About Cole

2-21-12 9 Days

2012-02-21T23:35:00.001-08:00

So anyways, like I was saying….I am now over half way to seventy. During the first third of my life I have figured some stuff out that might help each of you. First, an indictment is not a conviction. Second, vodka goes very well with cranberry juice and ice. Third, cancer can be defeated.

With that in mind, I have a bone to pick with a certain Mr. Cole. You see, he keeps on not having any adverse issues. Thus I keep having less and less medical related stress. As a result, I find my self less and less inclined to write.

That being said, I suppose I am happy that he is doing so well (irregardless of the fact that he gives me no writing material). Immunotherapy is done, and we are just finishing up the program with medications at home. He will be done with all of this by mid March, and then the big decisions will be made regarding the next step. My vote is that the next step is to not have cancer any more.

We do have some big news on the education front. Cole has been accepted to, and today was formally admitted to (as a note any medical professional who has not yet recommended that Cole start back up at school yet should please not read this paragraph) the prestigious Allen School. He was heavily recruited and has received a full ride scholarship. I cannot tell you how relieved I am that I do not have to pay for him to go to this school, because that would be kind of ridiculous.

I have some other business that needs to be taken care of. Since Cole has decided to no longer provide me with stress induced writing material (as Jar Jar would say, “how woood”), I think that this blog is going to expand its mission.

As many of you know, Elisa is going to have BBB#3 on or about March 1^st (on or about is the grown up word for the epic battle between mother and child regarding the date of birth. All plans have been made for the 3/1 birth, thus the child will try for some other day). I have decided (aided by a couple of glasses of Scotch tape) to chronicle this new addition to the California Baker clan. Don’t worry, I will continue to provide updates on Cole, will write about Logan as well (poor Logan, middle child always gets screwed), and of course will continue to explore the magic of pancakes.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, basketball coach.

1-31-12.......Day Minus 30

2012-01-31T13:32:00.000-08:00

Tonight we go to battle for, hopefully, the last time. I feel that I should say a few important words to that will live on in perpetuity; however, if you know me, that is not my style. So, as I did so often in jr. high (hope statute of limitations has run. If not, the I was just joking…..uh….), I will steal someone else’s stuff and make it my own. Here goes: (we will be having a contest to see who can be the first one to determine what famous speech I have brutally plagiarized and butchered. Entry fee is $5.00. Winner gets 3 points)

Cole, You are about to embark upon the final battle of a Great Crusade, toward which you have striven these many months. The hopes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of people everywhere march with you.

In company with you are your brave family and friends, and unknown brothers-in-arms, fighting the same fight, you will bring about the destruction of the cancer war machine, the elimination of all evil malignancies over your body, and security for ourselves in a cancer free world.

Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well trained, well

equipped and battle hardened. It will fight savagely.

But this is the year 2012! Much has happened since the Cancer was diagnosed 2011. The United Medications have inflicted upon the Cancer great defeats, in open battle, man-to-man. Our Chemotherapy has seriously reduced its strength and its capacity to wage war on your body. The BMT Home Front has given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons and munitions of war, and placed at our disposal great reserves of learned doctors.

The tide has turned! The cancer free men of the world are marching together to Victory!

I have full confidence in your courage and devotion to duty and skill in battle. We will accept nothing less than full Victory!

Good luck! And let us beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.

Pretty Cool huh?

Seriously, Cole I wish you Godspeed on your journey this week.  I physically will be there for part of it, but know that I am always there.  Every second of every hour of every day.  You are never alone.  Rest assured that this week glasses are raised everywhere for Cole, my son.

1-30-12.....Day Minus 31

2012-01-30T15:48:00.001-08:00

I know that this blog is about Cole, but there are some serious issues which first must be cleared up before we can, in good faith and with peace of mind, proceed. If you are an adult, and if you are wearing jeans, then you should not be wearing brightly colored crocs. There is just no reason for that kind of insanity. Please stop now. You know who you are.

There, now let’s move on, shall we? We are in the home stretch of what is visible in front of us. Did that make sense? Why am I asking questions? Hello, is anyone there?

Anyway, Cole begins his last scheduled hospitalization on Tuesday night. We are hoping that this week will go by fast and I can get my boy back home for good. While Kaiser Santa Clara hospital is not the worst place in the world to spend a few nights, I think that I can safely say that I do not ever want to see the 3^rd floor again.

Last Friday, Cole and I went to his pre-admission doctor’s appointment. First off, Cole has surpassed the 50 lb mark. 50 lbs has been, for me at least, the magic, albeit slightly arbitrary, weight number for him. Throughout all of these treatments (Chemo, BMT, Radiation, Immuno) we have been struggling to get his weight back up to a normal weight for a 6 year old of his height. He is not there yet, but he has definitely on his way.

At the appointment Dr. Taggart also informed us that she had given the big dogs at UCSF Cole’s file to review. The reason for this is that his last imaging still showed some neuroblastoma cells. Dr. Taggart said that these cells could be dead cells, mature cells, or active cells. There is no way to know just by the imaging. Odviously dead cells are the best. Mature cells are good because they will not reproduce. Active cells are, of course, not ideal.

Since the area that is lighting up on the MIBG scan (MIBG is the grown up word for the test than can detect neuroblastoma cells) has not increased in size, Dr. Taggart is optimistic that the cells are either dead or mature. In an abundance of caution; however, she sent Cole’s file up to UCSF for them to look at this issue.

UCSF basically came to the same conclusion that Dr. Taggart came to. So, after this week the next step is to do another set of imaging. If there is no change, then they are going to have the formal tumor board look at Cole’s file in order to make a recommendation.

They might try and perform a biopsy. By pulling actual cells, and looking at them under the microscope, they will be able to say with certainty what is the diggity yo. The difficulty with getting the biopsy is that since the cells are so close to the aorta (which is the reason they could not take them out to begin with) they might not be able to, safely, get to the spot to grab the cells.

If the biopsy proves not worth the risk, they will probably recommend that we do nothing but watch. We will regularly monitor and image him, and if the area does not ever increase in size, nothing will need to be done.

So that is the skinny on where we stand. I say good bye for now, and ask that you please raise your glasses and toast Cole, radish farmer.

1-25-12

2012-01-25T10:52:00.000-08:00

I was a history major in college, so I understand the struggle that has gone on between workers and employers since the industrial revolution. I get it. I understand that many of the comforts and rights that I enjoy today (8 hour work day, overtime pay, rest breaks, meal breaks, the right not to be beaten unless I want to, etc.) at my workplace have come as a result of workers fighting, mainly through the use of the strike. I get it. Now please don’t think me ungrateful, but I have to say that there are some strikers who are just being selfish.

Take for example the big nurses’ strike that is coming next week. Now some might say that they are badly needed workers doing a thankless job and are in dire need of more pay. Fine…whatever, but did you really have to set the strike for next wee? I mean, come on, Cole has not been in the hospital for the last three weeks. Couldn’t you have done this last week? Now Cole has to delay his treatment (maybe final? Don’t want to be too optimistic, but I am losing that battle) by 2 whole days.

(Please imagine I am speaking as if I had cotton balls stuffed in my cheeks as you read this paragraph) Now I have to make arrangements to have Cole start his treatments on Wednesday. If something were to befall him during this time…If he were to have an accident….If he were to accidently hang himself in his jail cell…I am going to blame some of the people in this room….

All that being said, I am looking forward to knocking this last treatment cycle out. I am guardedly, cautiously, and hungrily optimistic that once done with this treatment, we will never have to see the inside of the PICU again. That is my wish and dream.

Cole has been doing very well as of late. He has been going to school (orders to the contrary be damned), and my top secret informers tell me that he has been seen running and playing with other children at school. Thank (insert deity, spirit, or favorite celebrity of your choice here) for that. I have been scared that he would have trouble integrating himself into the social fabric that is first grade; however, as with seemingly everything else, he makes me feel foolish for my fears.

We are eagerly awaiting March 1^st (Thing 3’s entrance to the world), and have been preparing the homestead for his arrival. Cole and Logan are back in the same room. A room which has been painted with the San Diego Chargers in mind. The baby’s room has been painted. As soon as the crib gets here, we will be all set (except for buying diapers, wipes, a stroller, and all the other things that babies need. You know for only being a few pounds, they sure do need a lot of crap)

I guess that is all for now….wait…I almost forgot. I was looking at the stats today and I noticed that this blog has generated over 33K hits from over 10 countries since its inception. I know that is not a big number within the world of internet blogging, but to me it seems close to infinity. I want to thank you for your support this last year, and let’s all hope for a better 2012. In the meantime please raise your glasses and toast Cole, market research analyst.

1-12-11

2012-01-12T00:25:00.001-08:00

So here I am watching NFL Live, and they are talking about the Green Bay Packer’s O-Coordinator’s son who passed away. The advice that came out of the discussion was to make sure that you hug your kids a little more, because you never know. True Dat, yo.

Now don’t get alarmed, Cole is doing well. He came out of this last round of therapy in better shape than any other round, at least that I can remember. He continues to respond to treatment beautifully, and he will soon need a haircut (although I don’t think that I will ever push him too hard to get it cut. I think that he has earned some shagginess, don’t you?).

We still have a couple of issues that need to be resolved. First is that his T-Cells have not resumed function (thus his immune system is still compromised). As a result, he has not been cleared to start back at school. This is causing some consternation here at Casa San Miguel as I am rapidly running out of FMLA days, and we can only maintain for so long with me only working two days per week. It is likely to get a little dicey around here between now and March 1^st.

