Just wanted to write a quick update to let everyone know that Cooper’s surgery was a great success! The doctors at Scott and White were able to remove 100% of the tumor still in Cooper, which is wonderful. Cooper has spent the last few days in the hospital, recovering from surgery and is gearing up to go home again soon. We are so thankful that this surgery went so well, and to everyone who came, called, and prayed for Cooper that day.
Just days before his surgery, Cooper and brother Brayden celebrated their birthdays together. Cooper was turning four on the 31st, and Brayden turned 2 just yesterday, so the family got together for a Thomas the Train themed party. Here are some pictures from the party:
The awesome cake that Grammie and Diane made!
Cooper helps to add a candle
Cooper playing with Uncle Brad before cake and presents
Yes, I accept all forms of cake!
Cooper and Brayden: Now, for the fun part!
Cooper got lots of Thomas presents
Brayden got lots of presents in general!
Which he wanted out of the boxes immediately...
But you'd better open them quickly!
You didn't take a picture of me upset, did you?
In the end, the only thing that matters...
...is being surrounded by those that love you.
(and Thomas, don't forget Thomas.)
Happy Birthday to Brayden and Cooper – we are so happy to have this step of surgery behind us. We’ll be posting more as soon as we know what is coming next.
(You can see all of the pictures from that day here.)
-Aunt Amanda
Cooper is scheduled for surgery tomorrow at 11am at Scott and White. He’ll be spending about a week in the hospital afterward to recover before starting his sixth round of chemo.
Cooper’s family also celebrated his 4th birthday this last week, we’ll have pictures to share soon!
Please continue to keep Cooper in your thoughts and prayers, we appreciate everything that everyone has done and is doing for the family.
-Aunt Amanda
Cooper will be going in Thursday morning for a blood transfusion and another bone marrow biopsy. Afterward he will be sent up to the South tower 4th floor, where we normally stay. Sometime Friday, Cooper will be going in for his surgery to remove what they can of his tumors. They will be cutting horizontally across his ribs front to back. He will have dissolvable stitches on the inside. Dr Custer expects it to take two to three hours. We will be in for three to five days so that they can watch over Cooper in his first few days of healing and to manage his pain. After a few weeks of healing Cooper will go on to round 6 of chemo. Dr Grayson says that this round can be done outpatient, which I’m sure Cooper will be happy about.
Before we get out of the hospital we will have our results back from the bone marrow and know whether we will need a donor. We are praying that he can use his own stem cells so that there are less complications and risks. If we end up needing a donor there is a possibility that we can be in San Antonio for 3 months because of a disease called Graph vs Host. Please give us your prayers again that this time his bone marrow will be less that 5% infected and that they can harvest Cooper’s own stem cells.
I will give everyone that cannot join us Friday and update on how surgery went.
Jessica
Together, the social worker and I have decided that we will be coming to the clinic everyday to receive Cooper’s antibiotics. The home health agency wants 20% of the cost of the medication up front. Expenses are not cheap. It would be cheaper on us to pay for the gas to get back and forth to scott and white then to pay 20% up front. I have negative feelings for this hospital. Making Cooper be here for a week and then to turn around and make him come in everyday for the next week is necessary but sad. Then we will be doing another bone marrow the following week. Cooper will be happy when the cycle ends and he knows that he doesn’t live at scott and white. Till that day we sacrifice our sanity for the good of him.
-Jessica
Cooper was admitted Monday to start chemo. A fairly decent round, until Wednesday. Cooper spiked a fever in the middle of the afternoon. 100.4, this is consider fever in children with cancer. They usually admit for at least 3 days if it gets to 100.4, but seeing we were already here they went straight to giving him antibiotics and drawing blood. THey continued to give him antibiotics along with his chemo throughout the week until Friday, I surely thought we were going home Friday and so did the doctors. It was assumed that it was just contamination. Friday afternoon the nurse came in to give him his last round (so we thought) of antibiotics. She mentions that his blood cultures came back positive for strep. We start a new antibiotic that he can only have through iv. I assumed 3 days of this new medicine and Sunday we would be going home. Not a chance. Its Monday morning and we are leaving today. Later in the afternoon. Cooper has to ave some blood and a round of antibiotics before we leave. Because of the positive culture for strep Cooper has to have antibiotics at home through iv. We will have a home health nurse come out and show us how to give it. I don’t know for sure if she/he will be coming everyday or just the once. Dr Mulne assumes it will be just the once and then leave the responsibility up to me and Bryan.
Cooper has had ups and downs all week. Some vomiting, lack of appetite and , no sleep at night. As of today he is feeling pretty good. He is ready to go home as well as I.
I am thankful to every one that stayed with Cooper to let me have a break this week. Big thanks!
