult.  It has been the hardest day of chemo or for that matter any other treatment up to this point.  We started chemo this morning at 9:00 and everything seem to be fine, but that soon changed by Chance getting sick.  He threw up somewhere around 15 times today; it has really hit him hard.  This reminded Desirae and me about last fall and how sick he was then.  The only time all day that he wasn’t sick was when he was sleeping.  On top of that he picked up a temperature about 102 this afternoon, but thanks to some prayers and to God laying his hand on him it has come back down to about 100.  We know this is all part of the deal, but it is just hard watching him get sick and there is nothing you can do about it.

Destiny and Nana came over this morning and tonight, Chance was happy to see them, but not in any mood to play.  It is still good to have Destiny about 5 minutes away instead of about 3 hours.  She really helps all of us so much.  Tomorrow is hopefully an easier day than today was.  I just want to wish my dad a HAPPY BIRTHDAY, wished we could be there so much, we miss normal life so much.  Thank you for the prayers, support, well wishes, and the mail that you send.  It has been a challenging day, but we are half way done the tough days, two more days of chemo left this week and then we will be half way done chemo.  We pray that this is working and Chance keeps the fight, but we know that he is a fighter.  Once again I want to thank all of the people that serve for our country no matter what it is.  We are so thankful for the freedom that we have and the things we can enjoy everyday.  Well it is about time to start acting like we are heading to bed.

We are also thankful for the nurses here on 5100 ( I said 5300 last night, but we are on 5100), some of them stop by to check on him and Stephanie today was just great staying by his side while he was getting sick.  They show that they really care and that means a lot.  Talk to you tomorrow.

Love,

Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

          Well we are getting settled back in.  We got back here about 5:30 and started decorating our room.   We brought back Destiny with us, so Nana brought her over tonight after we got hooked up to our fluids.  They went down to the clinic and played some.  I think it is going to be a good idea to have her down here, because she motivates him to run and play hopefully that will keep him going.  It was good to see the nice nurses here on 5300, even though we wished we were just visiting. 

            We had a great weekend at home and going to church today was good too.  We miss seeing everyone, we took it for granted, but we won’t anymore.  We also celebrated Destiny’s birthday again and my dad’s birthday last night as well.  Dad’s birthday is tomorrow May 28^th and Destiny’s is May 30^th. 

            Tomorrow we start chemo at 9:00, so just pray for us to keep pushing and Chance to handle this like he has everything else.   We stayed up tonight cheering on Tony Stewart, but he ran too low on gas, but it was great to see Darian Grubb in Victory Lane with Casey Mears.  I think it is really cool that Darian; from Floyd is the crew chief for him.  Also it was cool that it was the National Guard car.  Make sure tomorrow that we keep in mind why we take the day off and not to forget all of the troops that are still fighting for our freedom.  Sometimes we take that for granted as well how free of a life that we have.  Make sure you thank any military vet that you run into, these men and women are very special people that gave you and me the freedom that we enjoy each and every day.

            Well I guess it is time to get back used to me couch/bed what ever it is called here in the hospital, take care and please keep the prayers going hard again this week and the next 3 leading up to our MRI. Thank You!

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny 

            Today is the day we head back for round 2.  It has been a great 3 days at home, and we hope to be back again in 4 weeks.  With this round everything will be the same except at the end of it we will do a MRI and a lumbar puncture to see how the tumor is reacting to the treatment, so we hope that everything still looks good and the tumor has shrunk more or even gone by now.  We are not real excited about heading back, we miss being here, we miss talking to people and being outside around our home.  Desirae and I still question why some, but we still realize that God has a purpose and a reason for this and being his followers we push on to that goal.  We are just thankful that we got home and thankful for the beautiful weather we had while we were here.

            Yesterday Chance was more normal than he had been in a long while.  Desirae, her mom, and the kids planted flowers and played outside most of the day.  Desirae enjoyed being back to what she enjoys.  They would load Chance’s gator up and he would take off with the flowers.  Last night we had some visitors in Jason, Carrie, and the Dalton girls, and also Pat and Bradley Vaughn.  It was good to spend time with them and see Chance play with them.  We still wish so bad that this was a nightmare and that Chance would have been celebrating his preschool graduation on Friday and the kids were coming over for a normal play day. 

            Well we are planning to leave after church today and head back and probably be admitted somewhere around 5:00, then start chemo in the morning about 9:00.  This will make two times in the last 3 years that we have been in the hospital on this weekend.  The first time was with the birth of Destiny on May 30^th and the second is going back in with our miracle boy Chance.  We are praying for another good week and that the tumor is responding to this treatment.  Also pray for Chance not to sick this week, he got sick twice last night and he just hates it so bad.  Thank you for the support, prayers, and the cards.  We love each and every one of you.  See you soon.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

P.S.      THANK YOU for supporting the Myers family and Cody.  I enjoyed seeing all of the support and words of encouragement that everyone has sent them please keep sending them and if you hadn’t take time to send one.  www.carepages.com  ; codymyers

P.S.S.              Congratulations to the seniors, this is a great time in your life, enjoy every minute of it.  Don’t miss an opportunity today to enjoy it.  Take plenty of pictures even if you hate to take them and huge your family and friends tighter and tell them that you love them.  If you are heading out on a trip, be careful and Good Luck in the future wished we could be there.

CODY MYERS

            Hello everyone.  Today has been a great day for Chance; he didn’t get sick even though we thought it was going to happen a couple of times.  Desirae and Nana took the kids over to Burger King to play on the playground and then to Wal-Mart.  He is in a pretty good mood, but his belly still bothers him some.  He is a little bit weak in his legs, but that will improve when all of this is done.  We are battling with him to take his medicine.  I got to go to work today, it was good to be back having a good time with the guys, and they have done a great job around the store.  All of those guys have really stepped up. 

            Tomorrow looks like a normal day, I am going to try to go to work and Desirae’s mom has come up so I think they are going to spend the day together.  The weather has been great so maybe they can go outside and play most of the day.  We are about 10 degrees less than Durham up here so it makes it a lot nicer, plus it is home.  Thank everyone for the support and cards I just don’t know what else to say, it has just been unreal. 

            Above is a picture of Cody one of our friends.  He has just turned 2 and they have just sent him home because the tumor is progressing.  His mother Angela has been so much help to us.  Like last night if there is anyway you could take 5 min. out of your day to show them the support and prayers that they need at this time in their life.  www.carepages.com; codymyers is the care pages name,  I was on their site earlier and saw where a couple of people had wrote them.  Show them the support from southwestern Virginia and all over that we have seen over the last 6 months, Thank you.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

 WE ARE HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!            

           Today has been an up and down day.  We left Durham today and got home about 2:00.  It felt so good just to be able to drive away from Durham for a couple of days.  Chance got sick once this morning, but other than that he has felt great all day.  His counts were shooting through the roof so we are very thankful for that.  Destiny was so excited to see her toys again; it was like Christmas all over again.  After we got home and I got the car unloaded I headed up to the high school for a boys basketball meeting.  My dad had met us at the house, so he stayed with the women to play with Chance and Destiny for awhile.  I really enjoyed walking into the high school and seeing all of the kids and teachers that I had taken for granted so many times.  Just to be able to talk basketball with the guys and Timmy Slaughter, talk about the future with a few people and most of all talk about how big a fighter Chance is.  I got to see Travis and Coach for a second and then spent about 15 minutes talking to Laura.  We have really missed talking to each other, but I know one thing we don’t have to worry about and that is that we are thinking about each other.

