Dear Family and Friends,
The past month has been a busy one for the Hantske family. Amelia's treatment continues as planned and she is handling it well. Let me update you.
The immunotherapy during the period 18 through 28 November at Sloan-Kettering went well. It is not a pleasant process as there is nerve pain involved during antibody injection. To handle that, Amelia receives morphine during treatment, but there is lingering muscle pain afterwards. The daily routine is to go to the hospital, receive treatment over about a four hour period, and then return to Ronald McDonald House for the rest of the day. Not fun for anyone, but tolerable.
We took Kathryn and Benjamin up on the 26th to spend Thanksgiving with Amelia and Allison. No treatment on Thanksgiving, so Mayor Bloomberg arranged for comfortable viewing of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade from the Olive Garden restaurant on Times Square for all of the families staying at Ronald McDonald House. Everyone had a good time and Amelia met the Mayor.
The 28th was the last day of treatment so we returned to Annapolis that night with everyone. The Hantske family was all together at last, for a couple of weeks, with intermittent visits to Johns Hopkins. The attached picture is from the first snowfall of the season on 7 December.
On 13 December Robert drove the family to New York, returning the next day with Kathryn and Benjamin. On the 15th Amelia had bone marrow biopsies conducted and was marked up in preparation for radiation therapy that started on the 17th. She'll have seven days of that, two sessions a day, weekends and Christmas excluded. Then after a weekend of rest, the second session of immunotherapy starts on the 29th. It will run through 9 January, followed by a three week break. Robert and the children will head up to New York next Wednesday to spend Christmas Day with Amelia and Allison.
Present plans, always subject to change, call for a return to Sloan-Kettering on 1 February for round three of immunotherapy during the period 2 through 13 February, with round four running 8 through 19 March.
It has been a busy 2003. For those of you that did not receive all of our Amelia Reports during the year (this is number 15) and want to see what you may have missed, they are all available at http://home.comcast.net/~tpdugan/ We're looking forward to things slowing down a bit in 2004. We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Thanks for your continued prayers and support.
