Eli's Army

Nothing major to post about today, but wanted to let people know what is coming up next. Saturday was a day of visitors (some of them even daring to wear Iowa State Cyclone gear in Iowa Hawkeye territory! Ok, myself included.) 🙂 Lots of people stopped by to give Eli their love and it really did a nice job of keeping him awake most of the day. That allowed him to break out of this “sleep during the day and be awake all night” cycle. So last night was really good, minus the IV setting off alarms every 30 minutes or so with air in the lines. I posted a few new pictures of Eli reading with our friend Matt and playing with one of his new toys.
Today is a day of rest (as it well should be) and preparation for this upcoming week. We’ve been battling with high blood pressure and his first fever since arriving in Iowa City. The doctors are actually a bit surprised it’s taken this long for him to get a fever. They are doing a blood culture to make sure he doesn’t have an infection. Sometimes those Central Lines (the semi-permanent IVs coming out of his chest) can get infected. Mostly just treated with antibiotics, which they’ve started already to be safe. The high blood pressure is also being controlled with meds.
Tomorrow Eli has a GFR test on his kidneys. This is a really critical test and we can’t start chemotherapy until it is done. It is a test to see how well his kidneys are functioning. If they are working 100%, then we can give him the maximum chemotherapy treatment, which is preferred. If his kidneys aren’t at 100%, we’ll have to scale it back accordingly. Please pray for fully functioning and healthy kidneys! Once those test results come back, we start chemotherapy.
We know that after another week or so here in the hospital, we’ll be able to go home. We’ll be home for 3-4 weeks, then we’ll have to come back to Iowa City for 5-6 days for chemo treatments. We’ll be doing that cycle several times until the neuroblastoma tumor is small enough they think they can surgically remove it all. No idea how long that will take.
Thanks to everyone for letting us know that you’re praying for us, we really appreciate it. It is absolutely critical in Eli’s recovery.
James 5:16 – Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous person has great power.

Today was a full day, even though on the surface it may not seem like it. We accomplished two tests and a bath! In a week full of bad news, there was at least some positive news today.
First, we know that the tumor hasn’t grown into Eli’s skull (technically we knew that yesterday from the head and chest CT scan). As a comical side note, they did find something in his right ear that is a mystery. They kept asking us if he has ever had tubes in his ears (like we’d forget that) and have determined that it is something he probably shoved down in there a while ago. They plan on having an ear/nose/throat doctor pull it out whenever time permits.
Second, we know that the tumor isn’t closing off the blood to the kidneys. He had a kidney ultrasound today so they could monitor the arteries to the kidneys and fortunately those seem to be just fine. He has had really high blood pressure the last few days, so they were worried that he might be having kidney problems, but that’s not the case. They’ve been able to manage the blood pressure with some potent medication.
Third, although we know the tumor is in the bone marrow (putting him at Stage 4), the preliminary results from today’s bone scan shows that there are no tumors actually growing on his bones. That is great news because those are extremely difficult to remove and would be a very bad sign. Final word is still coming back, but they are pretty confident that is one thing that hasn’t progressed into a dangerous thing yet. He was injected with radioactive liquid and then his whole body went through a scanner to show his bones and see where new growth was occurring. It was a pretty amazing process.
Thank God for His role in science and for the advancements in technology that physicians have made to better understand the things that go on in these extremely complex bodies He has designed.
We are still waiting for 100% final reports from the pathologists before starting any treatment. They emphasize that we have to know with absolute certainty what this thing is before we start treatment. So we could potentially not hear back until Monday. Until then, more tests and start planning our ideas for treatment under the assumption it’s what everyone suspects it is (neuroblastoma).
Please continue to pray. Hopefully this new “update format” serves people well.
Psalm 103:2 Bless the LORD, O my soul,and forget not all his benefits, 3who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases

I wanted to pass on the most recent news we have since the surgery this afternoon. Unfortunately, it’s not the news we were hoping for. Eli’s tumor is malignant and, based on the bone marrow test, it was confirmed that it is in his bones. The doctor said this puts him at a Stage 4 (there are only 4 stages, and that one is the worst). According to our Oncologist, we have a very big battle in front of us. According to Scriptures, we have a very big God on our side. They are going to run several more tests so they get a better understanding of what they are dealing with. They are also waiting to get final confirmation on the tumor, but they are quite confident it is neuroblastoma. The statistics and information on neuroblastoma aren’t encouraging, but prayer and faith is, so please keep that going.

The surgery itself went well and Eli is mainly sleeping off the anesthesia. We won’t have a definitive plan of attack (including knowing how long we’ll be in Iowa City) until the diagnosis is 100% sure, probably by Monday. It will undoubtedly include a lot of chemotherapy and radiation. It is important to attack it hard the first time because more than 50% of the time it comes back and it is very difficult to get rid of it the second time around. I tell you all of this so you can understand the gravity of the situation and the need to pray fervently that God will help Eli beat these odds. We must pray in faith that God will do it ( James 1:6 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who https://buycbdproducts.com is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. 7For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord. and Mark 11: 24 Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.) God will undoubtedly use this very hard situation for His glory. Thank you all for your love and support.

In Him,
Aaron

Just an update, albeit an uneventful one, that Eli was sent in for his biopsy about an hour and a half ago. They are going to do three things. 1) Cut out a piece of the tumor so they can determine what kind it is. This will require going in through his belly and cutting out a chunk of the tumor. Further CT Scans last night show that it extends from down in his pelvis to up into his chest, but it doesn’t seem to be choking any of his main arteries or impending any blood flow, which is good. 2) They will extract bone marrow to see if the tumor has gotten into his bones. 3) They will install a “semi permanent” IV, which will basically give them a port to administer medicine or extract blood without having to poke him numerous times. It does down through the neck and runs under his skin. It will probably be in there for a while, they can even use it to administer chemotherapy if needed.

They expect surgery to last 3.5-4 hrs. They are calling our room with updates throughout. Hopefully by tomorrow they’ll have a better idea as to what we’re dealing with and how we will proceed with treating it. As he was getting droopy from his meds before the surgery, he was laughing at how silly daddy looked in his “doctor’s outfit”. First time I had seen a smile or a laugh in days. I was able to hold him as he fell asleep. Now we’re just praying for wisdom for the doctors and a quick recovery for Eli. We appreciate all of the prayers.

Romans 8:26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. 27And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. 28And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
Aaron

I wanted to let you all know that we took Eli in today to get a CT Scan because his stomach has been hurting him for a few weeks and the Dr. found a very large tumor around his kidney. We were rushed to Iowa City where we are awaiting further diagnosis and action, which probably won’t be for another day or two. I’ll try to keep you up to date as I’ve obviously found the hospital’s public internet terminal.

Prayers would be REALLY appreciated right now. Eli has two very scared parents…