Dejah's Smile !

Here in Dejah's journal you will read an amazing story of a courageous little four year old and the mountains that he has climbed on his journey to being healthy again.
We created Dejah's Journal to keep family and friends informed of Dejah's treatments and progress as well as a writen journal for ourselves to remember always what a brave little soldier Dejah is each and every day! Please don't forget to say "Hello" in the guest book while you're visiting.

Dec 31st 2003...Dejah was diagnosed with Wilm's Tumour, (stage III) Chemotherapy treatments began Jan 4th, 2004.
March 30, 2004...Surgery (11 hours)to remove the tumour & left kidney. Dejah had a 12 day recovery (5 days in ICU)in hospital. A whole new 34 week chemotherapy protocol began, starting with 11 days of radiation therapy.



July 2007...Wilm's Tumor Relapse
A second journey begins.....
Sept. 5th, 2007 Stem Cell Harvesting
Sept. 24th, 2007 Dr. Blair performs his magic with more surgery...5 days in hospital.
Oct 29th-Nov 14th, 2007 Radiation daily to abdomen and surrounding area.
March 4th, 2008 Mega-Therapy begins with Stem Cell Transplant on day 8.

Journal

Sunday, January 25, 2009 8:31 PM CST

Well I rec'd an email today that has prompted me to write here in Dejah's journal. You see, I am now a Facebook Addict and do all my updating there, sorry :-)

So first off Happy new Year!!!!!
Christmas was wonderful here, quiet yet exciting, lazy yet we did alot! We had snow for the first time in like 25 years and we got alot! It was amazing white fluffy stuff that we could play in and tobogan in and build the best snowmen with! It was fantastic....till we had to drive. Vancouver is not equiped nor ready for the snowfall we had, so ICBC is pretty busy and we did alot of walking.

Dejah is in a skating class called Intro to Hockey. He couldn't be happier! They will actually be playing some hockey games over Spring Break in a tournament, so they have been playing games in class after their skills training. They have also been invited to play during intermission of a Giants Game (Vancouver's AA) so he is very pumped about that.

School is going well, he is keeping up with his peers despite missing the entire 2nd grade. He enjoys it all for the most, just really hard to get him out of bed and going each morning! He has wonderful teachers and his vice pricipal will now be teaching his class on Mon-Tues, he's happy about that, Mr. Hutchison is great!

He was having some leg pain again after our November 'wellness' check with oncology. Sometimes a dull ache and sometimes severe pain where he would scream for hours. It took awhile, but we finally got in for another ultrasound. They did a very thorough job and we were happy. It showed a couple of blockages near his groing where they had to put the central line in/where the initail blood clot occurred, but the blood is still flowing nicely at 60-70o they said there is no need to worry. But...that shouldn't be causing pain, so we will do a bone scan in the next 2 weeks to prove that there is nothing wrong!!!

We often wonder when Dejah can have something wrong and we won't panic and think the cancer is back. I'm afraid that we probably will never get to do that...it's been here, it's come twice and we were told 70hance of yet more. So we try to be normal. I know I'm not very good at it at times. I panic easily, I get frustrated and angry easily, but I do try to hide it from the rest of the world. I talk often with Tracy (Emma's Mom), we understand each other inside and out, we do cuz we've both been there...they are still there, and it sucks big time!!! We don't talk alot to others cuz we don't want to sound so sad and whiney, but alas we are sad and we do whine and we reach out to each other.

I also keep myself busy. I've gone back to work part time and I'm fundraising like crazy for The Michael Cuccione Foundation...and anything else I can do at school and for others, I do it! Right now we are working on the Skate For A Cure at GM Place. We have a web page on www.skateforacure.com if you wish to sponsor Dejah as he raises money for childhppd cancer research and his chance to skate on the Canucks Ice, meet Taylor Pyatt and attend the festivities for the day. He wants to win the prize of a ride on the zambonie and/or to stand on the ice with the Canucks during the National Anthem...ohhh, I get goose bumps when I think how thrilling that would be for him! We have all become very close with the Cuccione Family and I am volunteering that day, so I have been asking for and collecting donations for Silent Auction...it has been going nicely :-)

It is the kids birthdays on the 2nd (Rayne-14yrs) and 4th (Dejah-9yrs) so we have a very busy next couple of weeks with dinners, work, school, parties, snowboarding and the Skate. Exciting busy is good!

Rayne has been snowboarding every Friday at Cypress Mountain with her classmates. They take a bus there and back and have 3-4 hours on the hill with lessons and free time. She absolutely loves it. So Uncle Bruce is taking her to Whistler on the 6th. She is so excited! She is also still tapping, we had the opertunity to watch her class just before Xmas...she's fantastic! We look forward to the year end show when we will get to see it all.

Rayne had a very nasty bout with the flu, she was down and out from Friday night until Thursday morning...she's still not 100ut she didn't want to miss boarding so she went to class. She is my "well child" so it was hard to see her so sick...but I have to admit I loved all the cuddles and the Mommy lay with me askings...I don't get those anymore, so I took it all in while I could!

I hope I have caught you all up to date and I'll try to write here more often and will definately post after the bone scan is done.

Love to you all...don't forget to sign the guest book so we know you were visiting :-)

Oh...and it's not too late to get a Kourageous Kids Calendar, they are just $10 each and all money goes to support families going thru treatments with their children. I'll pop one in the mail for you...just ask!

www.skateforacure.com
www.childhoodcancerresearch.org
www.caringbridge.prg/visit/emmasheepwash
www.baldingfordollars.com

Read Journal History

Hospital Information:

B.C. Children's Hospital
4500 Oak Street
Vancouver, BC

Links:

E-mail Author: gbrd4@shaw.ca

Note: The foregoing information was authored by the patient, parent or guardian, or other parties who are solely responsible for the content. Such announcements or their content are not necessarily endorsed by CaringBridge, Inc. or any sponsoring agent.  This information does not confirm that anyone is or was actually a patient at any facility.