Cole does not go back to UCSF to get his T-Cell function tested until February 15^th, and we don’t get the results until 2-3 weeks after that. The insanity of that is further compounded by the fact that California Baker Boy #3 (Don’t have a name yet. I am willing to sell naming rights though, just like major sports stadiums do. Think about it. Oracle Baker, Adobe Baker, Geico Baker, KB Homes Baker. If you want to have a chance, send money to the Cole fund and whoever sends the most will be considered) is set to arrive on March 1^st.

The other issue is that there is still some cancer cells that show up in the imaging. These cells were so close to the aorta that the surgeon did not want to risk trying to cut them out. The problem with the imaging is that the results do not tell us if the cells are active. They could be dead cells, they could be live cells. They could be mature cells that will not multiply any more. We just don’t know. The not knowing is killing us.

Kaiser is in contact with UCSF regarding the next steps. My most recent understanding (which often ends up being woefully incomplete) is that there are two likely next step scenarios. First, and mo betta, is that we don’t have to do any more treatments. We just monitor to make sure that there is no spread. This is referred to as the stable disease plan. Second is something called MIBG therapy. Basically this is a form of radiation therapy.

Now on to more interesting news. This coming Friday, Cole and I are going to his first photo shoot. That’s right, he has been accepted to be on America’s Next Top Model. No wait, that’s not right. Actually, he is going to be in a calendar that the Make A Wish Foundation is putting together for a big fundraiser event that is coming up in February (If you are looking for a tax deductible donation location, I cannot recommend Make A Wish any higher. They gave us an amazing gift. Made us feel like VIPs.) called Wine and Wishes, or something like that. My understanding (see supra re: my understandings) is that it is a dinner that has multiple chefs busting out some yummy grub (yummy grub is chef talk for good food), and that this calendar will, in some way, be part of the event. The photo shoot subposebly will have wish kids as well as some of the chefs. Should be cool. I am hoping for two things to come out of this shoot, well actually three. First is that “They” recognize the greatness and give us a million dollars (I keep waiting for “Them” to do this, but “They” continually fail to do so). Second is that we get a free calendar (love the swag). Third is that the chefs are uber famous chefs and/or Top Chef contestants and/or Padma. We will see. For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, franchise quarterback.

1-3-12

2012-01-03T21:32:00.001-08:00

Hospitals smell funny. Sleeping in the little room on the uncomfortable torture device sucks (although the suckiness is much less since the acquisition of the magic air mattress). Very loud nurses coming in at 1am making more noise than they should and talking to themselves is ridiculous. Beeping machines minutes after I have fallen asleep is just plain annoying. All these, and still I miss being there.

Not being in the hospital is like having to sit out of a big game because you are injured. You have faith in your team, and you know that they can get the job done; however, you still want to be there to make sure that your team wins.

Today Cole finished day 2 of the 4 day treatment for this week. This is the nasty week, and the nastiness started today. Fortunately Chris was there today, and we all know that he is well versed in nastiness. Wait, did that last sentence seem like an inappropriate comment? Oh good, that was the intention.

Cole does seem to be doing better that the last time he had this same series of meds. He did have a pretty significant fever (topped out at 104), but it seems to be under control now. These fevers are one of the common side effects of this regimen, but it still sucks to see him suffer through it. I am sure that in a few days he will be back to his normal self. For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, pirate hunter.

1-2-12

2012-01-02T22:21:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year

Let me tell you what I am tired of…

Well first, I haven’t written in a while. I don’t know why, just haven’t felt like it. I know many of you have missed the daily peek into my brain (for which you should really have your head examined), so welcome back.

I don’t remember what my last post was, so I will just give an overall update.

Cole is working his way through the immunotherapy portion of his treatment. If all goes according to plan, this should be his last therapy that includes hospitalizations. Within the immunotherapy world, he is working through the 4^th of 6 phases (fortunately only 5 of which include hospitalizations). Phase 4 is the nastiest one, and I am not looking forward to it. Grandma Kathy came out for week one of this phase and Unca Chris is out this week for week two. Strangely, I am having trouble coming to grips with the fact that I will not be at the hospital, and possibly will not be back again. It is wonderful that we have so many family members who are willing and able to set their lives aside to help out.

Oooh, just had a random thought. They should totally remake Red Dawn. Not sure how to remake it and have it be relevant to today, but that needs to happen. WOLVERINES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cole has (now kind of unsurprisingly) been responding very well so far. His hair is all the way back, and has grown into an amazingly combed position. He is eating well (amazingly mo betta in the hospital last time, where he usually does not eat anything)

Over Thanksgiving, we went on the most amazing trip to Florida, courtesy of Make A Wish. I know many of you followed my sporadic tweeting so you have some idea of how the trip went. For those of you who didn’t, it was killer. I might write about the trip in more detail in another posting, but for now rest assured that we had the best time. Thanks to Chris’ team for coming with us.

Cole has really gotten into Star Wars lately. He and I watched A New Hope in the hospital, Empire Strikes Back (too much talking for him), and Return of the Jedi. We have also been running through Star Wars Lego on the Wii.

Now back to what I am tired of. I am tired of walking past Cole’s room at 10:13 pm, and not seeing him. I am tired of missing work because this damn disease keeps him from going to school. I am tired of worrying about how we are going to make up the missed pay from missing work. I am tired of being stressed out about the fact that I am almost out of FMLA days. I am tired of having to explain to Logan that Cole has to go to the hospital again. I am tired of Cancer.

Well that is all for now. Please keep Cole, and the rest of our family, in your thoughts and prayers. Also please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Jedi Knight.

10-3-11

2011-10-03T22:21:00.001-07:00

We have now booked 24 hours here in the PICU for round one of immunotherapy. Before we get to a wrap up of today’s events, we have some old business to take care of.

In my last posting I did not provide my readers with the results of the tests that were done a few weeks ago. Please accept my almost humble, and slightly sincere apologies. The tests were generally good. The only area that shows any active cells is that one spot that the surgeon could not get. The bone marrow looks good, and the parts of the bones (hip) that had been chewed up a little are starting to grow back. So while we are not completely out of the woods yet, we are on the right track, and are moving in the right direction.

Now on to our current experience. We checked in last night, and I was very pleasantly surprised to see that we had been upgraded to the corner presidential suite (I am pretty sure that it was our frequent hospital miles and/or my amazing good looks). All day I have been trying to reserve this room for next time. The space is even big enough for an air mattress. Now while I am all for nostalgia….air mattress v stupid misshapen uncomfortable torture device chair/bed thing……um…..this seems like a trick question……I think it is a squirrel but I am going to say Jesus.

Our first nurse was very nice, was cranially dotted, listened to every word I had to say about Cole’s medications, and (come to find out) paid me no mind whatsoever. Fortunately the doctor remembered Cole (aka the VIP, aka Mac Daddy, aka The Little Engine that Could), and rec-o-nized.

The overnight nurse was apparently tasked with remodeling the room, or maybe it was that she was born with sledge hammers instead of hands, or maybe it was that she knew that I was uncomfortable sleeping on the torture device so she wanted to make sure that I was not sleeping. Whatever the reason, she was louder and more annoying that any Queen ever was. Here is some serious advice for all you nursing students (as well as anyone who has no sense), if you are working the graveyard shift and you go into a room to check vitals, check a machine, etc, and you notice that all the people in the room are asleep (2:30 am, TV off, lights off, lack of significant movement, possible snoring….all good indicators of a sleeping room), then there is no need for you to talk to yourself (nor to talk to the voices in your head….they are probably asleep too) out loud. Seriously.

Today we have had two very awesome nurses (and they also seem to be good at medical stuff too).

They pre-medicated (insert George Carlin rant about how giving medication before is not premedication, it is just medication, but I am too tired to run that one out) Cole prior to starting him on the actual antibody (the antibody is the hook and signpost thingie from my last post that is the foundation of immunotherapy). One of the pre—medication drugs that they gave him was Benadryl, which resulted in Cole taking a nap for most of the morning.

This afternoon, we played a little Wii (My Sims and ThrillVille were the soup de jours of the day), and then after we were all warmed up, we pulled out the D&D. After engaging in a few battles, Cole decided that he wanted to be the DM (for those of you who are lost, please find your local nerd and get caught up).

As DM, Cole shows a complete and utter disregard for the rules of the game as well as no interest in keeping to reality (even within the relative framework of D&D). He makes things up as he goes along. If you ever play with him you have to understand that the colorful story is way more important to him than winning, losing, actually playing. It is AWESOME. I love seeing his creativity.

By way of example, I had just killed about 8 minions and recovered the mechanical horse from the swarm of 12 goblins that had been riding it. I then fought a mummy who was eventually eaten by said horse and pooped out. As I scoured all the bodies for treasure I found the following items (it is important for those of you who do not have any nerds locked away that can give you perspective. This game is set in Mid-Evil times. Think Lord of the Rings, King Arthur, Swords, no plumbing, etc): 1 million gold coins, a key, a treasure chest, a TV screen, some garbage cans, and some more garbage cans. I tried to see if the TV worked, and when I turned it on, the picture was of my party trying to save the princess (at which point my ½ sized DM said, “Do you think it is a good idea to turn it off?” Uh….of course it is.). Love it.

Tomorrow we have to do double homework (today’s and tomorrows) or else a certain wife who will remain nameless will kill me until I die from it. Until then please raise your glasses and toast Cole, creative genius.

10-1-11

2011-10-01T22:06:00.001-07:00

Tomorrow we begin immunotherapy. This phase should be the last hospital phase of his treatments. For those of you who aren’t oncologists, let me explain what immunotherapy is.

