Eric the fighter

Eric had many followups after this stunt in the hospital.  Going to the doctors is his favorite thing ever....hahaha

The Infectious Disease doctor was glad to see that Eric was getting better. That was pretty much it....

Dr. C saw Eric once right after and then a few weeks later. He is our favorite EVER! Eric has no new cancer (like they thought may have been the case when he was in the ER -insert angry face-) or old cancer. YAY We love being cancer free. At the first check up Erics blood work was still funky but after a few weeks of getting better it looked fine...YAY

The Neurologist explained that Eric is on the lowest dose possible for his seizures and that when he gets sick his tolerance level goes down. When this happens upping his seizure medication dose will take care of it. For now though Eric is good to just stay doing what he has been doing so thats good.


Bumps like this in the road are never fun. We are sure glad that Eric is fine. As always your love and support always gets us though these times.


Happy Fall :)

Finally home from his 5 day stay

Eric said that when Dr. Nibly (cancer specialist) came by Saturday morning he said that from his point of view Eric could go home. We were waiting on the Infectious Disease doctor to give the ok. Eric's last fever was Friday night at 7:30 and hasnt had one since! They wanted him to go without having one for 24 hours before they would feel comfortable sending him home. They continued to watch his white blood cell count. It was still a little high but his body is just fighting to get better.
A different doctor from the infectious disease team came by to check on Eric. I think if it had been the original Eric would have had a good chance at going home.

Got a new hat in the gift shop and got to take a walk outside!

I was able to stay the night at the hospital Saturday to Sunday.  
When I got there Eric was having one of his episodes. It started before I got there. When I called him to tell him that I was on my way he was all fumbly it took a couple tries to talk to him. I thought this was a little weird. When I got there he was laying down which is normal but when I tried to talk to him his tongue seemed twisted and his words werent making sense. I snuck out to talk to his nurse because I wanted them to check him. Luckily his nurse was from Brazil so we had that to talk about so that Eric wouldnt suspect anything. (Eric doesnt like when I 'tattle') I was concerned because this seemed new to me and unlike his partial seizure episodes that he has had before. A resident came up and assessed Eric but we never heard back...??? We just walked the halls during the episode. Sometimes he could speak clearly and other times he wasnt making sense with the words he did get out. Finally it went away and he slept it off.

His friend was nice enough to bring up a gaming system to help kill some time!

About how it went lol

Sunday was another day of waiting around for answers....We went on a couple of walks and sat outside for a little bit. Dr. Nibly was a little concerned about what happened the night before and ordered an MRI. The MRI didnt happen until 3 in the afternoon. By day 5 its understandable that Eric was so bored, sick of being there and needed to go home. Dr. Nibly talked to infectious disease doctors and read the report from the MRI and let Eric go home. He needs to continue the anti viral medication to help get over the CMV and  Monday morning I'll be making a few phone calls to have follow ups with a neurologist, infectious disease and cancer specialists.

A visit from the kids was the best! Going home to them was even better!

CMV and Rhinovirus

The day's are blurring together but I'll try to catch up. Hopefully what I write isn't too confusing. Lots of test and inconclusive results sometimes.
I was able to go up Thursday morning and be there when the doctors came by. When we talked to Laura a nurse practicioner from the Utah Cancer Specialists she said that Eric tested negative for mono and the flu but positive for the common cold.
Eric's fever broke the night before, or so it seemed. He was DRENCHED in sweat! They wanted to double check with the Infectious Disease doctor to make sure that they arent missing anything. We thought he might go home that day....yea right. They asked him lots of questions and wanted to dig deeper into his blood work and test it for more possibilities as to what was making Eric so sick.
Eric was given the green light to take walks outside. I think that has really helped to not feel so confined!
I took the kids up to see Eric after Tayvia's soccer game on Thursday. It was during Landry's bedtime and boy did he let me know lol Tayvia sure enjoys walking the hall with her dad! It was also so cute to watch them look out the window.
Later that night I had to run Eric a toothbrush because after he paged the nurses two times they still didnt take him one. (angry face) I also took his pillow to help keep him comfy.  He was a little agitated when I went to see him but a shower, change in clothes and a fan to keep him cool helped!

