Bloody Platelets....

As mentioned in our last update, Saskia received her fourth treatment on Friday 27 December through to Sunday 29 December. Her platelet count was still very low (32 in stead of the required 75), so she received half dose of chemo only, which made her feel not too bad. Saskia knew that if she did not manage to eat or drink anything, she would have to stay longer in hospital, so she did everything possible to make sure she did eat and drink something. At least she felt realy great for the New Years Eve party at our place.
However the platelet count remains a major issue. On 31 December her counts were 25 and was told to be careful and not bump into anything. Now being Saskia and fed up with all the restrictions she has, she "forgot" about that and climed into the rope swing we have. After several swings obviously she knocked herself against the tree, hereby bruising most parts of both her legs.  On 2 January we went back for another blood check and her platelet count was only 9, which required her to have a transfusion. Obviously the doctors were not to happy with all the bruising and gave her once again a little lecture of what could happen if the bruising was not on her legs, but for example in her head.

Saskia took the advice to heart and tried her very best to not harm herself again. However..... She stayed over at a friends place on Saturday night and realy behaved very well. They stayed indoors, watched movies, played games, shared photo's on ipads, ipods, etc. All went well untill her ipad slipped out of the cover and knocked one of her teeth through her lip. The photo here is the one she sent us Sunday morning, which woke us up realy quick.
It clearly showed that her platelets were realy down and back to hospital it was, where it turned out that her count was only 8...
She got another transfusion and luckily her face looks much better now. Also Saskia is well aware of what the function of platelets is now.

The doctors still do not realy know why her bonemarrow just doesn't make sufficient platelets. Our initial scare that it was a secondary cancer (which is likely with her treatment) which caused this "malfunctioning", was luckily ungrounded. It is possible that her bonemarrow is permanently damaged and is in need for a stemcell treatment. Luckily at the start of her treatment (after the first chemo session), there were sufficient quantities of stem cells harvested, so this is all possible. We hopefully know more over the course of the next week or so.

Her next treatment is at this stage scheduled for 16 January (straight after her 12th birthday). This treatment will be the same one as treatment number 3, which means a full week in hospital and feeling very, very sick.
But we do enjoy the in-between times, even with all the bruising...