Basically cancer is an evil villan dressed in a disguise. The body’s police force (white blood cells/T Cells, et al.) does not see the cancer cells for what they are which allows the cancer to continue to reproduce. Immunotherapy consists of sending special undercover agents into the body. These agents have a hook on one end that will only attach to the specific kind of cancer that is being targeted. On the other end is a big neon sign that says, “Evildoer here!! Come kill the mofo.” The body’s police force then will learn what the disguised cancer cells look like, and can eliminate any new cells that pop up.

So that is the science. Now to the kid. Cole has been feeling great. His hair is continuing to grow in, and the softness of it sends girls, and women alike, into a frenzy cooing and whimpering. Wherever we go, his hair brings all the girls to the yard. They keep offering him milkshakes and pancakes. I don’t understand why, but I think it is an MTV thing or something.

Yesterday Cole and I had a grand adventure up in SF. James Fitzsimmons gave us a couple of tickets to the wax museum that had been donated by El Crystal Elementary (once again San Bruno representing). I personally don’t find wax museums very interesting, and do find them kind of creepy, but free tickets are free tickets, so off we went.

Cole did not really enjoy the wax museum very much. First off it was very dark and had weird eerie music. Added to that was the fact that Cole did not really know any of the (statutes? Figures? Scary candles?) people. While the museum was not super fun, we still were determined to have a glorious adventure. We headed over to pier 39 to try and find something that was overpriced (never did find anything), and we soon found ourselves in a mirror maze. We, of course, immediately put on our claw gloves and fought it out.

So it ended up being a cool adventure. Our next few adventures will be to the Aquarium By the Bay (thanks to Keri Brown for the tickets), Alcatraz, SJ Tech museum, and Hiller Aviation Museum.

Tomorrow night Cole and I will head over to Kaiser to start him therapy (therapy is the grown up word for getting to play as much video games as you want), but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Olympic swimmer.

9-14-11

2011-09-14T20:31:00.001-07:00

Yesterday (Tuesday), Cole and I spent an enjoyable morning at the clinic while he was infused with IVIG. I can honestly say with no shame at all that I have no idea what the IVIG is, nor what it does. It seemed important to the doctors; however, that we do it, so we did.

While we were there searching for the lost ark (come to find out it was made of legos…..and to think, they had legos way back then), I talked to the doctors about Cole’s upcoming immunotherapy. I will discuss it more in detail in a later posting because we are still in the planning phase right now. They did try and schedule one session for the week that we will be at DisneyWorld (thanks Make-A-Wish for hooking us up, and especially thanks for the Virgin America flight. Not sure which is more exciting, having the super awesome Virgin America flight or the excuse to repeatedly say Virgin over and over again…hehehe), but I told him, buddy….er something.

For this past month, I have really been enjoying only working 2 days per week (other 3 days are spent watching Cole and saving Lego Gotham from supervillians and/or superheros; however, tomorrow is payday so I am sure that the unfortunate business of reality will soon set in.

In that light, I have picked up a little second job working for a wellness organization that arranges for doctors, message therapists, etc. to go into businesses and give wellness lectures and dole out free messages (along with a catered lunch from Subway) for employees. It probably won’t generate a bunch of money, but I can do the work remotely which is a good thing. If anyone out there has a company that is interested let me know. It is totally free to the company…..ok fine, enough pitching (but since I will be working as an independent contractor, and since I did some work via this blog, and since I am writing this blog on BART, I will be able to write off all my BART fees (despite that they are already pre-taxed), right?).

Now on to Cole……………………………………………………………………………………. (holding down the period button reminds me of when they came out with the turbo controller for Nintendo (or Sega?). Remember how many Contras you could wipe out with that thing?)………………………….. Cole has hair. Think I already told you that, but it is so awesome that I told you again. Expect me to keep telling you.

He has been feeling really great lately. Radiation finished up on Monday, and he seemed to not have any ill side effects. He gets the rest of the week off, and then next week he has all the tests (CAT, MIBG, SAT, ACT, GRE, MCAT, ETC) on Tuesday and Wednesday. Other than that he has a bunch of free time on his hands for the next couple of weeks. He is still not cleared to go to school, but he can go out and do things. Here is where you come in. Any ideas on cool stuff to do around the Bay Area? Now I know all the normal stuff, so don’t tell me about museums and such, but if you have any interesting, off the wall, kind of fun places to go, I would love to hear about it. Otherwise I ask that you please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Backpack designer/manufacturer/retailer/consumer (fully streamlined).

9-7-11

2011-09-07T00:50:00.003-07:00

I know that it has been a while since I last wrote, and I know that many of you have been concerned by the lack of updates. For that I am sorry. You see, I find it so very difficult to write when all seems to be going well (by that line of logic you can assume that if I am writing things are, or I am, less than stellar). This weekend has given me fuel to pick up the proverbial pen again.

To start, please rest assured that everything is going well with Cole. He is nearly done with radiation (last day is next Monday), and thus far has had no noticeable side effects. Everyday he goes into the room with the very funny Russian guy, Alex, and they have a grand old time.

Cole has had great energy, and little to no loss of appetite. His hair is even growing back. Within a week or so, his hair will be longer than mine (not really too much of an accomplishment if you have seen my dome, but at least it is a start). He has been getting schoolwork from his teacher in San Bruno that he will have as soon as he gets cleared to go to school, and has been enjoying having me home 3 days per week (cuz I play games and video games) and has also not enjoyed it (cuz we butt heads when it comes to school work).

The week of the 19^th of this month we have the full battery of tests (MIBG, CT, ECHO, and HEARING), and assuming that all is how it is supposed to be, we will jump right into immunotherapy. That should last about 5 months, give or take. I am going to go ahead and assume that his awesomeness will continue.

Heading into this last weekend, I was upbeat. Cole was doing well, and I had just spoken with the Make-A-Wish people and was informed that they were able to get us on the Virgin America non-stop flight for our trip to DisneyWorld. Elisa is very tired of me blabbing on and on about getting the Virgin America flight, but she has never been on one of their flights, so please excuse her ignorance.

Then, on Friday, the fit hit the shan. First I lost power to some lights and plugs in my garage (including the plug that makes the washing machine wash and the freezer remain freezed). I tried to replace the fuse (yes my house is that old) only to blow two more fuses just as soon as I popped them in. Of course that means that I have a short in my electrical line somewhere. Super!!!!!!! The only slightly silver lining is that I still have my home warranty so hopefully they will take care of most, if not all, of the cost.

If that wasn’t enough, on the way home from San Jose, I get an engine overheating warning and I almost blow my engine. I was able to get the Tourag back to the Rinde’s house (thanks to Bob’s help and the boys constantly asking me, “When is the engine going to start smoking” about 10000000000000000000000000000000000000 times). The next day I had it towed to the shop and have since discovered that the water pump and the thermostat are bad, and that both my belts are about to snap. $3K to fix. Super!!!!!!!!!

I know that these are not really big things, but with everything else that is going on, it is just crap that I don’t really need. I understand that all of this stuff is just the universe balancing itself out after giving me such amazing looks (wait, I am not that attractive, WTF universe? I don’t even know you anymore.)

The weekend did finally turn itself around. Liz brought Marty over for the first time, and while we did not sneak in and steal the black box that renders all encryption devices mute, we did have a nice time, and Mother ended up with some nice ramen leftovers.

Then on Monday we had a small BBQ with some of the other families on the block. There were a bunch of kids from brand new to 2^nd grade all running around having a great time. I love having these little get togethers because it reminds me that even though all my stuff (house, car, hairline) seems to be breaking down, I live on a kick ass block.

That is all for now, so please raise your glasses and toast Cole, winner of the 2011 under 14 Wipeout Championship.

8-18-11

2011-08-19T00:10:00.001-07:00

You know, I have found that I am a very different writer depending on the time of day that I decide to write. In the morning, I am not very polished and my filters that make me sound less insane are not quite up and running yet. Most of my posts that leave you aksing yourself, “What is he on, and can I have some?” are morning writings.

In the afternoon and early evening, I can almost pass for a normal person (despite the fact that we all know better). I do spell checks, I tend to engage in less parenthetical awesomeness, and sometimes I even proof read what I just wrote.

Late at night I find that I am more introspective, and have less humor than normal. This is where I find myself tonight. Another night with sleep difficulties. More thoughts about the unknown future. Some people have described stress as a big heavy weight that sits on them and seems to get heavier and heavier as time goes on. In my experience, stress is like a cold wind. When it is blowing lightly, you know it is there but it is not all that unpleasant. In fact, on hot days a cold breeze helps your day be more enjoyable. But that cold breeze can quickly turn into a biting cold wind. Now you know that you can take it, and that it will not kill you, but the longer that wind assaults you, the more you notice how awful it makes you feel. It makes your hands hurt. It stings your ears. It seems to somehow wind its way through the protective layer of clothes that you are wearing until it gets into your bones. It envelopes you to the point that all of your attention is focused on that infernal wind. Again you know that it will not kill you, and will not even keep you from doing what you want. But it really sucks, and keeps you from enjoying your day to the fullest extent possible. Tonight the wind is blowing.

Cole is doing well. He has almost completed his first week of radiation, and thus far has had no side effects that I have seen. Radiation thus far has been very anti-climactic. He does not glow in the dark, and has not grown a third eyeball. He is in good spirits and is having fun helping Elisa get her class ready for the start of school.

Starting next week I will be on FMLA and will only be working 2 days per week until Cole can go back to school. He has an appointment in early November to check his T-Cells, but we won’t know the results for a couple of weeks after that. I am hoping that it will not affect our Disney World trip. I will keep you posted, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, media mogul.

