Payton's Place

Welcome to Payton's webpage. It has been provided to keep friends and family updated about Payton and her progress in life. Payton was diagnosed with stage IV neuroblastoma in July of 2001. She had just celebrated her 1st birthday when she was diagnosed. She completed the N8 protocol at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City. Today Payton shows no evidence of disease and has been this way since January 2002. Payton is as normal a kid as any other and enjoys life to the fullest. She is also a proud big sister to Madison and Ethan. We are so happy to have a healthy family. Thank you for visiting our family.

Here is a quote from the First Lady, Laura Bush. Mrs. Bush was the keynote speaker at The Gold Ribbon days on Capitol Hill in September 2003. President Bush lost his sister to Leukemia in the 1950's when she was just three years old and he was 10. This is such a wonderful quote and I can only hope Mrs. Bush will continue to support Childhood Cancer Awareness.
During her remarks, Mrs. Bush said, "I'm wearing my gold ribbon because I believe that together we can find a cure for every child with cancer. There are many personal stories of triumph and tragedy. When told together in one voice, these stories become lessons for us all in courage and hope. By sharing your story you show the world that children with cancer are not statistics - but young people with hope, passion, and purpose."

Journal

Wednesday, June 18, 2008 3:18 PM CDT

WOW! Once again it has been some time since I last visited the site and made an entry. Life continues to be great and the kids continue to amaze us daily! Payton and Madison both finished up school a few weeks ago and now we are just hanging out and enjoying the freedoms of summer. We have not done much today just lounging about the house but we have had several playdates this summer with our friends and we are just enjoying the freedoms we have!

Payton went to NY last week for her one year check up and all looked good. Her kidney is functioning the same as it has been for 5 years now so we were happy to hear the Dr. L does not want her to have another renal scan for 2 years! AMAZING!!! We met with Dr. Sklar as well while we were there and he said she looks great and is growing as she should be so we don't need to see him for another year! So we are free from appointments for a while. We will need to see the orthodontist this summer and a dermetologist to have a wart removed but no real cancer appointments are in the near future. Next year when we return to NY they will begin the testing to look for signs of puberty. It may take a few years to know what her body will do but we are looking for some hormone spikes and then responses to see if she will go through puberty on her own. If they feel that her body is not responding properly then we will induce her puberty with hormone therapy. Basically in order to watch her properly we will need to start going to NY every six months to meet with Dr. Sklar instead of yearly. We have always known this was coming so it was not a big shock to learn that this was the last time that we would have a year between visits. I am just happy that we have managed to only go once a year for the last three years! :)

Madison will be going to 1st grade in the fall and is getting SO big! She is bigger than Miss Payton and LOVES to throw that around whenever she gets the chance!!! She is just so pretty, if I do say so myself and is currently missing both her front teeth, one of my favorite stages! She lost them in the spring and they still have not come in so I am enjoying months of toothless grins! SO CUTE!!! She is such a good kid, she causes me some problems on occasion with her competiveness with the other two but that is to be expected. Truly she is a great kid she just likes to test her limits and see what she can get away with! I'll have to watch her as a teenager I am sure!!! :)

Ethan is Mr. Happy and also getting way too big! He has great hair and an awesome personality that makes you can't help but smile when you are around him. He takes such great joy out of life! He will be going to a 3 year old preschool program in the fall. I will miss my little buddy I am sure!

Rob and I are doing great. Of course, we stay rather busy with the kids but life is good and we can't complain too much!

Thanks for checking in. I'll update again soon and I will try to get some new pictures up in the next day or so as these pictures are almost and year old and we have grown and changed so much since then!

Rob, Gin, Payton, Madison and Ethan

Read Journal History

Hospital Information:

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

NY, NY 10021
12126395948(Day Clinic number)

Links:

E-mail Author: vbogert@cfl.rr.com

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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.