Excellent News!!

Remington has just completed his 6 month scans. He had a CT scan as well as the high contrast bone scan. Everything is nice and clear! Dr. Barnette is so happy with Remington's scans that he is wanting to remove Remi's port-a-cath. This is a major milestone in Remi's treatment plan. If the Dr. had any concerns about Remi's prognosis he would want to leave the catheter in place until he felt sure. Now the big issue will be convincing Remington to go into surgery one last time to get it removed! He is not going to like this at all. But, it is one less thing to have to worry about.... If you keep your ears open, you will probably hear Remington holler from the other side of the ocean.

REMI IS DONE !!!!!!!!!!

November 23rd 2009 will be a permanently remembered date in our family now. Yesterday afternoon Remington completed his last treatment of radiation therapy! His cancer treatment is now complete. He will have annual scans and check ups for the next few years, but for all intents and purposes he has completed this adventure. It has been a long and difficult journey for Remington and the family this year. It actually feels a little strange not having to schedule and plan on getting Remi up to the hospital for treatment. The family is going to have to learn a new schedule again. I am OK with that!!
We had a special event last night for Remington, the Make A Wish Foundation had Remi's star raising ceremony at the Murray office. We invited friends and family down to participate and celebrate with us. It was extra special for us because he not only had his wish granted but completed treatment the same day!!
Thank you for everyone that has been there with help, hope and prayers. It made all the difference in the world for Remington as well as the family. You are all a part of our lives now.
May you all be as blessed as we have been. Happy Thanksgiving.

God Bless You All!!
With love,
Elijah, Shilo, Samara and Remington Jackson

Chemo is done!!!

The heading says it all! Remington completed his last chemo treatment on Friday afternoon! The nurses and doctors got together and celebrated with Remi. It was pretty cool. He had a banner hanging on the wall that said "Happy last chemo Remington". The charge nurse also brought in a big goody basket filled with toys and books. We have now completed one more step in this little adventure.
Now if Remi stays on schedule and does not get sick or delay his radiation treatments, he will complete his total cancer treatment on the 19th of November. That would be the ultimate Thanksgiving miracle for our family. It will be almost exactly one year since he was diagnosed with his sarcoma. Thank you for all of your prayers and thoughts during this time. It really has made a difference. Bless you all.

New activities

Hello to all-
For the past month we have been a bit of a holding pattern with Remington. He has had a round of chemo and has started radiation therapy up at the Huntsman Cancer institute. Remi will complete the first phase of radiation therapy this Thursday if he stays on schedule. This is the broad beam therapy that is covering the whole left side of his chest. The next step will be narrow beam radiation focused on the surgery and tumor sites. (This will last for 20 treatments.) During this time Remi will have to complete one last round of chemo therapy. If he stays of schedule, he will be completely done on the 2oth of November. It will be almost exactly one year from the time he was diagnosed with ewings sarcoma to the time his treatment is completed!
So far Remi has not had any major side effects from the radiation treatments. The most common side effects are fatigue and the skin at the treatment site turning red like a sunburn. So far we have seen little of either side effect. Thank you for all of your support during this time in our lives.

Good results so far

Hello everyone!
Remi just finished his 5 day course of chemo this week. He is doing very well. He has had very few side effects. The only issue he has had is some nausea. It was pretty mild, but did keep him from sleeping the other night. Remington is not losing his hair as of right now. It actually looks a little strange seeing him with hair after all of this time.
We are scheduled to meet with the radiologist on the 25th of this month. We will have a much better idea of how much longer Remington's treatment is going to be. Our hope is to have him back on a regular schedule and in school by the new year. We will have to see what happens....
Only 2 more rounds of chemo to go!!! It is nice to finally see a light at the end of this very long dark tunnel.

Latest news

Remington is doing excellent! He is scheduled to start chemotherapy again on Monday the 17th. The good news is he will not have to spend any nights in the hospital as long as he has no reactions or problems.. the rest of his treatments will be outpatient treatments from the infusion lab. We have a meeting scheduled with the Huntsman Cancer Institute to meet with Dr. Million. She will let us know what the proposed radiation treatment is going to be.
Remi is healing so well that most people do not even know he had surgery less than a month ago. It is to the point that Remi forgets and tries to climb or pick something up and his body reminds him that he is still healing from surgery.
Last weekend we participated in an event called Survivors at the Summit. It was a fundraiser for the Cancer Wellness House here in Salt Lake City. Kim and Jon Paulding as well as Shilo and I hiked from the tram at Snowbird up to the summit. It was a climb of 3000 vertical feet over a 3 mile hike. We started at 8000 feet and completed the hike at 11000 feet. Remi and his friends rode the tram up and met us at the summit. They had prayer flags set up all over the top, musical groups performing and had several cancer survivors speak. It was beautiful and cold! Remington did need to wear oxygen while he was at the summit, but that was the only issue he had. We then rode the tram back down to the plaza. It was quite fun. It was nice to meet other families and friends of cancer survivors.

A new development

Remington came home last night!! This little event surprised everyone. The Oncology surgeon walked into the room yesterday afternoon and started talking about sending Remi home. They are very pleased and surprised by Remington's recovery. (They say he makes it look easy.) We are a good solid week ahead of what the doctors were anticipating for Remington's recovery period before coming home.
Remi still has a feeding tube and an oxygen hose connected, everything else has been removed. The doctors will remove his feeding tube as soon as he starts eating regularly and he mainly needs the oxygen at night when he is sleeping. Remi is still pretty sore and is having to use a walker to get around a majority of the time but, he is doing all of this moving by himself. Now his only requirements are to eat, breathe,walk and heal. The doctors will be meeting to determine the next steps in Remington's treatment. He will have 4 to 6 weeks to heal, then he will be completing Chemotherapy (about 4 more rounds we think). After that it is possibly Radiation therapy up at the Huntsman Cancer Center. Dr. Barnette wil be meeting with the Radiologist soon to obtain his opinion. Hopefully it will be very quiet and calm for the next little while around here. We will post any news we get. Thank you everyone. Take care and God bless you all.