8-15-11

2011-08-15T00:16:00.000-07:00

Dear Cancer,

To begin with let me say Fuck you and the horse you rode in on. I tried to warn you, and I tried to be nice. You should have known that when we sent those CT Scans and MRI scans out to locate you, that we would find you and then send in our search and destroy team. You failed to heed that warning, and you will suffer for it.

We first decided to go medieval on your ass by poisoning you. You made me course poison through my boy’s body all because you decided to get aggressive. We got most of you with the poison. A normal entity would have just wrapped it up and called it a day after 99% of itself was destroyed though poison. Even a virus knows to skiv off when it can no longer affect its host. You are clearly a lower form of life than a stupid virus.

Now we are not playing around any more. We gave you a chance to go quietly into that good night, but noooooooooo, you had to stick around. You are like the dude who tries to hang around the bar at the very end of the night when all of the workers want to go home just because you know that you are not welcome anywhere else. Well you know what? You’re not welcome here.

Today is the beginning of the end for you. Going medieval on your ass did not seem to work so we are going forward in time. Today we are going to nuke your ass. We are going to take all of the potential devastation that could have occurred had the Cold War gone Hot. But here is the shitty part for you. The Cold War never went hot because both sides knew that to nuke is to be nuked. For you; however, you have no response to our firepower. You have no defense to the reign of death that we are bringing you. You have no way to stop us from killing you while simultaneously saving Cole from you. You are done.

Just thought you should know. Also please be advised that after you are done we will all be raising our glasses and toasting your destruction. Peace out, and screw you.

Regards,

Jim Baker

8-11-11

2011-08-11T11:54:00.001-07:00

When last we spoke, Cole had a busted broviac line, and the only thing keeping him from bleeding out was a strategically placed paper clip. Well on Monday Elisa and Logan took Cole down to Kaiser for a little splice job to repair the hole. All was good on Monday and Tuesday. On Wednesday night, Elisa went to the Giants game and left us boys to fend for ourselves.

After scraping together a dinner of steak and calamari, Cole and I put Logan down for the night. I then began to do medical stuff (yes that is the proper terminology) to Cole. The easiest stuff to do is to flush his lines. Naturally while flushing the lines, blood began spewing (or dripping very slowly, depending on who is telling the story) from the repair site. Fortunately I had been well trained by the RN in the springy clogs. I immediately found a paper clip and secured the situation. God, I’m good (and very pretty as well. The answer to your question is yes, I am the total package).

Since Elisa had a doctor’s appointment and potentially had to spend some time down at the County Courthouse, I had to take the day off to get another repair done. So Cole and I made the long and harrowing journey to a land known by the locals as Santa Clara. The journey was fraught with many dangers and obstacles, but our two tepid adventurers managed to survive. After receiving a hero’s welcome (at which point the mayor gave us the key to the city, again), we proceeded to the clinic to finished what we had started.

I was praised outrageously (although not without cause) for my sublime paper clip repair by all in attendance. The medical staff was perplexed as to why the line failed again, but decided to try the repair one more time. They prepped the site, got all of their tools ready, and were all set to cut the line off above the failed portion when Cole (who is about to start Medical School, see Doogie Howser M.D.) lifted his head and asked the doctor, “Shouldn’t you clamp the line first.” You see the broviac line goes directly into his blood stream, and if they had not clamped the line prior to cutting it off, there would have been a huge blood stream in that room. Gotta love it when the 6 year old knows more than the two doctors and one nurse in the room.

We went back home whereupon Elisa left us boys, again, for the evening. This time, I did not do any medical stuff, and instead just hung Cole from the rafters by his ankles (no real reason, just seemed like fun) until Elisa returned home.

Today Elisa and Cole are going to head back down to the clinic (for those of you keeping score this is the 4^th straight day of going to the clinic) to check the line, and get labs drawn in advance of the radiation treatment that starts on Monday. He might need a transfusion tomorrow, but otherwise should be ready to start on Monday.

My anxiety is starting to whip itself up into a frothy frenzy for radiation. My thinker can rationalize that this procedure will be less destructive and painful for Cole than the last two (Chemo and Stem Cell); however, I still get all worked up with images of a glowing child (not glowing in happiness, actually glowing from all the radiation) in my mind. I am sure that it will be very anti-climactic, but for now I am going to be a wreck for a while. You should watch; it will be fun. For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, City Planner.

8-8-11

2011-08-08T12:04:00.001-07:00

Good weekend. Cole got some cool looking tattoos (although not as cool as I was hoping for) that, appropriately I guess, look like little targets. Then, in order to make the radiation tech’s job harder cuz that’s how he rolls, Cole decided to tattoo his hands and arms with similar dots.

Cole also had a physical therapy appointment where the therapist said that he “toes out” but that structurally (bone, muscle, tendon, etc) all the parts are working right. He thinks that the quad is just a little weak from being in the hospital bed. Cole was given exercises that, as all physical therapy exercises are, seem to be kind of ridiculous, but since the therapist is the expert, we will follow his instructions. I still don’t know why Cole has to have a chicken on his head while doing them, but I didn’t go to PT school, so what do I know?

On Saturday, Elisa and I had planned to go to a movie and to lunch to celebrate our anniversary. We had PJ and Abby come over to watch the kids, and we set off. Now because Elisa’s life is rather boring with no challenges, I decided to refrain from telling her exactly how little gas we had in the car prior to leaving. In hindsight, that might not have been the best idea that I had that day. Naturally we ended up running out of gas at a stoplight on a good sized hill. I had to pop the clutch (in reverse) to get it going and then do a crazy maneuver to get the car up the hill. While we ended up missing the movie due to the delay, popping the clutch was pretty fun. I have not popped a clutch since my old green Honda (I sure wrecked the hell out of that car).

After not seeing the movie, we had a nice lunch at Jack’s Prime, and then headed home. We played with the boys and seemed destined to have just another normal weekend of hanging out….but oh no…..that would be too easy. Late in the afternoon, Elisa was flushing Cole’s line when it exploded. Yes you read right, Cole’s line exploded and suffered a gaping hole (ok maybe a slight exaggeration, but if you have ever heard me tell a story you would know that I am unable to not add color to a story) the size of my elbow.

So we headed down to Santa Clara in order for the line to be repaired by trained medical professionals who have access to some amazing medical instruments and supplies. Unfortunately the amazing medical supplies part turned out to be wrong. The nurse, who wears crocs with the spring heel thing... very strange looking, pulled a total MacGyver. He wrapped the tubing around a paper clip. Yes you read right, a paper clip. The paper clip kinked the tube and Cole stopped leaking blood (which for those of you who have less medical training than me (Medical training is the grown up word for watching at least two of: ER, Gray’s Anatomy, Hawthorne, Royal Pains, and the episodes of Friends when Joey was Dr. Drake Remore) is a good thing).

The surgeon is supposed to be back in town today, and we are hoping to get a more permanent fix. A binder clip at least.

Sunday was pretty chill. We went to the park (Cole and I rode our bikes there), and video chatted with the Zonians over Xbox.

Hopefully today we will get Cole’s line all taken care of, and Elisa and the kids can enjoy a nice summer day. For now, though, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, medical supplies distributor.

8-5-11

2011-08-05T07:56:00.001-07:00

So I totally had a great idea for my next book that I will probably never actually write. I haven’t decided if it will be a sequel to the last book that I didn’t write, or a stand alone. I willing to accept feedback from anyone who has read any of the books that I haven’t written.

When we last spoke we had narrowed down my unfortunate swing/gravity incident to a few possibilities, and after further investigation I think that we can very clearly identify the culprit as those working on behalf of Little Foot, that little subversive.

Now I know that you are riveted with the strangeness the seems to fall from my brain, but this blog is really about Cole, so let’s get to it. Any objections? No? Good, the measure passes.

Today Cole is getting a tattoo. We thought that he deserved it given how well he has been responding to his treatments. I suggested that he get a naked lady holding a sandwich from Columbo’s in Pacifica (insert drool here…for the sandwich, not the naked lady….come on, this is a family show…sort of), but instead he took the advice of his doctors and is getting tiny dots where they are going to aim the radiation blasts (is radiation blasts the right term? Sounds not very accurate. Maybe it is radiation shots….or maybe points….I think I like blasts….like blasts the Cancer back to the stone age).

He also is going to visit a ~~sadist~~ physical therapist today to try and work on getting his walking and running gait back to normal. It is going to be a long day for Elisa and Cole because the tattoo session is early this morning, and the PT is not until later this afternoon. Fortunately Granny and Pappy Rinde live nearby and they can chill at their homestead.

Elisa starts school later this month (goes back 8/22) which means that I will be utilizing the FMLA (Family Medical Leave Act) as well as the IGTSHFWALA (I Get To Stay Home From Work A Lot Act). I think that we need to immediately change the law so that I can take indefinite FMLA leave with pay. Give me Obama’s number…..wait, never mind, I’ve got it. Alas, had to leave a message. I guess this means that I will just have to take the unpaid leave.

I would like to say that me staying home with Cole would not have worked out without the amazing, extreme, wonderful, crazy awesome, badass, generous, selfless, lovely donations and support that we have received from so many of you. I can not even imagine how we would have made it without all of you. I thank you all from the bottom of my heart. Instead of asking you to raise your glasses and toast Cole, today I raise my glass (yes I am drinking on BART on my way to work. What of it?), and toast all of you.

8-3-11

2011-08-03T22:46:00.000-07:00

Definition of being a fat ass: when you sit on the swing with your 3 year old son, and the swing breaks.

Definition of being old: after falling from a broken swing, your body hurts in places that were not involved in the impact.

Definition of being awesome: drinking the pain away with nice Scotch that you did not buy.

