The light is on the horizon: Day 1 of engraftment!

We woke to a jump in white blood cell counts including a "score" of 750 for her absolute neutrophil count (ANC) which needs to be over 500 and growing for 3 days! So today is considered day 1 of 3 before she will be considered engrafted. With this news comes pain relief for our little warrior. Needless to say, neither transplant round was a walk in the park and each had its tough moments, but because her pain from mucositis in her mouth was greater this go around, relief can't get here fast enough. She is perking up, feeling less pain, acting less irritable, and had her best night sleep in weeks last night. Therefore, as long as things keep going as expected we should be healing up nicely and begin to plan for discharge after another week (and maybe some change) here.

Charlotte will still remain is isolation, unfortunately. Once she is feeling well enough to want to run and play this will be tough but perhaps by then we can begin to use our "day passes" to leave the unit and she can have some freedom outside of these 4 walls. She continues to amaze us by her resiliency, strength of character, and loving attitude despite her pain. She is soldering forward. We are starting to plan for her next therapy, Proton Radiation, which will be up at Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia. They have called to begin scheduling this. I'll write more about this another day because we have received a new piece of information that goes along with CHOPs analysis of her disease that has been something a little difficult for us to process. Because I want to celebrate this moment today, I will write more about this new information another day. For now, we look to Charlotte's eminent  recovery peaking at us in the horizon. And with it, the likely hood of being outpatient for Christmas and maybe even the possibility of a Christmas at HOME together....but no matter where we are, our hopes are to have a peaceful Christmas together celebrating Jesus and all the miracles around us.

Grow cells grow. Her "button" for extra pain meds is next to her

Yucky

Sweet face...it'll be better soon baby.

Visit from Pops and Mimi. Thanks for her New nail polish kit!

Moments of play now

Painting our nails...again and again 😂

Wants to have a stack of gauze tissues and a spit bucket at all times 

Swollen from mucositis but mustering up a smile with Mr.. Brad who cared for her so we could all go to Parker's holiday concert at school

Hatching a baby duck from an egg today 

Evidence she is feeling better 

Pure exhaustion is when you just woke up after a nap at 5:30pm, woke with a pain filled crying fit, crawled out of bed into mummy's arms and fell back asleep 

Brian won't have his bald twin for long...we can see her hair growing back now! 

After Bath grin from over a week ago during a bout of feeling playful