Georgie’s Journey

 Yesterday George checked into the hospital and had his port removed. Let me say that again. George had his port removed. The lifeline that has assisted George through this whole transplant. His nurse and I were laughing yesterday saying that this might have been the hardest working port of all time. That port needs an award. MVP (most valuable port). Ports can go bad. Ports can get dislodged. Ports can become infected. George’s port never wavered. Never failed. Like our God. Never wavering. Never failing. It was a long day at the hospital. Especially long since George was unable to eat or drink anything. The child life specialist came through again with lots of distractions in the form of legos and games and art projects. While we will not miss spending long days at the hospital we will certainly miss our child life specialists. I think we need to hire one to move in with us. The timing of George having his port removed thanksgiving week sums up how we feel about this whole journey. T

 The week leading up to Halloween was very eventful in the Mitchell house. We got a call from Kate’s school that she was possibly exposed to Covid and so she needed to stay home from school all week. That same day she ended up having a fever. When Bowers came home from school that afternoon, she too had a fever. After I had picked Kate up from school we went straight to have Covid tests but the results would not be back for 48 hours. I thought we may actually have it since both girls had fevers. After I put George to sleep I noticed he was having a hard time breathing. He was so congested that it was waking him up each time he tried to take a breath. It was a very strange and unfamiliar sound that he was making as he tried to breath. We took his temperature and sure enough he had a 101 temp. I called the on call hematologist and they said take him in to the ER. When we woke him he was complaining that his stomach hurt. I assumed this was actually his chest hurting and him just describi

 Last month at George’s check up his labs came back with rock star counts. His hemoglobin was up to 11.8. His platelets were in the upper 200’s. His ANC was sky high. This was all so encouraging considering he had begun the taper of his daily oral chemo. The reason that he was still on this was to make sure the anemia didn’t get out of control. Well guess what? We went back in for labs today and his counts stayed high. George will no longer have to take his daily chemo anymore. You heard me right. He is through with his chemo. Oh how I have longed for this day. Oh how I have prayed for this to happen. This is the best news. This means that his anemia is finally under control. Praise the Lord. Hallelujah. What a blessing. I am not saying that I didn’t trust that this day would come but I am going to admit to having some doubts that this day would ever be here. I had accepted that this may just be a part of his life now. One of the many side effects that having a bone marrow transplant h

 We went in for George’s MRI and Bone Marrow aspiration a few weeks ago. All went pretty well until he came out of anesthesia. He was so upset that they had to call me back to the recovery area to help. I couldn’t calm him down either so what do you do then? Well you put him back under. Yep, the anesthesiologist came in the room after hearing the screams from down the hall and juiced him back up. When he woke up from the second round he was still upset, but not in an all out frenzy. He has always had a rough time waking up from anesthesia but now that he is a head strong 3 year old he is really fun to deal with post procedure. We got the results back last week from those tests and his bone marrow looked wonderful and was as perfect as a perfectly healthy child’s would look. Wow is this amazing news. It is as if he was born disease free. Let that sink in for a minute. God, you are good. His results from his MRI came back with some other wonderful news. NO IRON BUILDUP!! His body got rid

 August 6th marks one year since George’s transplant. His new blood was administered to him the morning of August 6th, 2019 at 10:30 in the morning. It was a day we had been planning and anticipating for almost 2 years. I remember when the nurses walked into the room with the bag full of Kate’s bone marrow there being  a quiet peace. I was so nervous leading up to this moment. They told me that once George got his new marrow he could have seizures, violent shaking, and a spiked fever. Leading up to the moment they walked in the room I was extremely anxious thinking about this. The fear left the room like a passing breeze. One of the nurses asked if I wanted to pray over the marrow before they started. My answer was no. I had been praying for this moment for the past two years. Every day. Multiple times a day. The moment was here. I knew God had this covered. We held George, played worship music and prayed for the few hours it took to administer it. There was not one seizure. There was

I always wanted twins. Twins run in my moms family so I somewhat imagined it might actually happen. What I did not imagine was it happening at the ripe old age of 42.  They may not have shared a womb or even been born in the same year but Kate and George are officially twins. 100% engraftment! George’s transplant was a complete success. They are identical twins in every way internally. They share the exact same DNA. Our second child literally saved our third child’s life and now they will forever have a bond that only identical twins share. People may not have chosen this path to get twins and frankly I wouldn’t have either but I would not change even a second of any of it. Because of the blessing of George’s disease we have become a closer family. We have become closer with both old and new friends. We have met so many amazing people. We have experienced so many wonderful things. But most importantly we have grown closer to God. I did not know that I needed all of this in my life, but