            After open gym I headed down to get Chance a pizza and then stopped by the grocery store to pick up a couple of things.  When I got home my Grandma Margaret was here putting a puzzle together with Chance.  We all sat down and just talked and ate in the sunroom.  We have missed the view and the conversations of normal people so much.  Not that we don’t like talking to our doctors and nurses or at least most of them.  It is so great just to lie down in our bed and be in our house.  Well tomorrow looks like a normal day hopefully, I told Desirae that I was going to wake up about 6 and head to work, she just laughed, I don’t think she believed me and in the morning when I get to work about 8 I will understand what she is talking about.

            The down side of today is that one of our buddies that we keep up with had a MRI on Tuesday and the results showed that the original tumor has progressed pretty quickly, the doctors gave them days – 3 months, they just didn’t know.  I feel so sorry for another set of parents who have to go through this.  They just had another little boy about 4 weeks ago.  You can send them a message on www.carepages.com and his name is CodyMyers1, they would really appreciate it.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

           Test day went well.   Chance gets a little uptight on this day because we cram a lot of testing in a short amount of time.  We got to the clinic about 10:30 for our 11:00 appointment and they took us back.  The first one was like a sonogram; I don’t even try to watch it because I couldn’t tell you anything about them.  The next test was his EKG, which he got very upset because of the leads they have to put on, but after we got him calm they got what they wanted.  Off to the pulimary test, this is where they tested his lungs, he had to breathe into this machine and it read something.  After that it was about 12:00 and all we had left was the hearing test at 2:00, so I asked if we could do it early that way we would have the rest of the day off and sure enough they were ready.  It went well, all normal hearing was excellent or they said in the ranges so I don’t know what that means either, but his high, high frequency were a little off.  This is no big deal because this isn’t normally tested in most people, but with the protocol they test the highest of frequencies to see if anything is affected by the chemo.  After that we left and headed out to run around awhile. 

            The afternoon went good and we played most of this evening.  We tried to get Chance hooked up to his nutrients about 7:00, so that he would be done about 7:00 in the morning.  This was the first morning that he hadn’t got sick in probably about a week, so that was really good, there were several close moments, but he never did.  He didn’t eat as much today as he had in the past, but that is expected.  Tomorrow is clinic day and we are hoping to hear good news about the counts and news that you can go home till Sunday, but we will have to see.  It isn’t like the car is packed, full of gas, and we are prepared to leave from clinic.  We can’t leave straight from the clinic we have to stop by the apartment and pick up his Nutrients in the fridge, but the rest of it I would have to admit is true, it’s like we hadn’t been home in awhile or something.  We are really hoping to get back to Floyd County, they had said this might happen, but we still are not sure till tomorrow morning.  They open at 9:00 so we will be beating on the door at 8:45, just like the day after Christmas shopping.  Destiny has really been a pick up for Chance, so we are going to try the second round with her here, just pray that is best for our family, because it just cheers everyone up with her around.  Well it is about 2:00 in the morning, just had to change the batteries in the pump so I wanted to write so everyone could pray in the morning before we went in.  Pray to see us come through Carroll County into Floyd County, you will know it is us; I will be hanging out the window like a dog waving to everyone.  We are really excited about coming home. 

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

            P.S. I read in the Current where Larry Mannon was going to retire and they were going to honor him at the sports banquet on May 28^th.  Larry has had a lot of success and good seasons at Radford and he deserves a great night of honoring him.  Hopefully a lot of past players and people that he has touched over his years at the Radford High School and surrounding areas will come out and support this honoring night.  I believe it is May 28^th at 6-7 for the meal and then the senior awards and honoring him will follow, this being at Radford High School.  This huge family of Mannon’s that extend to here in Floyd are very special to me and please keep Larry and his family in your prayers as he starts the next road of his journey.

           Today was a very fun day.  Chance woke up and again got sick one time, so every morning we are prepared and about 15 min. after getting up here it comes then he is fine.  He ate some again today and we played some tonight.  We went down to the roundabout in our apartment complex and rolled golf balls across the road to each other and just had a great time.  The weather is so nice down here, especially as the sun is going down.  That is the only time that I feel like I am back home some because it is pretty nice.  We also went to Chuckie Cheese to eat today, Destiny and Chance played hard there as well.

            Tomorrow we have all of our hearing and the heart tests.  We pray that these come back good.  Then hopefully we're home on Thursday around 12:30 and have a weekend at home. (Hopefully).  We have to come back down on Sunday around 1:00 to get labs drawn to make sure our counts are where they need to be to start chemo on Monday.  They should be, but there is still a chance that they may not, but that is a very slim chance.  We are having the problem of trying to correct Chance from some things.   He still is a normal 4 year old and Desitny and he fight a lot, but we have to pick and choose when we correct him, this has been a challenge.  All in all it has been a great day and we praise God for that.  God has blessed us with one round done with three to go and we are so thankful to have our family together and to be able to play together.  Well time to go to bed, thank you for the mail, well wishes, and the prayers, THANK YOU!

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny    

          Yesterday has been the best day so far.  Chance had a good report from the doctor’s office.  His counts were on the rise, his weight was up about 2 lbs, and we hope to get to Floyd County on Thursday.  That is the plan right now, but we do know it can change at any time.  The way things are looking we should be there.  Sorry for not updating last night, laid down with him and then didn’t get back up.  Yesterday morning he got sick once again, the doctors said this was normal and that we may just have to deal with the one time a day.  That is a lot easier for them to say when they are not here watching him cry and yell because his belly is hurting.  Seems like once he gets sick then everything is fine the rest of the day.  It has been really hot down here, so we try to stay inside between 12-5, but then the night time is real nice.  Today we are just going to hang out maybe ride over to Chapel Hill for awhile.

            I have a story for all of you golfers and anyone else that wants to hear something inspirational.  This past weekend they had the Duke Children’s Classic here at Duke Country Club.  It is a golf tournament that they do every year and this draws a lot of famous people.  One person that played this year that I would have loved to see was not a famous athlete, or a famous singer; it was a fourteen year old boy from California.  Now I know what you are saying why is he so special.   He was a Duke patient when he was 3 years old and had an inoperatable brain tumor, but he did receive treatment for it.  Here is what I want you to think about.  How many times do you go to the golf course and complain about how you hit the ball, where you hit the ball, or maybe where the pin is placed.  That is something this boy would love to see, he is blind.  He began playing about 2 years ago and his dad plays with him.  His dad lines him up and he hits away, when he is on the green his dad walks him up to the hole and then back to the ball so he can judge the greens by the slopes.  He helped his team several times this weekend, and earlier this fall he got his first birdie.  So next time you get the opportunity to go, enjoy all of Gods beautiful makings in the land, trees, birds, water, and even weeds and tall grass; enjoy being able to see where your ball is where you are trying to hit it and all the other enjoyments that we take for granted each day. 

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

          Today has been a blast.  Chance woke up feeling like he had over the last 5 days, with his belly hurting.  Once again he threw up and then he was fine.  We have clinic tomorrow so we will be able to ask more questions on why this is happening.  I still believe that it is from the TPN.  Tomorrow they will draw blood to see where his counts are, I think they will be high enough to lose the mask and go out in public places again without it.  We have a couple of tests this week, a heart test and a hearing test.  We are still hoping to be able to come home towards the end of the week.  What would be great news, if we walked in tomorrow and he said we could go when our test were done.  That would be really cool, but we are not pushing our luck, Thursday will be fine.

