Category Archives: Christian’s Story

St George’s

February 28, 2007 by Peter · Leave a comment

Christian’s Hickman line is red and sore, it is probably infected so we have brought him to St George’s. He is in good nature but is neutrapenic and his Hemoglobin levels are low so they have put him on antibiotics and he is going to have a blood transfusion.

If he remains happy and doesn’t spike a temperature we hope to take him home tomorrow.

St George’s have set up a credit card payment site for the Christian Blandford fund. If you wish to sponsor or have already pledged this is an efficient way to pay, they only charge 3% as opposed to the 10% justgiving charge.

If you forward me your confirmation e-mail from the donation I’ll be able to keep tally of what we have raised and I’ll add your name to list of generous donors.

Thanks again to all those who have sponsored so far, we are over the moon with how it’s going.

Finally I’ll leave you with the question, “Is the world ready for another super-hero?”

KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

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Home

February 12, 2007 by Peter · Leave a comment

Christian came home on Thursday and has had a good weekend at home. He’s back for chemo at the Royal Marsden, this Thursday, Friday and Saturday. It is the one that needs him to stay in overnight for so Claudia will be in Thursday night and I’ll do Friday night.

The run is going fantastically well. I have ordered 150 T-shirts with a nice design on the back and have assumed everybody who is running will want one. I’d like to thank Jonathan Cook for his help in designing the T-shirt. Jon has also volunteered to come and take photographs on the day. So make sure you’re looking good as you cross the finish line…

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Still at St George’s

February 6, 2007 by Peter · Leave a comment

TWe were hoping to come home today but Christian isn’t well enough. He still has a slight temperature and his blood counts are low. He had a platelets transfusion and had a bad reaction to it which made him itchy and uncomfortable, He’s been given piriton which seems to have worked and is now sleeping peacefully.

I got an E-mail today from the organiser of the run and there are only 100 places left. So if you wish to run and have not entered yet please do so now.

Could you please tell me if you have entered and are raising money. All the people I know about are also listed on this page.

If you are planning on sponsoring and haven’t done so already please send me a pledge by e-mail, I’ll chase up payment out later! Again all the sponsors I know about are listed in the yellow box on the right.

If you are not running please consider coming along on the 4th March and cheering us all on. It should be great fun day out.

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St George’s

February 5, 2007 by Peter · Leave a comment

Christian has been on very good form for the last couple of weeks. On Wednesday he even went into nursery for the morning, they have made of photo montage for the wall of his day in!

The last few days he has had a bit of a cold and his temperature spiked to 38.5 on Saturday afternoon. Because it was a week after chemo we had to assume he was neutrapenic and took him down to St George’s. One of the children at nursery came down with Chickenpox later in the week so Christian had to have an injection to protect him as, even though he has already had Chickenpox, the chemo will have killed his resistance to it.

He has probably got a viral cold which is relatively harmless, but they have to follow protocol and treat it as an antibacterial infection. He is on intravenous antibiotics and they will keep him in for 48 hours while they try and grow cultures on a blood sample. If nothing is grown in that time and he doesn’t get another temperature and he seems well in himself, he will probably be allowed home.

Danny, Claudia’s sister, took some photos of Christian last week while he was having his stem cell harvest. Here is one…

stem cell

Dans is off to Montenegro to turn around the local property market. Our boys are really going to miss her. Here she is doing what she does best, making them laugh and spoiling them rotten…

KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

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Stem Cell Harvest

January 24, 2007 by Peter · Leave a comment

Claudia and Christian came home from the Royal Marsden today. Christian had a stem cell harvest done yesterday which went well, they got all they needed in one day, not two. He had a vascath fitted, which is a special line for the blood but that has already been removed. He is due for chemo and will be back at the Marsden tomorrow, Friday and Saturday as an outpatient. Once this is done we will be half way through this stage of the treatment.

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Scan Results

January 18, 2007 by Peter · Leave a comment

KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

Christian had a temperature on Tuesday so we have spent the last couple of days at St. George’s. It looks like it was an infection in his leg that caused the temperature. He has been on intravenous antibiotics which have done the trick and has been allowed home today. He will need to continue the course of antibiotics until next week but, as it’s a once a day dose, it can be given by the community nurses at home.