Jessica (Cooper’s Mom)
Cooper and I arrived at Scott and White at 9:30am Monday morning. The nurses accessed his port, which is never fun. His favorite phrase and the one that hurts me the most is “please, someone help me?!” It now takes at least two of us to hold him down. We then retreated back to our room. At noon we still had no word on our room being ready, so me and Cooper took a trip to the dining hall. We grabbed some salad for me and cereal for him. Around 2:15 we still had no room so the nurses proceeded with hooking him up to hydration. At 2:35 we were finally in our room. We decided to go to the playroom until the nurse had his i.v. ready for him. While in the playroom, I read a Silverstein book and Cooper played PS 2. Three o’clock rolls around and we are pushing his i.v pole through the playroom to continue playing Cars on the Playstation. Then Cooper finally has to pee. He head back to our room. After hours of hydration and peeing, its 10:30pm and we are finally starting chemo. We had a sleepless night all in all. Cooper wet the bed at least 3 times. Everytime a nurse would come in, Cooper would wake up. We were up bright and early.
Dr. Mulne came in early this morning to give us the bone marrow results. A dreadful NO change.I dont know how to react to this. I dont know whether I want to look on the bright side that he still has two rounds of chemo to go. Or look at it on the dim side. It should be gone by now! We have yet to harvest his stem cells for the transplant! We should have done this a month ago. Why is it taking so long?! All Dr. Mulne had to say was that Dr. Grayson was talking to Dr. Grimley in San Antonio. But what does this tell me?? It doesn’t tell me a darn thing. I want to know whats next. And obviously so does everyone else. I havent one clue.
The rest this afternoon, Cooper and I sat and twiddled our thumbs. Finally around 1ish, Joshua showed up. I left after having a short but informative conversation. I will be going back to the hospital tomorrow afternoon. I will keep everyone updated on how this round is treating Cooper.
-Jessica
Cooper goes in Thursday morning at 8am for his next bone marrow biopsy and MRI. The MRI will take about and hour so they will be sadating him. While he is still sadated they will then take him back to the main clinic to do his bone marrow biopsy. We should be there for most of the day. The longest part is waiting for him to wake up. Cooper will be sore afterwards, but I expect him back up and running around within a few hours. It will take a few days to get results back. I wont expect them back any earlier than Tuesday. I will post the results and our plans for the next round of chemo when I know them.
Please pray that his bone marrow has finally cleared. Cooper is over-due for his collections that needs to be done before he can have his transplant. Thanks to all that have supported us!
-Jessica (mom)
Coming into the new year, Cooper had a rough start. Eating was slim and so was he. He wouldnt get off the couch and ran a low grade fever for 2 days. He wasn’t sleeping.
Cooper had his last appointment of 2009 on new years eve. He was down to 30lbs and he needed two blood transfusions. Dr Grayson prescribed him a new pain medication. It’s stronger than the codien but not as strong as morphine. Dr Grayson and I talked about what the next few weeks would bring. Cooper will be getting another MRI and another bone marrow biopsy this week. Next week he will start round 5 of chemo. I will post the results as I know them. I have not heard officially what days we will be doing these tests.
As of today, Cooper is back up and running! He is eating like a champ and sleeping well at night. It is nice to see the color return to his face. All just in time for it to start all over again. I am praying that this time next year, Cooper will be clear of all cancer cells and pain. I hope that you all have a happy and healthy new year!
-Cooper’s MoM
Merry Christmas from our family to yours. We just wanted to say thank you for everyone in Cooper’s life who have offered their prayers for him. We are truly grateful to have this holiday season to celebrate with Cooper, and are so thankful for all the great results we are seeing from treatment.
A quick update on Coop:
Cooper did a straight 72 hours of chemo last week. He had to have a second IV put into his hand because he was on 3 different meds and one very large bag of hydration. Bryan and Jessica are now giving him his Neupogen shots at home. Cooper has been doing really good this round. No vomiting at home and eating plenty of Captain Crunch. 
We finally got his bone marrow results in. He is down to 5% of cancer cells on one side and 5-10% on the other side. As of today this means no collections for stem cell transplant this round. Nothing is set in stone though. Cooper was really excited for Santa to come and get lots of Thomas!
Thanks again to everyone, and Merry Christmas from our family to yours!
Shoot for Coop!
Shoot for Coop was a great success! We had 11 teams show up to play this last Saturday, thank you to all who braved the cold! With temperatures in the 40’s, everyone stuck it out and had a good time for Cooper’s sake. With a silent auction, and a live bake sale auction, we were able to raise nearly $3000 for Cooper.
Our friends at KCEN were there to cheer us on as well, and he was featured on their evening news cast. Click Here to watch!
Many thanks go to cousin Tonya – she gave up nearly three months of her own time every day to put this together, and it would not have happened without her determination to see it through. We all all looking forward to maybe doing it again…in warmer weather of course! 
Enjoy some pictures from that day here.
-Aunt Amanda