            Desirae’s mom and dad came down today, that always puts Chance in a good mood.  He played all day and didn’t take a nap, he rode his bike, played ball, and we even wrestled some.  We stayed outside about all afternoon; it was really nice down here almost too hot.  Destiny enjoyed being outside as well.  We took the basketball goal outside and shot some and even played some soccer.  Someone is going to have to teach me something about soccer besides just kicking the ball.  Chance ate more today too, so that is another reason why I think he is getting used to the TPN.  Something else I would like to share is what Chance has been thanking God for before he goes to bed and that is another day.  Tonight he said that when he died that he was going to see God, but that God wasn't ready for him.  He was going to grow old before he was going to see him.  I don't know where he is getting this, and maybe God is sending us messages through him.  He has already sent alot through him.

            Well we are still praying for counts, eating, coming home, and that the chemo is taking care of this.  We have two friends going in for scans this week, Cody and Grant, say a small prayer or a big one for them to be clear and look good.  Hope church was good today and we hope to be there next week. Take care and talk to you tomorrow.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

           Today was a good day as a family.  Chance got sick one time this morning so I think hopefully he is getting used to the TPN.  He did eat about three bites today and tonight, Praise God! Chance rode his bike a lot and played outside.  We went to Target twice with his mask on, but we didn’t stay in there because we have to see where is counts are on Monday.  We are hoping that they are somewhere around 1500 and we are hoping that they will let us go home at the end of next week.  I think Desirae’s mom and dad are coming down tomorrow so hopefully it will be a good night and a great day.  Other than that a normal day as a family besides being 3 hours away from home in an apartment, but we are just happy to be back together again no matter where we are.  Thank you for the cards, support, and prayers.

            Love,  

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

             Today was a super day.  For the first time in three weeks we had all of our family together again.  I couldn’t tell you how great it was to see Destiny again.  She has changed so much since we have seen her.  Anyone that has a 2 year old, you know how much they change in three weeks. 

            All of this happened after a long night.  Last night when we were hooking Chance up, we thought there was something wrong with his pump that puts the nutrients in to him.  We called the nurse on call and she knew as much about it as we did.  His TPN started at 24 hours first of the week and then they try to cut him back to 12 hours.  Last night it was supposed to be 12 hours, but instead it ran for 10 hours, not a big deal, we don’t know, but we do know that he got sick three times before 12:00 today and wasn’t feeling real good.  We paged the doctor and he said everything was normal so that is good, by this afternoon Chance was feeling a lot better.  The doctor said that he would get used to the TPN; I believe he will start eating once he quits getting nauseated.  I think he wants to eat, but is just scared to.  Tomorrow will be a week since he has eaten anything and I mean anything.

            Right now we are sitting here watching the truck race at Charlotte, last year at this time Desirae, Chance, Derek Mannon, Allie Burgin, and I were sitting at the race and Chance was really enjoying it.  He told me tonight he couldn’t wait to go back next year and I can’t wait to take him back next year.  I look back to then and just think about how great life was and we were taking a lot for granted, but that won’t happen anymore.  We have had so much fun over the last 5 months and hopefully we will have a lot more fun with years to come.  Today Desirae’s dad came down with Destiny so Chance played ball, rode his bike, and wrestled with him.  It was a good day, we are still hoping next week at this time we get to Floyd.  Hope everyone got a chance to read Kassidy’s article, I really liked what Danny said about her graduation speeches at all of the levels, how great that will be.   I also want to Thank everyone for the cards and gifts Chance keeps receiving in the mail, when he goes to the mailbox it is like Christmas morning for him, THANK YOU!  Hopefully tomorrow will be a good day with the kids and Chance’s counts will increase and he won’t get sick anymore.  Keep warm in Floyd I saw where it may get down in the upper 30’s tonight.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny   

            If you keep up with the updates and realize there wasn’t a update last night most of the time that means we are at home, I fell asleep with Chance and was too tired to wake up and do one, well that is the case, WE ARE HOME (apartment).  Now you look at the time and realize it was early morning when I updated, Chance just got sick threw up once.  This is no big deal, the doctor said that after we are done with treatments that he could throw up everyday for a year, that wouldn’t be no fun, but what Desirae and I got out of the conversation was “for a year”, future.  Once again my book for doctors on how words can get your mind rolling on good things. 

            Chance’s counts had gone from 34 to 274 which were really good.  I told Desirae when I found out that they were that high that I didn’t think Dr. G. would let us go, but about 11:00 he came in and said you are heading home.  Words I had waiting to hear since sitting in the ER for 9 hours.   The only thing is we had to get a blood transfusion; well that is what may have put us back in the hospital last time.  Well if that is what we have to do to get out that is fine.  I checked his temperature about twice last night and went to bed, not going to push my luck.  He has done really well besides every now and then throwing up.  He still hasn’t eaten anything, but he is drinking.  His nutrients and fats are on an IV pump like a backpack for 12 hours at night. 

            My dad came down today and let Chance beat up on him playing Candyland.  Chance has really started enjoying playing that and other things, when you are stuck in a hospital bed you will love to do things like that, now you may get tired of them, but at least there is a winner, nobody wins the battle of starring at the walls.  

            Tomorrow is hopefully the day where we can reunite with Destiny, which has been really hard on everyone. I think she is supposed to be down here about 10:00, we can’t wait.  I don’t mind being away from her, well I do, but it is the reason why we can’t be around her is what makes me upset, but forget about that we have hopefully 10 days with her and then like I said before I think she is going to try to stay with Nana here at the apartment for round 2.  Please keep praying for Chance’s eating and getting sick, and most of all, all of the poison taking care of the actual problem we are facing.

            Mom said she felt closer to home yesterday, as she was walking over from the parking garage there was a truck park down at the hospital with plants and flowers on it, and it was from Riverbend Nursery in Riner, VA.  Speaking of home, we are going to start bargaining that first to the middle of next week; we have a clinic appointment Monday if we don’t get back into the hospital.  After his counts start coming up the chance of getting back to the hospital drop, so we are in that are now.  I couldn’t tell you what it would feel like to walk into out home again, only for a day; it was like a vacation just to get to the apartment.  Once again I want to give God all of the praise for everything he has done for us, and will do for us in the months to come.  Right now Chance is in there laughing, so I think things are good, I better get back to sleep, my nights and days are all running together.   Thank God for being able to reunite our family again, it is going to be a great day, weekend, and next week.  I didn’t want to leave out when we got ready to leave our battery was dead on our Tahoe, Chance said it was just the devil not wanting us to be able to go home, I told him we would walk to the apartment if we had to.  We got it jumped off, I did get a little frustrated so he got me to that point, but then I realized how lucky we were to be able to drive out of there with Chance and a dead battery was not a big concern.

            As I finish, I wanted to let anyone that was interested in going to the Truck Race with All-star qualifying tonight at Charlotte I have 2 tickets.  I took Chance last year and he had a blast.  I bought these tickets early in the week for nothing on the internet, that way if he was OK and I got to go that was fine, or if he wasn’t I wasn’t going to be out much.  I had consider going, but last night when he asked me when I was going to take him to another truck race, I just decided then if he couldn’t go then I wasn’t going to go, we will watch it on TV.  So if there is anyone out there that would like to go, or if you know someone in this are who would like the tickets, just call my dad at 540-745-2252 (that is the store) and he will get you in touch with me.  Well I better get back to bed if I can fall asleep, thank you for your prayers, support, and especially the mail that you keep overwhelming Chance with, that is his highlight to ride his bike over to the mailbox and get the mail, especially when it is over flowing, THANK YOU.  As I end I want to put Joel Osteen email yesterday, if you would like to receive these daily go to www.joelosteen.com and give them your email, we have really enjoyed receiving his words, check this one out from yesterday.