So there are a few possibilities as to why the swing broke. 1: A certain Auntie Julia weakened the structural integrity in response to, and retribution for, a certain unfortunate incident with Little Foot (I make no apologies. He had the necessary information. He should have talked. No reason to take that kind of pain. Lives were at stake.) B) A certain Uncle Chris girthy self prematurely aged the support rope; or III. I had to suffer that great indignity in order for the universe to balance itself out when I win the lottery.

I cannot tell you how happy I have been to watch Cole these past few days. He has great energy, has been eating well, and (other than the bald head and pipes hanging from his chest) looks and acts like any little 6 year old on summer vacation. The second I get home from work I am attacked by two little dirty bare foot kids begging me to play with them. Irregardlesslyness of how tired I am from a long day of sitting on my ass at work, the second I am accosted by those imps, I am ready to rock and roll.

The only thing we have noticed with respect to Cole is that his gait is not normal. He walks and runs like his hips hurt. We have asked him repeatedly if his legs or hips hurt, and he repeatedly (and exasperatedly) says no. Now for those of you who know Cole, you know that he will always say that he is fine, but watching him you can tell that he is not in pain.

The doctors think that it is just that he was in bed for almost a month, and the muscles have kind of forgotten how to move properly. I had the same problem after my knee surgery. (random memory. Shari’s shakes in Tucson. Yum.)

So homie has an appointment on Friday with the physical therapist. I am hoping that they make him do awesomely strange exercises to help out, but that is just how I roll.

Seriously, I hope that he is able to get his normal walk back, but we will see. For now, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, fashion designer.

8-2-11

2011-08-02T17:31:00.001-07:00

Ok so first things first. I have to get something off my chest. Now I know that I am hardly a fashionista. I also recognize that clothes worn by one generation must, and a central rule of the universe, look completely ridiculous to other generations. I also recognize that I am rapidly becoming old. Despite all that, I have to say that there this a fashion trend that I have been noticing that troubles me greatly. You know what I am talking about. Capri Pants on dudes. Come on. As Cole would say, “seriously.”

Now that my conscious is clear, we can move on to why we are here today. Today I am not going to talk about Cole (except maybe tangentially), nor am I going to talk about medical stuff. Today we need to recognize Elisa.

Eight years ago today Elisa momentarily lost her mind and married a balding, silly man. Granted the man has a quick wit, easy going nature, and nice round backside, but let’s be frank. He is completely off his rocker. Still Elisa took the plunge and agreed (based primarily on the eternal promise of ready water glasses upon request) to be married.

In those ocho anos (insert ~ as appropriate for you purists), there have been many ups, and as you all well know, some staggering downs. But through it all Elisa has held her family together, and kept her husband on the straight and narrow (well at least kept him near it. Come on, she is only human after all…..or is she?), and has generally just been the best possible wife a man could ask for.

If you see her today, or if you get some time to drop her an email or a facebook note, wish her happy anniversary, and let her know how awesome she is. I know that I will.

Love you babe.

So I ask that you please raise your glasses today and toast Elisa and my marriage (to each other). I know I will.

8-1-11

2011-08-01T20:29:00.001-07:00

Sorry we haven’t spoken in a while, but I have been having too much fun….too much fun…what’s that mean? It’s like too much money…no such thing. It’s like a girl too pretty, with too much class, being too lucky, or a car too fast. Whatever they say I done, …..er something. That distraction was your fault, not mine.

Going back to Thursday, we pick up where we left off with our tepid adventurers. I brought Jackson and Sophia, full of grace, what a pretty face, down to la casa for a noche of pelucliaing. Given that we had not yet watched Yogi Bear 1000000000000000000000000000000000000 times, and considering that there are not any other movies that will play on my laptop (think that Cole may have hacked it), we bundled up the Arizonas in blankets and filled them up with hot chocolate and watched Yogi Bear in our open air exterior Cineplex.

Jax and Soapie stayed the night, and played all day on Friday with Lobert and Coley Moley Guacamole. When Chris and I got down there, we let Elisa and Lo take a nap and the rest of us played some D&D. The adventures were grand, the humor was crass, and the battles were won. Good times all around.

That evening, Julia (whose favorite movie is Side Out….go ahead ask her about it. She can quote the entire move…go ahead ask her to…..please…..please….if you do, she will give you money….please….please) and Tina (my understanding is that welcome to fb is in order) came down and we ate sausages and frozen pie (nothing is too good for big homie’s birthday).

That evening we said our goodbyes to the Arizonas. I just wish that our language was not so limited. I have been trying and trying to find the words to express my thanks to them for coming out for the entire month and taking the lion’s share of hospital shifts, and for all that they did. I think the only way to truly show my gratitude is to say: pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake pancake. You guys are the best.

They left on Saturday morning, and Elisa and I just enjoyed hanging out with the kids. Logan went to swim class, and got to use the kickboard. We went down to SJ for some pizza. Nice and relaxing. Sunday was more of the same. We took a fun little adventure to see the tide pools in Half Moon Bay (unfortunately the tide was in, but we had a great time anyway), ate some clam chowder, and just enjoyed having our little family all together.

This last week Cole also had his follow up appointment at UCSF, where (of course with this kid), everything looks good. He also had an appointment with the radiation department and an appointment at the normal clinic. They explained the process of radiation to Elisa. Basically he has 20 sessions (one session per day M-F for 4 weeks). Most of the sessions are lower levels of radiation, but there will be some (~6…..Elisa told me but I don’t remember the exact number if you can believe it…I know, surprising) that are higher levels which will be directed at the spots that the surgeon tagged with the clips. Right now we are set to start this process on 8/15.

I think that is all for now, but stay tuned. While you are staying tuned, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, stock broker.

7-24-11

2011-07-24T23:05:00.001-07:00

Yo this weekend was off the hook. We have a lot to talk about so we should get right to it and refrain from any distractions. This means that we must please ask you to place your seatbacks in the upright position and return your tray tables the their locked position. Please remove all jewelry and any shiny objects should also be put away as I am easily distracted (might be too late…I might have already become distracted….focus….focus….almost there….five more seconds and then I’ve got him…..focus….focus….yee ha, Jester’s Dead….)

Saturday was a super fun day. I took Logan to his swim lesson where he, very enthusiastically, showed his teacher that he can put his whole head under water. He also showed his teacher that you are not going to tell him what to do, and he will kick when he is good and ready and not a second before. Oh he will placate her with a weak leg movement that cannot really be called a kick, but we know his game.

Later the Arizonians came over and we had a rockin good time. There were many secret meetings and elaborate plans that all somehow seemed to end with some combination of children throwing balls and Auntie Julia. She screamed out in pain, but I think that deep down she really enjoyed the attention.

When Logan went down for his nap, and the older girls went shopping, we continued our D&D adventure. The team (also known in some gladiatorial circles as “Alotta Butt and Some Fries) fought valiantly for justice and all that cool stuff. We eradicated many unsavory foes, and rescued those in danger.

After Logan woke up, the kids all played and had a grand old time. Logan especially has really taken to Sophia (he now has stated on multiple occasions that “his” Sophie Bear now lives with us.), but given her cuteness factor, who could blame him?

By the end of all that, Cole was pretty beat. To be honest (funny for me to ever say that with a straight face) I am amazed that he has been able to operate at the level of energy that he has. I mean if you look at it, he went in to UCSF on 6/28. First few days he still felt good enough to bounce around and dance, but he was still confined to this small room. He got out on 7/22. That is 3 weeks and 3 days of little to no exertion. He has now been out less than 72 hours and he has been running all around chasing the Arizonians.

Today Grandpa and Grandma Rinde came over to destroy my front patio (they had permission, don’t get mad at them). Grandpa had a sledge hammer and was having just a grand old time so I thought that I would jump in and lay some smack down, hammer style. Of course, I made the classic mistake of forgetting that I don’t do physical things normally (and in fact usually go out of my way to avoid doing physical things (physical things is the grown up word for moving) during the ordinary course of my life), and started swinging that stupid hammer over and over again. Of course I hurt my knee. Of course I will not be able to lift my arms tomorrow (wow I am old and out of shape.).

After doing a little work, I left the rest of it to the professional (professional is the grown up word for someone else) and went back to what I know and do best….nerdy things. More D&D. More justice fighting. More awesome fun.

Cole decided he wanted some chicken wings (a little tear came to my eye when I heard this. I have never been so proud) for dinner, and since Cole has gone through everything that he has gone through, Elisa had to relent, so (Cole, make sure you use this leverage while you still can. Eventually Momma will find a way to counter this power with one of her own.) we had some chicken wings for dinner. AWESOME (and they really weren’t that good of wings. They came from a frozen package and I baked them instead of frying them, but they were wings and wings are like another activity that I will not say cuz this is a family show…but it is the one that makes beasts with two backs and/or babies…., bad wings are better than no wings.

So all of the above was pretty cool, and I cannot tell you how much I love having Cole back in the house; however, concurrently with all of the awesomeness of today, we had the Car Wash Fundraiser organized by the SMAFTOAA (for those of you out of the loop, San Miguel Awesome Fundraising Team Of Awesome Awesomeness which is the grown up word for the Kaisers and Rossis). The event was an amazing success.

You know prior to all of this I was not a very sentimental guy (getting married, having kids, and watching Hoosiers aside), and I never really gave much thought to the goodness of people. I was always kind of a social libertarian. You leave me alone, I will leave you alone. So it has been awe inspiring and humbling to see the outpouring of support and generosity of so many people. Humans kick ass.

I need to go recover from this super awesome weekend and will post again in the not too distant future, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, demolition expert.

