A meeting with the surgeon

We went to Doc R's office today so he could have a first hand look at Alan. He also wanted to talk to us about the deliberations of the tumor board last Friday. We were hoping that the tumor could be easily removed, but besides still being heavily involved with his hip bone, there are also a lot of nerves in the area they would rather not mess with if there was a better option.

The docs obviously have access to more research on Infantile Fibrosarcoma than we do. In our limited research, most cases we read about talked primarily about surgical resection as treatment, so in our minds, that was always the goal. There was also that very primal wish to get that )#$(%&@&* thing out of our baby boy.

However, in looking at other cases of Alan's type of cancer, the docs have noted that there were many cases that were treated only with chemotherapy, or with chemotherapy then surgery that had to leave some of the tumor behind (a positive margin). In these cases, the kids were healthy and cancer-free even years later.

The bottom line is that the plan for Alan's treatment is still fluid. We will complete the chemotherapy and scan again. There may be more chemo after, or exploratory surgery where only the easily accessed bulk of the mass is removed. It's hard not knowing what and when, but we're greatful that the tumor is responding to the treatment and that Alan is feeling good, eating and playing.

This morning we had oatmeal pancakes (I picked up a mix on a shopping trip to Williams-Sonoma with a fellow cancer mommy). Alan loved them so much that he was grabbing them out of Kevin's hand! Like the fig newtons, the pancakes made a big mess, but at 240 calories a pancake, who cares! This weekend Alan started climbing down the stairs as well as going up, not to mention getting up on the bed for snacks and scrambling up onto the sofa to peek over the edge. Messy monkey - he's driving us crazy, but it's the best kind of crazy!