          Trust God’s Timing

Today's Scripture                                                                         

“For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and will not delay.” (Habakkuk 2:3)

Today's Word from Joel and Victoria

There’s an old adage that says, “God’s answer to your prayer is seldom early, but it is never late!” God will give you the grace you need when you’re in His timing. So if you will keep a right attitude and not allow bitterness or resentment to take hold, then at the right time, in due season, God will answer your prayers. The answer may be “No,” or something different than you think, but it will be for your best. Habakkuk 2 tells you that God has an appointed time to answer your prayers so that you receive just what you need at just the right time to live victoriously and happily. You probably have dreams that God has put in your heart; wait for His timing to bring these dreams about. Your situation will improve, but on God’s timetable, not yours!

A Prayer for Today

God, I believe You are at work in my life bringing about what You know is best for me. My desire is to be patient as I faithfully await Your answers. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

            I am glad we are on God’s timing, because he knows what is best at the best time; we have realized that from the last several months.  Our prayers haven’t always got answered so far like we want them to be, but in time; his time they did get answered and a lot better for us than the prayer that we had prayed.  Glad someone is looking out for us, wouldn’t we be confused if we didn’t have God, it is all part of his great plan.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

           Today was much better.  Chance woke up in a pretty good mood.  He still hasn’t eaten anything today, but has drunk some.  We talked to him this morning about his belly and he did admit that it felt funny so we gave him some zofran, it really works.  I think he got sick once today, this also may be caused by the nutrients.  Dr. G. Came by and was very positive, he said we may be able to go home tomorrow, but probably on Friday.  That is Ok; I think we can stand it here for a couple more days.  His counts today were 34, so we are getting there, hopefully tomorrow they will be over 100.

            This afternoon we were unhooked from everything.   This is the first time that has happened since last Thursday, so we took off.  He wanted to go down and shoot basketball and walk a lot, we went everywhere.  We had so much fun playing ball, it was Nana, Momma, and him against me.  That was the old Chance we had a blast all afternoon.  On the way down to the basketball court we saw Dr Grant, he was the doctor that did Chance’s surgery here, we like him a lot.  He had kept up with Chance, and said the MRI looked very promising and that he was glad to see him.  He is such a super person. 

            Brother Mike came down today to see us and stayed about 3-4 hours.  Chance enjoyed seeing him and we did to.  It was good just to talk to him, because we hadn’t been able to in a long time.  I want to Thank everyone for sending Chance mail, He LOVES this.  The address here, once again is 1102 White Pine Dr. Durham, NC 27705.  He likes opening the cards; he always waits for stickers to fall out of them.  Right now I would like you to pray for Chance to eat some, and for Destiny to lose her cold so we can get them back together.  Dr. G. did tell us that we need to get them together and that it wouldn’t be that big of a deal, so I think we are going to try to keep her down here for the next round.  That will help him a lot and help us a lot.  Well tomorrow I hope to update you from the apartment, but we will see.  Hope everything in Floyd is still going well.  Keep Clay Vest’s family in your prayers as he has won that victory, no more suffering.  Also, keep Kassidy, Cody Myers – another ATRT patient, and Alaina Adkins – another friend of ours that had a MRI today in your prayers.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

Thank God for improvement and hopefully his counts going up and getting back to the apartment.  When we went back to the apartment today it felt like home, I couldn’t tell you right now how it would feel to get back to home, home, but we are one day closer.

It is time for me to update, as I listen to Martina McBride sing a song about God being great.  Today has been another day with ups and downs.  Chance’s counts were up today, they went from .1 to .2, and Dr G. still says it will probably be Friday before we get out of here.   Desirae and I are so tired of everything to do with the hospital; we would give anything to be out of here now.  Hopefully Friday that will happen!  Chance didn’t eat anything today which has been a struggle.  He did drink some, but not much.  The TPN that he is on could effect his eating, so we hope this is the reason why he isn’t eating.  He has been in a pretty good mood most of the day, tonight he wanted to go down and shoot ball at one of the playgrounds outside the hospital.  It is only for kids here at the hospital.  He really had fun with this; just to get out of the room and get outside is very nice.  Tomorrow will have the same schedule; we are going to start bargaining with Dr G. in hopes that he will let us out of here on Thursday.  So far we have been here for 13 out of 17 days and by Friday that will be 16 out of 20.  Then we hope for a week off before we do it all over again.  We just keep praying that this will cure Chance.  We were hoping that Destiny would be able to come down and spend some time with us, but that may not happen either.  She has had a temperature and runny nose, so if that doesn’t clear up we won’t be able to take the chance of getting them together.  Chance misses her, he has been asking about her each day.  I know God is allowing this to make us stronger Christians and this is happening.  We are not going to let the enemy win, Chance and we are going to win this battle with God’s support and love for us.  We still praise him day in day out, this journey has been hard at times, and will get harder, but I know he is going to give us the strength to fight on.  Every time we get down, he always sends us another sign that it is going to be OK.  He is the rock we are holding on to right now.  I am asking for several special prayers, (1) for Chance’s counts to come up, (2) that he will start eating and be normal for the next 10 days before we start the next round, (3) Destiny will feel her best so that we can get everyone together before we start the next round, (4) that we could get back to beautiful Floyd County for a couple of days before we hit it again.  Thank you for everyone keeping up with us, we are struggling along at times, but as I have said before, One more day closer!

Love,

Well counts are moving up.  They went from <.1 to .1, I know this is not much, but in this case that is a good start.  Dr. G. came by today and thought we would get home Thursday or Friday, we are still hoping to go on Wednesday.  Chance slept a lot today and acted real tired, I don’t know what exactly is wrong with him.  He has been real fussy also, so we don’t know.  It is a chance that his red blood count is dropping so that may be something we have to do over the next few days.  Tonight we took him riding in his wagon, he enjoyed that, it is good just to get out of the room.  If we have to stay until Friday that will give us one week out hopefully before we do it all over again.  Desirae and I got to go get lunch today and run by the apartment.  I looked up on the calendar and it said 95 days left.  We are getting there slowly, frustrating days and good days all add up at the end.

Love,

Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

Today was a normal day in the hospital.  Chance’s counts are still zero; we are hoping that they will start up anytime.  The doctors said today that when they start up most of the time they take off so we are just sitting here waiting.  One of our friends Megan checked in today, tomorrow she will start the same treatments that we have been going through so please keep her in your prayers.  Chance played some today, watched Jeff Gordon win the race, and did some craft activities.  Tonight we walked down to the clinic to get Chance out of the room for awhile.  Fevers have stayed away so far, so we pray that will continue.  Tomorrow will be like today and hopefully those numbers will start up.  Hopefully we will get back to the apartment early in the week and maybe a good weekend and then maybe home, home for a couple of days.  A lot of maybes and a lot of hoping, but with God these things are possible.

We have had some other moms putting a web site on here that you can register your bone marrow.  Most of the time this test costs somewhere around $100.00 and according to them it is free right now, but that deal isn’t long.  I thought as many people that read this website that maybe several people would register.  If you are a match you don’t have to do it, but you might be able to save someone’s life later on down the road.  Pray about it and think about it, you may be an answered prayer to someone with little hope. www.marrow.org.  I think it is just a swab that you have to put in your mouth, so it isn’t a big deal.  Well thank you for all of the support.  Keep Kassidy in your prayers, because she starts back tomorrow with the chemo to beat her disease.