7-22-11 Superman is Back in The Building

2011-07-22T23:42:00.001-07:00

He’s back. He is back. He has come home. He is home. Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes (and for the record I wrote all of those out, no cutting and pasting).

You know, I knew that the UCSF thing would be tough. My kid gone for a month. Seriously? It’s almost funny how stressed out I get over each phase of this whole thing and then Cole seems to just glide through it.

When we first met with the UCSF doctors, I jokingly asked what the record time was that anyone recovered from this procedure. The answer was 15 days post transplant by some construction worker. Cole did 16.

Cole seemed to have a pretty good day at home. He played a little Wii with his uncle and cousins and then just hung out at the house. He had good spirits, and ate a decent amount of dinner. Around 8 or so he started to run out of gas.

Elisa hooked him up to his hydration IV and we started reading Mouse and the Motorcycle, but only got through one chapter.

I want to remind everyone that this Sunday we are having the Wash Your Car for Cole event at the self service carwash over by our house (Hillsdale and Saratoga in front of BevMo), being put on by Joe et al and Jaci et al. The flyer is below.

We hope to see you out there on Sunday, but for now, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, badass.

Car Wash Flyer

2011-07-22T23:39:00.001-07:00

CAR WASH FOR COLE

Wash your car and help Cole fight cancer!

Wash your car, grab a bite to eat, and help one of San Mateo Village’s bravest children beat this terrible disease. Every dollar you spend will go directly to Cole’s family and help them pay for hospital expenses.

WHEN:

Sunday, July 24

(Food and drinks available from 11 a.m. – 3 p.m.)

WHERE:

Clearwater Car Wash (directly across from BevMo)

Self-Serve Car Wash

341 East Hillsdale Boulevard

San Mateo, CA 94403

7-19-11

2011-07-19T12:37:00.001-07:00

The badassery of Cole appears to know no bounds. In my last post I described Cole as getting better a little bit each day. This past weekend Cole decided that enough was enough, and a little bit each day was no longer acceptable. His counts jumped exponentially over the weekend. Specifically his ANC count (basically his white blood cells which fight infection, etc) went from 60 on Friday to 360 on Saturday to 1330 on Sunday to 1900 on Monday to 3000 on Tuesday morning. Now I am not an ANCologist, but I now that that is some kick ass recovery. The doctors are talking about the possibility of going home as early as this Friday. That’s right. That’s how we roll.

I am ecstatic that Cole will be coming home, and that we are now done with phase 2 of this insane process; however, I have to temper my enthusiasm a little because we still have a long road ahead of us.

After Cole gets out, he will have about 4 weeks off before we start with the radiation therapy. My understanding of this therapy is that the side effects are very minor (at least compared to Chemo, but then again the effects of falling off a 3 mile high cliff are minor compared to what Cole has gone through), and he will be medically cleared to go to school. It really freaks me out to talk about him going back to school (afraid to jinx anything), but it is a very real possibility. The radiation will be a logistical nightmare as Cole will be going to school in San Bruno, but the treatments are going to be in Santa Clara. The treatments are every weekday for 3-4 weeks. The gas alone is going to case a million dollars, not to mention that we will need to figure out how to get him there and back each day. I will probably invoke the right of prima nocta….wait that is something else….. I mean the right of FLMA (if you don’t know what FLMA is, look it up. It will be a good research project for you), and work ½ or ¾ days.

While this will be tough financially, it will not be anywhere near as tough as when I was only working 3 days per week. As always, with the help and support (which is still staggeringly amazing) of our friends and family, we will make it through.

On that note, please be aware that the date of the car wash fundraiser has changed. In my last post, I said it would be on Saturday. That is no longer correct. It will now be held on Sunday, July 24^th. If you are interested in helping, or if you want more information, drop me an email and I will put you in touch with Joe and/or Jaci. Thanks again to them for setting this up.

In other news, Logan, in his capacity as the ruler and absolute center of the universe, has made a one time exception to the ban on human slavery. He has decreed that Sophia now belongs to him. Sorry Chris and Tina for the loss of possession of your daughter. If only your knees did not hurt so much, I would suggest that you try for another daughter, but this time try for one less awesome. Oh well.

While we sort out the logistics of transferring possession of Sophie Bear to Logan, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, newscaster.

7-13-11

2011-07-14T00:05:00.000-07:00

Let me tell you about something that I hate (besides Cancer). I hate awards shows. I truly do.

Let me tell you about something that I love (besides my family). I love sports highlights. I truly do.

So that is how I found myself watching the ESPY’S this evening. I turned the channel and saw VCU win their award (gotta love scrappers), so I kept the show on. The next award was the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage. It was given to a guy who spent over 30 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. He did all the stuff that you would expect of this type of award recipient (learned to box, obtained college degrees, finally was exonerated, etc.). The only reason that I bring this up is that he was not pissed about the fact that he lost 32 years.

One of the, among the many, shitty things about this whole cancer experience, and the one that I have been having the hardest time reconciling in my mind is the feeling that Cole, and my entire family (extended), has lost, so far, six months of his life. There were so many things that he did not get to do. Playing with friends, going to school, you know all that stuff. Every time I think about it, it makes me mad.

So when Dewy (the prison guy, great name huh) did not seem pissed about the loss of time, and in fact simply said that each day he woke up in the joint he just worked to make himself happy. Thanks Dewy.

Now on to other stuff. First the everworking Neighbor Joe has arranged for a new fundraiser event later this month. He has convinced the owner of the self service car wash near our house to donate all his earnings for one day to Cole. In addition, Emily (Joe’s wife) convinced Costco to donate some food. More details will follow, but basically we are going to ask people to come wash their cars for Cole. We will also be cooking some food to sell as well. Should be a good time. Tell your friends. Right now we are looking at July 23^rd, but I don’t know if that date is certain.

Cole is maintaining his stoic badassness as his body recovers from the crazy chemo that he was given. He has had some ups and downs, but seems to be improving ever so slightly each day. I say that of course just based on conversations and reading the daily shift log because I only get to see Cole on the weekends. I know that it is a blessing having Chris’ family out here to take the burden off of me, but I sometimes feel guilty for not carrying the burden. I think I just miss my son.

On a separate not, why do I watch Criminal minds? I know it is going to jack my brain up, and cause me to lose sleep. It is not the dead bodies that messes with me. It is the destruction of the families that comes from the loss of a loved one. I know that, and yet when it is on, I can’t turn it off. Oh well.

I am going to bed now, and hopefully will get some sleep. In the meantime, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, playwright.

7-12-11

2011-07-12T22:54:00.000-07:00

So I know that it has been a while but I have been lodging a silent protest in the hopes that if the American People realize that the only way that they will get their favorite form of entertainment back (this blog), then they need to force the NFL lockout to end. I mean come on, I know way too much about baseball right now.

So to, I am sure, everyone’s great delight, it appears that the NFL lockout is nearing an end, and you get your blog back. It’s a win win.

When we last spoke Cole had been admitted to UCSF to begin his stem cell transfusion. Since then he has been dosed with the insane amount of Chemo, and then last Wednesday he received his own stem cells back. The Stem Cell transfusion was Day 0, in the parlance of BMT (which is Bone Marrow Transplant, not a Subway sandwich) talk.

With each passing day, his blood counts dropped, and he felt worse and worse accordingly. His immune system is now, and has been for a few days now, basically 100% compromised (even to the point that his immunizations are gone). He picked up a little bug that would normally not affect anyone, but with him, he was pretty sick the last 3 days. They finally figured out what kind of bacteria it was, and gave him antibiotics accordingly and I am happy to report that he is doing much better today.

This phase has already been, to me at least, about one million time more stressful than the last phase. I think that the main difference is that during the last phase Cole would come home. We were always living with this damn cancer but at least he was home. Now; however, he has been gone for 2 weeks. And with every passing moment the pressure gets more and more. I just want him home. I just want this over. Fuck you cancer.

Please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Psycologist.

6-30-11

2011-06-30T23:44:00.000-07:00

Dear Cole,

The last few nights I have had the opportunity to watch some great movies. Specifically I have watched Shawshank, One Flew Over the Cookoo’s Nest, and Few Good Men, and I have started thinking about great movies.

Great movies have a couple of characteristics that identify them as great movies. Now movies are art, and art is necessarily subjective so when determining what makes a movie great, personal opinions have to be disregarded. Or rather we mush regard the opinions of the masses who may like some crappy movie just because it has a lot of explosions and boobs the same as some obscure movie that the film elite decides is an important movie.

In determining whether a movie is great there are really only three characteristics that you must look for. Number 1: if you happen to run across a movie that you have not seen for a while and it is on commercial television, you find that you have to watch it, irregardlessly of the time that it comes on (and in fact the later it is the higher greatness scale it has). Number B: there is some great character that is usually not the main character (think Big Jack in A Few Good Men). And 3: there is a line in the movie that given the appropriate set up, you can’t resist saying it.

****

As you can tell this isn’t my normal blog post because since Tuesday Cole has been at UCSF, and I have not seen him. I am trying to hold it together, but not seeing him, and not being there to help is killing me. Fortunately I will be there tomorrow night. I miss my son.

After I get there tomorrow, I will try and put together a good update. For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, winner of nine academy awards.

6-27-11, another one

2011-06-27T23:46:00.001-07:00

One love
One blood
One life
You got to do what you should
One life
With each other
Sisters, brothers
One life
But we're not the same
We get to
Carry each other
Carry each other

That’s right baby, we are set for UCSF, and we are in the one cycle group. For those of you keeping score, that means that Cole could be home by the end of July. Assuming all goes well he will take August off, and then start radiation in September. Following that he will have 6 cycles (similar to the previous Chemo cycles with respect to duration) of immunotherapy.

