Update & Prayer Request!

We took a little break from posting, I'm sure you noticed! ;) It has been so nice for the past month to watch Robert and Ashley settle back into normal life, well as normal as it can be. Robert has been back up to Salt Lake twice for check ups and everything has been looking good. They even took Robert off of his appetite stimulator. He's been gaining weight so well, they want him to slow it down a little. He still takes it occasionally, it helps with his nausea or if he has a couple days when he doesn't feel hungry. He has some cute chubby cheeks these days!

About a week ago Robert started feeling a little crummy. His docs thought he was detoxing all of the chemo and radiation and other drugs from his bone marrow transplant--a little too fast. He developed a small bump on his chest on Tuesday, and he's been feeling a little worse and sleeping a lot. He had a check up here in Vegas with Dr. Gollard yesterday (Wed). Doc was concerned about his overall health, so he sent Robert to check in to the hospital. They ran some additional blood work, and there are no abnormal cells (great sign). I talked to my dad just after he had been at the hospital last night to give Robert a blessing. While he was there Dr. Litman stopped by (the infectious disease doc) and he was checking Robert out. He said from what he could see, and the look of his skin (he has a rash?) that he thought Robert was developing graph vs. host disease (GVHD). Now that would be a good thing! We've been waiting a long time for some GVHD to show up!

GVHD would explain him feeling worse and worse. And one doc even said it could have caused the bump on his chest. If is is GVHD they will start Robert back on anti-rejection meds and that would help him to keep the GVHD under control and he would start feeling better.

We don't want to cause too much concern. Robert is in the hospital because as my dad said, "with all of Robert's health concerns they are going to keep him on a short leash." They also wanted to be able to help Robert feel more comfortable too. They want to know exactly what caused the bump on his chest, so they are running more tests. Today they will do two bone marrow biopsies--one on his chest and one on his back.

So Ashley wanted me to request extra prayers for him today! Pray for them both please!

I started this post on Thursday. Here is the Friday update: the results from both bone marrow biopsies are in and there are no leukemia cells. His blood cultures came back and they look pretty good too. His liver is a little stressed, raised enzyme levels I believe. They did an MRI and a CT scan, they were checking on his liver and kidneys and they looked good. This afternoon they were doing a lumbar puncture (spinal tap) to be sure there isn't any infection in his spinal fluid. The docs thought that Robert might have a secondary infection, besides possible GVHD. So far they haven't seen signs of it. I hope this makes sense. It is a lot of medical info all at once!

Robert is feeling better. They have been giving him fluids and some pain meds, so he is much more comfortable.

Please keep praying for Robert and Ashley! We'll continue updating daily, at least until we know what is going on. Thank you again for your love and support!

Hugs & Kisses

XOXOXOXOXO