Love,

Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

P.S.      Happy Mother’s Day, I know that Desirae and my mom didn’t want to spend Mother’s Day like this, but we are thankful for the opportunity to spend this time together.  Next years Mother’s Day will be very special and all of this will just be a memory.

Today was a good day.  Chance woke up in a great mood and played most of the day.  I know he is feeling better because he let Desirae and I run over to the apartment for a minute and grab something to eat to bring back to the hospital.  Chance ate pretty well today.  Counts haven’t started in the right direction yet, but we know it is just a matter of time.  His platelets went up on Friday, but then when they took his blood today it had showed that it came back down, so they gave him platelets today.  This is normal; we are just hoping that the white blood count will start back up anytime.  Hopefully we can get back to the apartment Tuesday or Wed.  Chance went down to the clinic to play some today as well; with no one there it is a really nice place to go with his counts where they are we have to be very, very careful.  He walked from down there back up to his room to; this was good to get him some exercise.  We just keep praying for no more fever and for the counts to improve.

From what I have heard sounds like the golf tournament was a huge success.  Hopefully this tournament will continue, it is a good fellowship opportunity.  Other than that just another day in the hospital.  It isn’t as bad as we thought it would be; now I am not saying I am enjoying it, we would love to be back at the apartment, but it is OK.  Tomorrow will be half way through the first round, so we are getting there. 

Love,

Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

P.S.      I would like you to remember Roy Akers’s family in your prayers; he lost his mother this week.  This will be a tough time around Mother’s Day.

HAPPY MOTHER’S                    

DAY!

Today was pretty good.   We finally got into a room about 7:30 this morning; it was a very long night.   Chance felt good, we all took several naps throughout the day.   Chance’s temperature has been gone for all of the day, hopefully that will stay normal.   They started him on antibiotics today and on nutrients tonight.   This is all normal so we had expected it, just hard to go back and stay in the hospital.   He did several sticker books with Nana today and ate just a little bit.   Other than that it was more normal than last night.  

Here is the good news; Chance’s genetic test was NEGATIVE.   This means the tumor has the cell in it, but that cell is not in his blood and he didn’t receive this cell from Desirae or me.   This means Destiny’s chance of having this tumor is zero.   This was very good news that we had been waiting for.   Now all we need to do is beat this thing.   Praise God!

As everyone has read we were struggling last night, so during the night I received an email from Joel Osteen.   The funny thing is I just signed up Wed. night to start receiving this email daily.   Last night when I really needed it, it hit home.   God knew exactly what we needed.   Before I post this email the next thing is the Snelling’s family and Bobbi Jean beat me to it, they had already posted it in a well wish.   Thank you guys for keeping me motivated and focused, last night I got my eyes off our goal, but now the destination is back in sight.

Don't Let Your Hope be Stolen

Today's Scripture

"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full." (John 10:10)

Today's Word from Joel and Victoria

The enemy has a goal for your life. He wants to steal your hope and joy, he wants to make you so discouraged that you just quit and give it all up. He knows that if you get discouraged and down, you will eventually settle for less than the best, and less than what God wants from you. The right attitude and mindset will prepare you for your miracle, but that can't happen if you're down and discouraged. God may take His time to accomplish what He wants to do in your life, but you can't lose heart and allow the enemy to claim victory. God will allow everything to pass as He sees fit. Your job is to have an attitude of expectancy. The rest is up to God !

We are happy to be back on our old floor with these nurses that know us and treat us really well.   As Owen’s mom said we are back in our cushion place, it is so much more comfortable here, because nurses and everyone else’s understands.   If we were going to be in I would want to be on this floor and this wing.

Love,

Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

 P.S. I wanted to put Chance’s address down here just in case anyone wanted to send him a card, he loves receiving mail.

Chance Harman

Thank you to everyone that has already sent him mail, he really enjoys opening them!

P.S.S. Hope everyone enjoys the golf tournament tomorrow, Good Luck, Hope someone hits a Hole-N-One

           Where do I start?  This may not be one of my best updates.  Not because of our situation, but how frustrated I am right now.  After Chance received his blood we went back to the apartment and everything seemed fine.  Well about 8:00 I started taking his temperature and it started rising.  It got to about 101.5 so we decided that we'd better call.  We tried reaching the neuro-oncologist on call twice, but the operator couldn’t get it through to the right person, so we called our doctor.  He said to go to the emergency room and he would call ahead to get everything lined up.  We got there and they took us on back, everything going good.  The security was like going through an airplane terminal with a metal detector and a few cops, but at least it made us feel safe.  The emergency room is not a place you want to be with a zero count, so I figured that we would go right up to fifth floor where we were the other day.

            The doctor came in and did some blood work, x-rays, and physical.  Everything looked good, so I thought then we would be on our way up to the room, I was wrong again.  We have been sitting here about 5 hours waiting for a room.  After going and asking the head nurse if we were going to have a room, she told me why they didn’t in a not good mood, which in turn got me in a not good mood, so I called the operator again trying to reach the on call person.  Well, after three tries this time, I was connected to our Doctor, I hated to wake him, but I thought we would only be in the ER for a little while.  He in turn told me that they had a bed problem and sometimes patients had to stay over night in the ER, this wasn’t what I wanted to hear, but what can we do.  So right now it is 2:00 in the morning, I have been aggravated.  The other thing is that his temperature is normal after being here for a couple of hours.  I asked if we could go back to the apartment until they had a room, but the head nurse had a good comment of “wouldn’t that be nice”.  One nurse said she was going to start anti-biotic about 2 hours ago and I haven’t seen her since.  This has been one aggravating night, but before we come in tonight I prayed that if Chance needed to go into the hospital for his temperature would be up.  We will start nutrients tomorrow, which will be a positive.  This fence along the journey has been a hard one to get over, but anyone following won’t have to worry about that section of fence, because after tonight, I just went ahead and took it out.  I thought I would never want to stay in the hospital again, but right now I would love to have a room so my son could go to sleep with out announcements and crying going on.  I thank God for 5 days out of the hospital and another day closer to our goal.  This section of the journey will be nothing but a funny story in about 3 months.  Sorry for the frustrating update, but I don’t like to see my son suffer. 

