Wednesday, April 23, 2003

Wednesday, April 23, 2003 9:45 PM CDT

Susan here...

Today Nathan went to the clinic. His blood counts are still not up much. He still has no immunity right now. We were pretty disappointed because we are ready for him to feel better. He did have a bit more active day today and was pretty interactive with us. Tomorrow he will get platelets. They would have liked to do them this afternoon but we feel that one trip to the clinic a day is more than enough for him. Platelets only take about a half hour to infuse so he won't be there for too long. He gained another 1/2 pound on the TPN and is back around 30 pounds.

Many of you are asking about blood donation. It is not possible for anyone out of town to be a direct donor to Nathan. We had the opportunity to donate to him directly but with the amount of blood he is using we decided not to bother. So basically we just ask that if you desire, you donate blood in your community knowing it may help some other child in need. Those of you who live in Colorado Springs can go to Memorial Hospital and tell then you are donating blood in Nathan's name and I believe they make note of it and send us a card or something. Thank you all so much for your generous offers in this matter. The blood he is getting is making him able to fight this disease.

Nathan helped me make oatmeal cookies today. Cooking is the one activity that he really gets excited to do and he jumps right off the couch and walks into the kitchen. He still isn't eating but he was anxious to give a cookie to Julia to eat as soon as they were ready. Even making toast excites him so we are trying to let him do as much of that sort of thing as he wants. It will be even better when he is eating, but maybe he won't be as fascinated with cooking then.