16th August

 16th August 


The day had come, I'd been having nightmares all weekend, I wasn't sleeping thinking about the outcome of what the oncologist was going to say. I had looked up lots of things on the internet, which I should have learnt from last time not to do. 
We take a deep breathe and walk into his office. He explained to us that thankfully it wasn't cancer but a rare form of brain tumour, so we could relax at little but his tumour had come back. There was no way they would operate so our only choice was to give him Chemotherapy. I couldn't believe they were talking about my child, my gorgeous little 9 month old. Our lives were about to change, our routine was going to change and everything would be different. 
He would start off with intense chemo every week for ten weeks, and then it would get less frequent but more intense, he would probably be in hospital a lot and would need some platelet and or blood transfusions. 
We got designated a lovely nurse who we could contact if we had questions. After the appointment with the oncologist the nurse came and gave us all the paperwork we needed to sign, all the booklets we needed  to read and what our next steps were. He also asked us if we had a questions, he said to us this is tough, but we will get through it. I can safely say he is right, we are now half way through, the journey has been rough and very tough but we are doing it. He explained to us all about platelets what they do and what we need to look out for is his go low, as well as explaining all about his blood levels. 
We had a small get away planned to Bournemouth for a few days which they allowed us to go on. As after that everything would change. 
The holiday was bitter sweet, we had a really lovely time and the children loved every minute but we knew what was coming after. 
Zack's first step was to get his port,(this is a little tube inserted into his main vein near his heart where they will give him all his chemo)  which was a small operation, once that was done his chemo would start. I never in my life thought this would be me. Never my child. What do we tell the children? how do we get through all these appointments? 

After we came back from our mini break away we had another appointment to check Zacks hearing as chemo can affect his hearing. Before this appointment we took the children to GOSH, we explained to them that Zack was having special medicine to help him get better, and this is the hospital he would be having it in. They were amazing, and whilst the appointment was going on they got to play in the amazing Disney reef play area at GOSH. We then took them out for the afternoon to somewhere fun to take their minds off of everything. Children don't know how lucky they are, hopefully they won't remember much of this, but as adults we will always remember. 

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