            I guess the positive of the night was when we pulled up to the ER, the valet person parks your car no matter what.  He asked if I had shaved my head for my son and I said yes.  He said “It takes a special dad to do that for his son in support.” Boy, was he wrong!  I have such a special son that has fought hard, hasn’t complained about anything and still wakes up ready to fight again the next day.  If and when he wins this battle I don’t think “competitive or determined” is going to be one of his problems.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

         Well we are in, but hopefully only for a little while.  We came in this morning for counts and his white blood count was at <.1 and his platelets were at 12 and they should be for a normal kid over 130, so right now we are getting platelets which takes about 30 min., then we will receive a blood transfusion, that takes about 4-41/2 hours, so I figured I would update now and then again later.  His temperature last night never did get over 100, so we were very thankful for that.  The nurse did say today that sometimes a transfusion would trigger the fever, so we may be in tonight, what ever God’s plans are will be what we will do.  Other than that they said everything looked good and sounded good.  He is just laying in bed in a pretty good mood.  He wanted Nana to go get him some pizza so that is good too.  We ran into another one of our friends Megan, she has been next to us since day one down here, we were the next room from her after surgery, in the same room during stem-cell harvest and gcsf, and she is getting admitted for Chemo on Sunday with the same protocol.  They were doing well; she looked really good, so hopefully they will keep pushing on.  My dad and my grandmother Margaret came down to see us today.  They wanted to spend more time with Chance and us, but this is the way things work sometimes.  It is still hard to believe at times, that day in day out we are pushing IV poles, helping him take several different medications, and waiting for the next incident to put us back in the hospital.  Don’t get me wrong we are thankful for everyday, but you think work is hard, or school is hard and no fun, (I was there to), but I can’t wait to get back to work and the guys at school.  Well till later, enjoy the day.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny 

           Today was better than yesterday.  Chance woke up in a pretty good mood.  He took his medicine this morning and tonight.  After getting sick I think he realizes that medicine isn’t as bad as getting sick so maybe we won that little battle.  He also used the bathroom today which was good too, that took some threatening as well, but right now what ever will work is what we do.  Nana and he played all day.  They did a lot of sticker books, which he loves to do.  He didn’t eat anything today, but drank a lot.  Tonight he wanted to go to Cold Stone and he got one of his favorites, Cotton Candy, but he didn’t eat much of it.  Right now we will take drinking and taking his medicine over eating because when we go in for our first fever, which hasn’t happened yet, they are going to start him on nutrients so that isn’t a big deal right now.  I know I told you guys that I thought we might have to be in today, but he acted pretty normal except the eating so we will wait and see what the blood draws show tomorrow.  We expect his numbers to be at zero and hopefully getting ready to head back in the right direction.  We might have to get a blood transfusion, but that is expected as well.  We are very thankful for another day out of the hospital.  We are flirting with it right now though, we have taken his temperature three times tonight and the last one had one testing at 100.0, if this is the case and it keeps rising just a little we will have to go in tonight.  Desirae and I are starting to pack a few clothes just in case.  This is expected, but we are still praying that it is just a fluke and we will be at clinic in the morning as an outpatient, but what happens is going to happen.  Well I guess that is all for today.  I do want to thank everyone for the cards, Chance looks forward to that everyday, and he loves to go check the mail to see if anyone has sent him anything.  Desirae and I are like that about the emails and well wishes as well.  Thank you to everyone for taken the time out of your day to check on us and to send us these encouraging words.  Well hopefully I will write again tomorrow from the apartment.  I will update as soon as I can about his blood counts as well. 

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

            Today was a pretty normal day.  Chance is getting caught up with fatigue right now.  He didn’t play much today, some of this may be his Red Blood Count, it is low.  It was right on the border line of getting a blood transfusion the other day.  The nurse said that if he acted tired or pale to bring him back in on Wed. to get the brain transfusion.  So we are going to wait till tomorrow and see how he acts.  Right now we are struggling hard with Chance to take his medicine.  He got sick once tonight and he is having a small problem with constipation.  This comes from the Chemo, so I guess it was a blessing that we had the bug last week.  Just pray about the medicine situation and that we will keep that fever away from us.  One more day closer.  We got to talk to Destiny again tonight; it seems like so long since we have seen her.  One of my jobs while being down here for 4 months was to transfer some of our old videos to DVDs so I have been watching some of them, man that is great stuff to go back and watch some of those. 

While you are reading this tell me if this is you; I hate to take that video camera with us everywhere we go, my wife always wants me to video everything and then we just put them up and never watch them or you are a younger person and your parents always wanting to video or take pictures, gosh that gets so old, one more cheese or one more picture, no mom.  Well I will take video of everything everywhere now, I have really enjoyed watching these videos and I have just started.  All I can say is video everything, take the time, take pictures, take the time, and go back and enjoys these moments very often.  DON”T GET TO BUSY, TAKE THE TIME.

Love,

Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

P.S. Pray for Kassidy that she is getting to come home, for a few days before they hit it again hard on Monday.  Thanks for the encouraging email, we are determined to beat this thing.

ZACK (CHANCE'S COUSIN), CHANCE WANTED TO WISH YOU A HAPPY BIRTHDAY, NUMBER 10.

           Today was our first clinic for blood counts to see what was going on.  We went in about 10:00 and got our labs drawn.  While we were there they looked at Chance and said everything looked good.  The only thing he wouldn’t let them do was look at his throat because he was upset.  His throat had some sores in it and they wanted to look to see how bad it was.  We took care of that; today was dressing change on his lines and everyone knows how much he likes tape.  This worked perfect, he yelled and yelled, but we got it changed and they got to look at his throat. 

            Dr. G. came in and told us that the stem-cells had bugs in it.  Not real bugs, but small virus that Chance had when he did this back in February.  He said this shouldn’t be a problem, because he should have had a temperature by now if it was going to bother him.  Another day, well we have about 3 more hours, but another day down hopefully without a fever. 

            Chance’s numbers are dropping hard, from what I have read they have to go to zero before they will come back up.  They have a formula to go by and above 1500 are OK, and above 500 is critical numbers as in that he is more prone to infections, and under 500 means he has no blood cells to fight anything.  On Thursday his number was 1834 and by today they were 357, so dropping hard, but we just keep pushing on.

            Chance played some today and also rode his bike some today.  Only took one nap so hopefully his fatigue is improving and he ate more today.  God is really blessing us right now.   We are fighting him right now to take his medicine, man he just will not take it, but on his concern we are mixing about 5 meds in a small amount of pepsi.  I hate watching him and trying to coaching him to take something that taste that bad, why sometimes why is asked a lot in our days, but we know God has a plan, but we just pray to keep getting the strength to move on along this journey. 

            Chance got to talk to Destiny tonight, it is funny and sad to see them talk to each other on the phone.  Why should her brother at the age of 4 have to talk to her over the phone, that is one hard thing to take hearing them tell each other love yu and hearing her say brob bro.  Yesterday Chance was watching a old video when I played baseball and he said he wanted to play baseball when he gets bigger.  He told me today he wanted to go back to the races and go to another monster truck show.  We don’t know what the future holds, but to look ahead and not know if our son will be able to do some small things so many people take for granted is hard to swallow sometimes.  We try to stay positive, but thoughts, a song, or something he says still keeps us in perspective.  I looked at the calendar tonight, we have 102 days left roughly, nothing else I can say, but keep fighting and push on.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

P.S. Pray for God to be stronger than the fever or his will be done with the fever, also pray for his meds to go better and that this time day in and day out is taking care of his cancer.

           Today has been an improvement.  Chance woke up a few times last night after rolling around to get him to sleep.  He kept complaining that his back was hurting, after calling the doctor he thought it was from his stem-cells growing and coming back.  This would be a really good thing, but it is hard for me to believe that his counts are improving this quick.  I guess we will find out tomorrow, we have clinic day.  No fever so far, but we are expecting it at anytime, but like I said before we are praying that God shows he controls the fever not the chemo, we of such little faith.  We also have prayed that if we have to go in for a fever, there will be a reason for that. 

            Chance played more today and slept less.  He also ate some chips and some pepperonis, I know not the healthiest things, but for a chemo kid anything will work.  Not just for a chemo kid, but this is for Chance anytime.  I pray that we can keep pushing along and stay off TPN (Feeds) for awhile.  Everyday is one more that he won’t be on it.  He rode his bike some today and right now at 10:00, he is making Nana put stickers all over his basketball box.  Other than that a normal day in Durham I guess, we don’t know what normal life is, but in Durham we do know what normal days are.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

P.S. Hope church service was good today; I heard Terry Harris did a great job.  I also heard the softball game was a lot of fun, hope all you older players don’t hurt to bad tomorrow.