Now I am not sure if I have become sentimental throughout this whole process or if the universe is talking to me (or maybe it always has and I am just now listening), but the last few days have been very strange. Please allow me to elaborate.

Since the initial diagnosis experience, I have been doing a pretty good job of keeping it together. We have a plan. We have an enemy. We execute the plan. We defeat the enemy. It is simple, and it was working. So then you can understand how badly I was hit when Dr. Taggart first told me on Thursday that the MIBG reading showed new, active cancer cells. This was not part of the plan. Eradication was the plan, not growth. WTF?

Dr. Taggart did say that she disagreed with the reading, but by then the box had been opened, and in my mind, the worst case scenario had become a foregone conclusion. To make matters worse, we were not going to find out if the cancer had spread, much less if we were going to be able to start the UCSF procedure, until Monday. Fortunately Elisa kept us sane, or at least stopped us from going completely crazy, by planning and then flawlessly executing a weekend of awesomeness.

Despite that, I was on pins and needles all day today. There were so many things that, if just one had not gone our way, would have derailed us. First Cole had a dentist appointment to fill some cavities. If problems arose, or if there were complications, or if the wind decided to blow the wrong way, UCSF gets delayed. As always, Cole sailed though with such ease that I am beginning to question whether I am just becoming a paranoid crazy person.

I got word of the successful dentist appointment at around 8:45ish (for exact times please ask Elisa), and then had to endure my own overactive paranoid imagination until his clinic appointment at 2. Again, of course (now I am beginning to think he does it on purpose) good news came our way. Not only was there no new active cancer cells, and not only were we cleared to start at UCSF tomorrow, but we were even randomized into the one cycle group (which means that this phase will be about 8 weeks shorter than if we were in the two cycle group).

So that is kind of the factual world that I have been living in. Now two things have happened during this time that have perked my ears up like when our dog, Charley, hears….well whatever it is that he hears that make his ears perk up…..

The first thing that happened was yesterday after a dinner of Chinese food, we all opened our fortune cookies. Elisa’s, Logan’s, and mine were all unremarkable; however, Cole’s read as follows, “Determination will get you through this.” Talk about freaky.

Then, and this one was a little bit more obtuse, I was watching Shawshank Redemption (awesome freaking movie. It is one of those movies that I never think about making an effort to watch, but then when I happen to watch it, I think to myself why haven’t I been watching this movie every day) and the hope concept caught my attention. For those of you who haven’t seen it (you know now that I think about it, I am not going to give a plot summary for this one. If you haven’t seen this movie, shame on you). So anyway right after Brooks’ demise, Red talks about the danger of hope. After his lines, I found myself applying his ideas to my life. I do understand the danger of hope. Within the context of cancer, hope can set you up for the destruction of your mind/soul/emotional stability/whatever. Assume the worst and you can only be pleasantly surprised.

Towards the end of the movie (Buxton Hay fields, long wall, black obsidian), Andy tells us otherwise. “Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and good things never die.” True dat.

If you have seen the movie, go watch it again. If you have not, go watch it (Cole demands it). In the meantime, raise your glasses and toast Cole, male model.

6-27-11

2011-06-27T08:15:00.000-07:00

Dude, killer weekend. Elisa planned a bold weekend that many of the naysayers, critics, and various other naredowells thought could not be pulled off. Oh how little they know my wife.

We started off Saturday with some aquatic education time for Logan. He really is getting into swimming. I think is favorite part is doing the dive off the wall. After that we ran up to Crissy Fields for baby Vivian’s first birthday. The weather started out cold, but warmed up before too long. They boys enjoyed the beach, although Logan has acquired his father’s (very healthy, sane, and frankly reasonable) respect (no it is not fear, please stop interrupting) for the ocean and would not go near it.

After the party we headed home for a little rest time before heading out to our next adventure, bowling. Taking the boys bowling was very fun. To begin with I somehow was able to get the lane and the boys’ shoes for free. All we paid for was our shoes. I, of course being the bowling pro, barely missed bowling a 300 (just missed it by about 180 points). Elisa and the boys were not far behind me. During the, highly competitive, game, Elisa had the great (great does not do it justice, more like legen……….wait for it……….dary) idea of ordering some of the snack bar nachos. Mmmmm stale chips and melted plastic cheese……….(insert drool here)…….

Of course all great bowling adventures (except for maybe in ’74 due to the strike shortened year) must be concluded with a trip to Denny’s in order to eat breakfast for dinner. Denny’s was everything that you could expect right down to the old lady at the front with the chains on her glasses, 50s style. The temptation to call her Flo was almost too much to bear. I refrained, mostly because this weekend was about the boys.

After Denny’s it was back to the house to finish up the preparations for Outside Movie night. In order to illustrate how awesome Elisa is and how she intended to leave it all on the floor this weekend, we painted a big white square on the side of the house which was going to serve as our movie screen. Saturday’s feature presentation was Ant Bully. I laughed. I cried. I drank scotch (which may have caused the first two).

The kids were in bed by 10:30 pm, and then back up to continue the weekend of awesomeness. On Sunday we took the boys to Gilroy Gardens, a very fun theme park that is designed for people that are approximately ½ the size of me and roughly 1/10^th to 1/5^th my age.

Logan loved it. With him you never know if you are going to get the scared kid or the adventurous kid. Fortunately we got the adventurous kid. It helped that he has a big brother that loves all kinds of rides. We went on nearly every ride (and even rode the train, at Logan’s very persistent insistence, twice), vastly overpaid for food, and generally had a great time. We even ran into some folks from the neighborhood (Village representing)

The drive home was quiet because everyone (even me a few times while I was driving, but never for more than 10-15 min….don’t judge me) fell asleep. We decided to finish off the weekend by ordering enough Chinese food to feed 2133245365409845 people (yum yum leftovers). All in all a crazy awesome weekend. The California Baker Boys thank Mama for it.

This morning will not be quite as much fun. To begin with, as I am writing this blog I am stuck in a BART car somewhere just outside of Daly City. Problem with the track. I am thinking about starting to scream and act like the car is on fire just to see what happens. Maybe I will make the news.

Cole also has a dentist appointment today to have two cavities filled. Apparently Chemotherapy reduces the amount of saliva in the mouth which increases the amount of cavities (another in the long list of reasons to avoid Chemo unless you really need it.).

In addition we are still waiting on the green light for Operation I Really Hope That UCSF Starts Tomorrow And That We Are Randomized For The One Cycle Group. We have an appointment at the Kaiser clinic this afternoon, so hopefully we will know by then (although I plan to start bugging them much earlier in the day to see if we can get the ball rolling a little faster).

In the meantime please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Graphic Artist.

6-24-11

2011-06-24T09:06:00.000-07:00

So anyway, like I was saying…yesterday we runned up to UCSF to sign all of the consent forms for the transplant procedure, and we met with the Doctor. I love meeting new doctors regarding new medical things (things is the most eloquent word in the English language. It just gets a bad rap. Don’t judge lest ye be judged) because we get a whole new set of worst case scenarios to mull over. Some people would find that disturbing and emotionally draining, but not me. I look at it like….well…no…it sucks, and I am tired of it. I do; however, appreciate that the worst case scenarios were always preceded by the word “rarely, and not by the phrase, “what will likely happen.

We also swung by, via the longcut (long cut is the grownup word for taking the emergency exit stairs from floor 3 to floor 7 then realizing that they are emergency stairs then having to go all the way back down to the first floor before some nice person finally lets you back into the hospital so that you can take the elevator), the 7^th floor pediatric ward. It is amazing how different UCSF and Kaiser Santa Clara really are. Kaiser is a very suburbia hospital. There is a lot of room, and everything moves at a more gentle pace. UCSF is very much an SF hospital. It seems very chaotic, it is very cramped, and the people you see are much more unique. There was a seemingly lost crazy lady hovering outside of our room for a while and then ended up kind of following us outside. She never said a word, but I am pretty sure (after some deep and meaningful introspective thought (i.e. drinking two Stellas in my new father’s day beer mugs that had been chilled in the freezer…yum)) she was a government agent who had been nearly killed and was suffering from amnesia (that is a good idea for a movie, someone should look into that).

We also learned, after I randomly commented that I had seen (what seemed to me to be) a large number of correctional officers, that at least one to two residents of Chez San Quinten come up to UCSF every day for medical treatment. Sometimes the Constitution is dumb.

All in all the day was pretty fun. Cole has embraced my challenge that he get up to 50 lbs by Tuesday. So he had doughnuts for breakfast, quesadilla for lunch, frozen pizza dipped in ranch for dinner, and 2 bowls of Cinnamon Toast Crunch (with magic fat powder added) for the unnamed meal at the end of the night that is really an attempt by kids to avoid having to go to bed (we should form a committee to name this meal).

Last night Cole facetimed (for those of you who are not as cool as Cole…Face Time is an app on the ipod and iphone that allows the user to video chat over WiFi) Uncle Chris and they planned their upcoming D&D campaign. I know I am biased because I love D&D, but I can’t tell you how awesome it is to see how excited he gets over this game.

We are looking forward to Chirs’ team’s impending California invasion, and Cole is crazy excited. As we wait, please raise your glasses and toast Cole professional golfer.

6-22-11

2011-06-22T19:51:00.001-07:00

For some reason it keeps getting harder to write. It is not really that I am tired, rather I think that it is more that with each passing day I get more and more used to the life that we now live. As a result, medical stuff does not seem like it is really worthy of writing about. I know that all of my adoring fans do not live with it everyday like we do, so I guess I will push on……woe is me….(I have never really tried to sound like a victim before. How did I do?)