I had to work on Friday. Eric's mom Susan went up to be there when Laura the NP was there to give Eric an update.  She said that the labs are not what she understands so she was waiting for the infectious disease doctor to tell her the results. They suspect a virus but want to make sure it is not a virus that would take him out of remission with his transplant history.
Eric's brother Paul has been great to go up and visit Eric everyday. I know he enjoys the company! Paul was great to update me as well. I've been really irritated with the service and care that we have been given. I guess we have been through a lot to know the difference. you know...?!  {
Side note: After our wards bbq I was able to run up and see Eric. Of coarse I had to make a pit stop at Cold Stone! I deserve it after all!!!}

I would say that Eric has had 2 really good nurses. Tell you what experience and truly caring about your patients needs really shows in your work. I called the Nurse Manager and left her a voicemail tonight. I have already complained to her on the first day. It should not take 2 hours to get a patient Tylenol...
The one tonight was (insert hands in the air raising the roof!)  Last night I asked the nurse to make sure to pass on the word that I WANTED UPDATES! Since I had to work I couldnt be there to know what was going on. Eric's nurse tonight was really good to talk to about it because he has been in Eric's shoes. He  also spent weeks in LDS Hospital on the 8th floor...East wing. (BMT) He said the floor that Eric is on no where near has attentiveness that an ICU or BMT unit has.  He sat down with us and went over any scans, xrays, utlra sounds, blood work etc that Eric has had done. He explained a little more about Eric's diagnosis of CMV (a certain strand of mono) and Rinovirus (cold). Eric is on an antiviral medication. Its one that he has to take for 3 weeks. When Eric gets better he can continue taking it at home. Eric's white blood cell count was up to 25.8 and he continues to get fevers at night. It doesn't look like he will be going home for a little bit. They want to see his white blood cell count trending down and for Eric's fevers to go away for 24 hours.

Annual Neighborhood BBQ & Fireman hose slip n slide

Eating his toes...

Now dont start that again

For the past 10 days Eric has not been feeling well. A week ago it was so bad that he contacted his cancer doctor about getting a CT scan. Dr. C called and said that his scan looked fine. Eric continued to have high fevers of 102, loss of appetite, etc Tuesday night Eric's temperature reached 104. I told him it was time to go in and get looked at. I convinced him to go to insta care. While there the doctor said that with Erics extensive history and lack of equipment that he needed to be seen at the ER. That did not sit well with Eric as he is going to school full time and didnt want this to trigger more doctor appointments. I drove to the ER anyway. As we were checking in Eric almost refused to be seen. He wasnt in any pain so he didnt think it was necessary. After some nudging I got him to consent. SHEESH! They were pretty quick about getting blood work done, IV going, chest xray and CT scan done. The CT scan showed some fluid in his belly and swollen lymph nodes around his liver. Eric's white blood cell count was 23.1 and they saw abnormal cells as well...blast and smudge. All things combined the signs were pointing towards leukemia. If that was the case they were going to send us up to LDS hospital. They kept Eric over night to keep the fever under control, and they gave him antibiotics. 

Wednesday morning the pathologist took a closer look at Eric's blood work. He didnt think that Eric had leukemia. Erics red blood cells and platelets looked good. Instead he thought that Eric might be fighitng mono or influenza. Eric was transfered to the oncology floor. He had a nose swab done to check for those. We didnt have the results yet so I went home to take care of Landry and get some rest. (Tayvia went with my parents) They had Eric on an IV of fluids and an antibiotic. His fever wasnt being touched with tylenol so they were going to try something stronger.

Summertime

We have enjoyed lots of picnics, walks, hikes, and days at the lake. Eric has started a computer boot camp to learn coding. 

Welcoming the newest member of our family.

It wasn't the easiest journey to have another child but well worth it!

Introducing

Landry Leon Holman

Feb 13, 2017

8am

8.6 lbs

21.5 inch

Christmas

Christmas came and went so fast that I forgot to blog about it.

 It has been really great having to have a second dog. She has a great temperament and after some time our other dog accepted her and they became friends!

We had a fun Christmas Eve with the Holmans and a great Christmas day with the Ross'. 

Tayvia was spoiled like always!