           Today once again had a lot of ups and downs.  The morning he woke up in a pretty good mood.  He played a little while and then took a nap.  He is still complaining of his throat and mouth hurting.  So they gave him some medicine for that.  Then the good news, we got discharged at about 11:30; everyone told us that we would see them next week sometime.  We have prayed really hard that God will prove them wrong.  This afternoon he played a lot and took another nap.  The lady came by to show us how to use his pump that we got.  It pumps the GCSF shots in him.  Those are is the shots that increase his stem-cells, the pump is not on an IV pole it is a backpack so he an still play and doesn’t have to be hinder by a pole.  At night he is on fluids for 12 hours and probably soon he will be on feeds.  We have 104 days left roughly, I know we are not looking for the end, but we like seeing another day down.  After tomorrow we will be one week down and one chemo week down.  He has improved today, but it is still a struggle to get him to take his medicine.  Our cabinet looks like a local pharmacy.  Well, I better get off here and pray for God to keep proving these people wrong.  I just saw where Richmond won’t see a race tonight, I hate that for everyone there, but hopefully tomorrow it will happen.  Everyone be careful and enjoy it.  I also forgot to tell everyone that the Busch race on Friday was started by a Make-A-Wish kid; I thought that was really cool.  6 months ago I would have never thought anything about it, but now I do.  Pray for good days and no trips to the hospital. 

            Love,
            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

Today has had several ups and downs.  The good thing is it's Friday and we are days closer.  Last night was a long night; he was up frequently, not getting sick just not feeling good.  A nurse showed up at 11:30 p.m. to hook him up to a heart monitor that worked for about 15 min., and then the leads came off.  Not a big deal just didn’t get much info from the test except waking him up and he doesn’t like stickers on him.  Chance hasn’t been sick since last night around 7:00 so we are very thankful for that.  He still hasn’t eaten anything over the last three days; he is dropping some in weight but not a concern yet. 

They put the stem-cells back in today, and that was successful.  A lot of the side effects are very, very rare, but they are like an allergic reaction to a bee sting so this can be very dangerous.  Chance handled this real good and after it was done got back to his normal self for awhile.  He didn’t want to get out of bed, but he wanted to play so it was nice to see him normal and not just laying there.  He did this for a few hours, but then was ready to go to bed about 8:30.  His main concern and biggest problem right now is mouth sores.  He just starts fussing and most of the time it is his mouth.   We have some stuff for him to take, but about like all of the other medicine he doesn’t want to.  Tomorrow we are scheduled to go to the apartment hopefully as long as he doesn’t run a fever or anything goes wrong.  It will be nice to get out of here for a couple of days, because sounds like we will be back next week sometime.  We are getting there, slow go, but we are moving along. 

Well this weekend is another situation how our life has been changed.  As all of you know I love racing and the last three years my father and me always head to Waynesboro on Friday night and hang out, go out to eat, just spend time together.  Then Saturday morning we would wake up early meet Desirae’s dad and brother and head to Richmond.  We love going down there and really look forward to it every spring and fall.  Well this year the spring race isn’t going to happen for us, but I do know that we will enjoy the next races we go to more than ever.  So everyone going to Richmond enjoy yourself, be safe, and have fun.  Enjoy the fellowship of friends and family because you don’t know what you will be doing the next weekend.  T.R., Ray, Jason, Carrie, Ashlee, and everyone else heading to Richmond, make sure you cheer Tony Stewart on and Chance wants you to cheer for Jeff Gordon. 

Love,

Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny 

TOMORROW IS NANA HARMAN'S BIRTHDAY!

Last night and today has been a realization of chemo and it effects.  Last night Chance got sick twice and then this morning he got sick also.  Today they gave him a lot of medicine to help with this.  All day Chance either slept or woke up and got sick.  It was a long day, but at least he did sleep a lot.  This is all normal, the doctor is still very positive and they are going to let us go on Saturday back to the apartment.  Everyone we have talked to said that they would see us next week with a temp., so we prayed earlier today for God to prove them wrong if that was his will.  Chance woke up about 7:00 tonight, this has been the first time today that we have been able to talk to him and play with him.  He played from his bed; he didn’t want to go anywhere tonight so I know he still is very tired.  He sang some, shot some ball, and threw some ball.  Tomorrow is stem-cell rescue which shouldn’t be that big of a deal, even though they will monitor him constantly just to make sure everything stays OK.

Two stories that made us hurt a little were during one of his spells when he got sick, he told me that he wanted to pray for his belly, at least he knew where to go with his problem.  Today has been more like back before we knew what was wrong with Chance and he would just throw up.  He hates this so bad and we do too.  We just hope this is towards the end of the sickness.  Fatigue we can handle, but the sickness needs to go.  The other story was how Chance wanted us to call Destiny so he could tell her he loved her.  It was so good to hear them talk to each other and to hear her say brabro.  They had a long talk, it just hurts that they have to be away from each other, but hopefully in about 10 days we all can be a normal family again for about 10 days and then do this all over again.  This just makes me appreciate our family so much, and this includes everyone reading this.  Since this has started I make sure if I have something to tell someone or if I have a problem with someone it is going to get solved now, because what if I had something to say and then something happened to them where they either died or went into a coma and I never got to solve the problem or tell them what I wanted to.  Don’t let family or friends leave your presence with out telling them how you feel or if you have a problem; solve it.  This was one of my problems, pride, didn’t want to give in; now I realize how stupid that was. 

Please keep Kassidy and their family in your prayers.  Just pray hard that the test come back the way they need to.  Also tomorrow Rayley one of our other friends in Texas with ATRT are having their scans.  These will determine if the one year old can start radiation or that there is no reason to and to just take her home.  If you are not thankful for your situation or your healthy kids put yourself in that spot.  If you would like to send them a well wish it would take but a minute, click here http://www.carepages.com/

Then care page Rayley Kocurek

            Hope for a good night and a good day tomorrow, pray that Chance stomach will improve and he will keep fighting like he has up till this point.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

         Today the reaction to chemo hit.  Chance got sick when he first woke up this morning and then 3 more times today.  That still isn’t bad and we got through the day and we will take it.  His first round of chemo is done, thank GOD.  Tomorrow is a rest day which he really needs.  All he did today was lay in bed and then we took him down to play with the trains, but all he wanted to do was lay in his wagon.  Fatigue has really set in.  He went to bed tonight before 9:00, so hopefully he will get a good nights rest.  Doctor G came by and said that he was doing well, so hopefully after the stem-cell rescue on Friday we will still get back to the apartment on Saturday.  He didn’t eat anything today but did drink a little bit.   We just hope that the days keep passing before we have to put him on feeds to keep his nutrition up.  Once we start that we are on it the whole 4 months and it would cause us to be in the hospital for a 5 day stay.  Just keep praying that the chemo is hurting the bad cells while not hurting him and that he won’t get a temp.  Getting a temp is an automatic back into the hospital for a stay.  One of the nurses on our hall today spoke to me and told me she was from Salem, and that she kept up with us on the website.  Even though we are not in Floyd or close we still see people who know where we are from and why we miss home so much.  Well keep the prayers and well wishes coming we appreciate them so much we when are sitting in the hospital for numerous hours.  Please keep Kassidy in your prayers, tomorrow is the day of the surgery.

