Tanner's white blood count was .64 on today's report so he definitely can't go out in public right now. Hopefully, these will be his lowest numbers and he will start to rise from here. I definitely don't think he will be released in the next couple of days - but I do think we will be home some time within this next week.

We go tomorrow at 8:30 a.m. for his labwork, the new cast at 10:00 a.m., and then to see Dr. Barlogie at 11:30 a.m. It took quite a while when they put the last cast on so I'm hoping we won't run late to the doctor's appointment (though we nearly always have to wait 1 - 2 hours when we go to the doctor's office).

I'm kind of dreading the cast appointment. The last time they put a cast on, they had to squeeze on his leg where the break is to keep the fracture aligned and it hurt him so much he was in tears. I just hate to see him go through that pain again - especially since they are putting on another long cast and it feels almost like he hasn't made any progress at all after six months of living in a full cast.

When he first broke his leg in June, we never dreamed he would have to go through all the treatment that has entailed since then. We sat in the emergency room that night and for all we knew it was a simple broken leg and then the doctor walked in and said those words that started our lives on a different course, "there's a tumor in his bone".

You go along living your life day after day, never considering that it could all change in an instant and then something like this comes along and smacks you in the face and you realize that your life is forever changed.

Tanner has had the best attitude through all of this. You couldn't ask for anyone to have a better attitude than he has since he was first diagnosed - but he's come to a point here six months later that you can tell he's getting tired.

If Dr. B tells him tomorrow he has to have another round of consolidation chemo, Tanner said he's going to ask him if he can have at least two months to just "recover" and live at home before he has to go through any more treatment. I just hope he handles it okay if Dr. Barlogie tells him he needs to go ahead with another chemo round without delay.

I tried to tell him he could look at it two ways, if the doctor says he can have a two month break then he will get a nice long rest, but if he tells him he needs to go ahead with the chemo as soon as possible, then he will be getting the last of the chemo behind him so that he can go on with his life. He didn't seem to think much of my reasoning.