The bone scan which was due tomorrow was brought forward to today and he and I were taken down to the Royal Marsden for it by ambulance. It was very exciting for both of us…

We are seeing Kathy Pritchard Jones tomorrow to discuss his treatment and get the results of the bone scan. Kathy did pop into the radiology department this afternoon and at first glance, the scans looked good with no sign of the cancer spreading and a good reaction to the chemo so far. Good news at last…

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Stem Cell Harvest

January 15, 2007 by Peter · Leave a comment

Christian needs to have a stem cell harvest next week. It will involve him going into The Royal Marsden for a couple of days where he will get a new line fitted, unfortunately the Hickman Line will not work for this. They will take blood and draw stem cells which will then be frozen. Stem cells are special cells that can develop into either red cells, white cells or platelets and are normally produced by the bone marrow. When Christian has intensive chemotherapy in a few weeks he will not be able to produce any stem cells and they will use what they harvest next week. He should be in hospital for a couple of days.

At the moment he is in pretty good form and seems to have reacted better to the last dose of chemotherapy than the first. His mouth is getting sore which could be a sign that he is developing mucositis, this is when the lining of the digestive system becomes inflamed, a common symptom of chemotherapy. His leg pains seem to have also got more frequent recently. We have an appointment with Kathy Pritchard Jones on Friday so we can discuss some of these issues with her. They are trying to fit him in for a bone scan and an x-ray for Friday too.

The line up for the 10km run is looking good. Thanks very much to all those who have offered to sponsor so far and those who have are joining in. Even if you are not running please put a note in the diary and come along and cheer everybody along. All the team will have the same T-shirts so we should be easy to spot…

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Message From Claudia

January 7, 2007 by Claudia · Leave a comment

7th January 2007

Claudia here! Peter has instructed me to write the latest update so please bare with me as I am under a lot of pressure to live up to the usual high standards! Christian was fine over New Year, if a bit tired and emotional (or was that me?!). His Hickman Line is working fine now, and after a couple of transfusions (platelet and blood) he was fit enough to go in for his chemo at the Royal Marsden on Tuesday January 2nd as an in patient for three days. This all went as normal and Christian was on pretty good form, until we went to leave on Thursday and he promptly threw up everywhere. I was worried they might want to keep us in, but he seemed fine after that so we were allowed to leave. He was sick again in the night, but since then the various anti-nausea drugs they gave us seem to have kicked in. For now he seems in good spirits and even wolfed down a massive plate of spaghetti with grated cheese followed by 2 yogurts for his tea – a proud mum moment so I asked Pete to take a photo of it!

KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

As Pete mentioned in his e-mail he is arranging a 10K run on Sunday 4th March in Battersea. PLEASE do sign up for it – Even I am going to give it a go! All money raised goes towards the “St. George’s Charitable Foundation – Christian Blandford Paediatric Fund”. I can not tell you how much we (and other families) have benefited from the money that was raised in 2005 by all of you. The Pinkney Ward is now so much more comfortable! So, if like us you over indulged in too much food and wine over Christmas get your running kit on and start training!! Obviously no pressure, but you know our son is ill……………….

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Christmas 2006

December 30, 2006 by Peter · Leave a comment

30th December 2006

Fortunately, Christmas was fairly peaceful. We had to visit the hospital every day in the morning to get some GCSF but that was much better than the 3 visits a day it looked at one point that we would be making. Christian’s hair started to fall out so we had to give him a haircut which he was a bit upset about. It didn’t seem to help when we told him that it looked like Daddy’s hair now. I can’t say I blame him. He still looks gorgeous though…

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Christmas Eve 2006

December 24, 2006 by Peter · Leave a comment

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We have been in and out of St. George’s for the last few days getting antibiotics for Christian. He has also had GCSF to boost his neutrophils and a platelet transfusion as they were very low. The last couple of nights we have brought him home to sleep and yesterday he was home most of the day, returning to the hospital three times for his antibiotics. He had the last dose of that this morning and we are waiting to see what his blood results are to see whether he needs more GCSF.

Nanny and Grandad (June and Sandy) were here yesterday and the boys got their presents. Henry and I have been playing scalextrix all morning and Christian is very excited about his pink dancing car! it could be worse Danny was threatening me with buying him a pink fairy costume…

Merry Christmas from all of us and thank you for all of your support over the last few weeks. It really has made a massive difference.

 

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