            Love,

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

            Another day down.  Chance woke up in a pretty good mood.  Last night was a pretty long night, they kept waking us up every so often to make him urinate which was aggravating, but it was for his own good.  Doctor G came by again today to check on him.  He had an hour long chemo today, it went well.  Then about 2:00 he got the hiccups, this causing him to gag and then on to throwing up twice.  Hey we are still very thankful for this.  Every hour is one more hour closer to getting over the first round of chemo so we are thankful for that.  He felt like eating a little bit and also going to play with the trains.  We went down there twice today and also outside for a little bit.  He loves to go down to the clinic at night; it is so nice because there isn’t anyone there.  Other than that it was a pretty normal day, we just give God all of the praise for keeping him from getting sick.  While we were down at the trains a little girl came over to play with Chance along with her mom and dad.  They were from Argentina, and they had a four year old that had had a blood transplant of some sorts.  They had been here at the beginning for 8 months and just got back again in Jan. because it reoccurred.  They were hoping she would last a year.  I still don’t know how to tell everyone how lucky we are to have the situation that we have.  We have a chance, and some peoples hope is very little.  We still have the hope of holding on to God.  He is just so great!  Right now there are a couple of kids crying and yelling on the floor, and Chance just plays goes to bed and wakes up like nothings wrong.  I don’t know what else to say, but Thank You God. 

            Desirae has been listening to Purpose Driven Life on CD and she wanted me to listen to one chapter today.  It was about surrendering.  It talked at the beginning about how competitive everyone is in today’s time about everything, and I would fit right in there with that.  But the chapter said that we just need to surrender all to him, we know first hand this is hard, but it talked about Jesus the night before he got crucified.  Jesus prayed to God to not let it happen, but whatever his will be done.  If all of us had that outlook, life would be a lot simpler.  This is easy for me to say because right now my son is handling the medication and treatments real well.  Desirae and I have come to the realization that it is going to be Ok, I still question God and have questions for him, but what ever happens it is his will and it is best for Chance.  I still don’t know why there are so many kids that are sick, but I also don’t understand why he has blessed us as much as he has because we don’t deserve it.  Once again I just give God all of the praise and just surrender it all, his will be done, and it will be OK.

            Before I quit and go down to get me something to eat, please keep Kassidy and her family in your prayers.  Danny and I have spoke several times over the last couple of days and times are tough there.  A lot of questions, and a lot of uncertainty, but just pray for God to give them the strength that they need and that for this procedure to help Kassidy overcome this obstacle to become a great testimony of how great he is.  Pray that the next couple of days go well and everything is successful.  Danny and his family are getting closer to us everyday even though before all of this happen we would just speak at games.  I don’t wish this on anyone, but God did say he would send someone to go through these situations with you.  Just keep the faith.

            Thank you for the entire well wishes, emails, and prayers.  One more day of chemo, then a rest day and hopefully back to the apartment on Saturday.  Love each and every one of you that are following our journey.

            Brian, Desirae, Chance, and Destiny

God gave us another sign he was with us; yesterday Chance developed a fever of 101F.   Brian and I began to worry a little.   If Chance develops a fever during chemo. we could end up in ICU or worse, we could develop a bad infection.   We automatically began to pray and ask God to help us through this and allow the fever to come down.   The nurse called the Dr. and he said to check it again in about a half hour and see what it does before they take measures.   The nurse came back 30 min. later and by this time Chance was burning up.   We had felt his head, torso, and feet; they were on fire.   When ever he gets a really high temp. his feet become really hot.   We knew when she took his temp. we would be in trouble.   The nurse felt of him and thought his temp. would be even higher also.   She took it with her thermometer and it read 99.5f, she said no way, its got to be higher than that.   She took it under his arm and under his tongue, again 99.5F (99F is not considered a temp. here).   She even got another thermometer because she thought hers was not working properly.   We know why the temp. started to come down and we know who allowed the temp. to be in a good range.   God answered our prayers.   He decreased his temperature and we give praise and glory all to God.

 
We continue to praise God for all his blessings and allowing us to make it thus far.   We don’t know what the future may hold but we do know God is with us every step of the way.   We know he will continue to guide us and protect us.   Each day we are another day closer to healing Chance whether it be in heaven or on Earth.   God will do what is best for Chance and us; we find peace in that.   Chance is in a win-win situation.   He will never loss his battle with cancer; he will be healed.   Only God knows what is best and we trust him with all our hearts.   May God bless each and every one of you.   Thank God everyday for all the many blessings he bestows upon us no matter how big or small!!!

Love,                                           

Well, where do I start?  It has been so long since my last journal entry.  Here lately I have just been helping Brian write the updates.  Chance has been so busy and active he has not given me the opportunity to update the journal.  I truly thank God everyday he has been healthy enough to run around and for me to try to keep up with him.  We all have been blessed so much. 

We are down at Duke now starting our chemo.  Today is the second day.  Chance is handling it like a champ.  The children around here truly amaze me with their strength.  The floor we are on are all chemo. children.  They range from only a few weeks old to teenagers.  It just breaks my heart these children have to endure such sickness; just hoping for another day to awaken to what most of us take for granted.  There is nothing more precious than an innocent child. 

Chance is sleeping right now.  He looks so peaceful and beautiful.  I just love to watch him sleep.  He has gotten sick twice today.  Yesterday he didn’t get sick at all.  He really is doing well though.  He had more of an appetite today.  He ate a handful of cheerios, a cracker and maybe a few french fries.  His appetite was much better today.  Yesterday, he only ate a gummy bear and a cracker all day.  Dr. G. said not to expect him to eat anything.  I am just so thankful to God he did eat a little something today.  Prayer really does work!  Being down here really makes Brian and myself be thankful for all the many blessings God has given us.  We meet someone each day that are in a worse circumstance then we are with their own child.  Brian told you in the update about the couple we meet tonight from Argentina.  Please lift them up in prayer.  I couldn’t imagine going through what they have endured in the last year.  Brian and I just can’t fathom how many sick children are in this world.  We have only seen a handful here at Duke compared to the world, but it truly breaks your heart to see these little ones suffer. 

I won’t lie to you; it is tough being on this floor.  Chance is doing great but some children are crying down the hall due to the strenuous treatments.  I just wish I could take all the pain away from these children.  We can’t take the cancer out of their bodies but we can pray for God to help them through it and to heal their bodies.  I am asking you to please do this; if you could only see the children it would humble you.  God is so great; he can do imaginable things if we only turn it over to him and pray. 

Chance went strolling this afternoon around the hospital.  We played with the Thomas train set down stairs; he really seems to enjoy it.  Tomorrow if he feels like it we may go down to a playground they have for the cancer children.  We have to get written permission from Dr. G. first though saying we are able.  Chance is looking forward to that.  We visited the helicopter pad tonight and rode the tram back and forth.  Anytime we can get out of our room we take advantage of it.  No matter what time of night or day we try to get out of the room as much as possible.  I told Brian we need to take advantage of it as often as we can, you never know what tomorrow may bring (physically he might not be able to the next day).  Chance enjoys getting outside to enjoy the weather.  We sat in our window sill today.  Chance told me how beautiful the day was today and that the view we had was beautiful.  He loves outdoors.  Well, I better get off this thing and go to bed; it’s about 11:45 p.m.  We have another busy day tomorrow.  God bless each and every one of you.  Please don’t forget to lift Kassidy up in your prayers along with Chance. 

Love,

Desirae, Brian, Chance and Destiny