I don’t remember the last update that I gave, and as I make it a point not to go back and read previous posts, I will just have to pick a point and start from there. If you feel lost, drop me a line and I can fill in the blanks.

I think in the interest of being the slightly off center person that I am, I am going to do this update backward. I will start with the present and work my way back to the starting point.

Cole is gearing up for his stay at UCSF. For those of you not in the know, the down and dirty procedure for the UCSF stay is as follows: 1)super high (much higher than any of the other rounds) dose of Chemo for 3-4 days; 2) 1-2 days of rest; 3)Stem Cell Transfusion (they are his own stem cells and will, apparently, smell very much like creamed corn. Modern medicine is amazing); 4) recovery.

We are also part of a study. The study has two test groups. One group does one cycle of steps 1-4 above. The other group does two cycles. From a purely selfish standpoint, I am hoping for the one cycle so that he can get out of the hospital as quickly as possible.

Cole is really excited about one aspect of his UCSF stay. Uncle Chris has designed (patent pending I am sure) a D&D campaign for Cole and the cousins to play. Excited is not really the right word. Giddy is probably more accurate.

Elisa, Cole and I are going to UCSF tomorrow (Thursday) to sign all the consent forms and do whatever other medical stuff needs to be done for Cole to get ready for the (as of right now) next Tuesday admission date.

These last two weeks are been filled with a bunch of doctor/clinic visits and tests. They were all supposed to be jammed into the previous week, but one test (bone marrow) had to be pushed a week so that his platelets could get to the right level. Also I totally dropped the ball and forgot to give him the potassium drops that are needed to protect some organs from the nuclear injection that he gets for the MIBG. Despite those minor setbacks and the two transfusions (one platelets and one red blood cells), Cole finished all this tests this afternoon. They even threw in a bonus 3-D test. It appears that he has all 3 Dimensions after all. Good for him.

Other than that, we have been enjoying the wonderfully warm weather in San Mateo. Elisa is out of school. Although the week right after school got out (cuz she is a glutton for punishment…why else would she have married me), she attended a week long class that was designed to increase her technological savvyness in the class room. She is now the queen of Google Docs.

Logan is down to 2 days at day care/preschool. Both boys have decided that their new passion is now woodworking. Logan refers to it as “fixing the wood.” For those of you who aren’t familiar with that term, “fixing the wood means to take a piece of wood and bang it repeatedly with a hammer then bang it repeatedly with every other tool irregardelssly of said tool’s actual purpose.

Cole, too, has been working with wood. Fortunately (and yet way more unfortunately because he has already surpassed my abilities) he actually tries to build things. He has currently built a water plane and is working on a lemonade stand. He is such a sophisticated carpenter that he has even hit his finger with a hammer (real, not plastic cuz dats how we roll).

Uncle Chris’ team comes out at the beginning of July, and we are all eagerly awaiting their arrival. Chris was able to secure (though means that are better left unsaid partially because this is a family blog and partially to avoid incriminating evidence reaching the D.A.’s ears) from the UofA A.D. a basketball signed by the Elite 8 UofA basketball team which includes very soon to be drafted Derrick Williams (not too late to change your mind and stay another year.)

So while we wait for UCSF to happen, I ask that you raise your glasses and toast Cole, NBA All-Star.

6-8-11

2011-06-08T21:51:00.000-07:00

I have developed this kind of strange fear. While I am always concerned about Cole’s cancer, I find that I am not really afraid of it right now. Maybe that is because he is doing so well, I don’t know. What I am terrified of is that Cole will get through all of this cancer stuff and as soon as the Dr says that he is cured, he will get hit by a bus, or an airplane will fall on him, or he will be abducted by aliens. Now as a parent you always have that fear that something might happen to your kids, but it seems that my sense of fear has been heightened lately. Very strange.

This evening we went to Cole’s open house for his kindergarten class. The teacher was very happy to see him. Cole was a little shy at first, but soon opened up and was chatting away with her. I was glad to see that the other kids remembered him by sight alone, and all seemed very genuinely happy to see him.

Part of the open house event was that they turned the multi purpose room into an art gallery to display all of the art the kids had been doing. Now this was not just Cole’s class, it was for the whole school. The organizers did an amazing job. At one point we were in the gallery and Cole was standing three of his friends. The moms were taking pictures (as moms do, especially at the end of the school year), and for about 30 seconds we were not the family dealing with cancer, Cole did not have cancer. He was just a kid standing with his friends. So far I have been pretty good about holding it together during this difficult time, but those 30 seconds almost crushed me. You see the problem was that those 30 seconds ended, and Cole does have cancer, and we have to deal with it every second of every day.

That being said, we will keep fighting the good fight, and while we do please raise your glass and toast Cole, the next Food Network Star.

6-6-11

2011-06-06T12:10:00.000-07:00

So I have been a big bucket of nerves and have been suffering from white screenitis(MS Word spell check says this word is misspelled, but I ask you Mr. Computer how would you spell it? No suggestions, then leave me alone), which is why I have not written since my last post right after Cole’s surgery. Also I assumed that since it is NBA Finals time, everyone would be much more interested in that than what I have to say. Apparently I was wrong. Sorry Bron Bron.

So by way of summary, Cole had his surgery on the 24^th of May in the year of our lord 2011. They were able to get the main tumor and just had to leave a “film” (as Dr. Sullivan describes it) of cancer cells on some important structures (like the aorta). She did tag these structures with tiny titanium tags so that the radiation techs will have some billboards to direct them to the cancer cells. In order to defray the costs of all this high faluten’ medicinal hocus pocus, we did obtain some corporate sponsorship. His titanium tags have appropriate little advertisements extolling the virtues of products such as Coke, Nike, and Depends.

So the surgery was on a Tuesday, and immediately after the surgery Dr. Sullivan said that he will probably be in the hospital for a week. We started off in the PICU (Pediatric Intensive Care Unit? Papays In California Usually? Protein Is Creepy and Useful?). PICU is kind of cool because you have absolutely no privacy and no bathroom. Well that is not entirely true. There is a super secret unknown to the general public and only super secret spies like me know about bathroom (crap, I was not supposed to talk about the secret bathroom. They are going to come after me now. If anything happens to me please go find the safety deposit box. It is the one in San Francisco. The password is “Fluffy Bunny Feet.” When you get there, open the contents and let the world know. Don’t let this secret die with me…..please help us Obi Wan, you are our only hope).

So he was then transferred to the normal Pediatric Unit (or PU for short and because it houses a bunch of kids, most of whom are stinky because that is how kids are). A week they told us. Uh, I don’t think so. Cole decided that on Saturday he had had enough, and snuck out of the hospital disguised as a kid who recovered amazing quickly from surgery.

So just to rub it in Dr. Sullivan’s face (a week, what a joke), Cole took an excursion to Malibu Grand Prix on Sunday (for those of you keeping scorecards at home, that is 5 days from the surgery). He played mini golf, rode the bumper boats, and he and Logan skillfully turned my $5.00 at the ticket giving games into 2 yo-yos and 3 plastic rings. We then decided to push our luck and go out to dinner that night. We went to Bennihana’s. Unfortunately Logan forgot to pack any pain medication for Cole, so he did not really get to enjoy it. We will definitely have to go back in the not too distant future so that he can have more fun.

So after enjoying the long weekend, Cole and I (armed with a suitcase full of D&D stuff) went back to the hospital to check him in so that he could knock out his last round of Chemo. Chemo started on Tuesday and he was discharged on Friday. The doctors told us that the effects, especially the nausea, of Chemo are cumulative which means that after this round he was going to feel as crappy as all the previous rounds plus this one together. Again Cole turned up his nose at the conventions of modern medicine, and instead decided to swing by San Jose on Friday and eat some homemade pizza and some cake. He wrestled with his cousins and assaulted his grandpa. The kid is a rock star.

So this week we have my parents visiting from tropical Arizona, which as we speak is burning again (Arizona catching on fire is a more accurate indicator of summer being here than any calendar or weatherman could ever be). Papa Baker has been tasked with building a living wall, a built-in book case, and a treehouse/fort. Cole is the assistant.

So we got our dates set for the big Disney World trip (thanks to Make-A-Wish). We are going to be going out the week of Thanksgiving (actually flying out on Thanksgiving….the plane better have a good turkey dinner for us). We will most likely be staying at a place called Give Kids the World. The place looks insanely awesome when viewed through the eyes of a kid. If you get a chance, check out their website.

So in the meantime please raise your glasses and toast Cole, playground equipment engineer.

5-24-11

2011-05-24T21:31:00.001-07:00

So today was the big surgery day for Cole. He went in around 9:45 and was in surgery for almost 6 hours. I am pretty sure that the actual surgery only lasted about 30 minutes, and the rest of the time was spent photographing all of his differnent body parts for medical textbooks (see the Chapter called, “ideal human form”) , but I can’t prove that.

The surgery was succesful in that the tumor mass was removed, no organs (or pianos) were removed, and 99% of the tumor cells were removed. They had to leave a sheen on some of the body structures (like the aorta). She did leave some little titaniam tags next to the sheens (and labled them destroy me please) for the radiation techs (think Star Wars or Star Trek) to know where to shoot their beams of cancer death.

Cole is in the PICU recovering this evening. He has been waking up about every 30 minutes or so, and has been pretty out of it due to the morphine (which he is not sharing. Will have to talk to him about that tomorrow); however, I know he is doing fine because all he wants to do is play D&D. The doctors who have examined him, post-op, have been happy with how he looks. Now comes the waiting game. We wait for him to recover. I think that this is the hardest part. This is when he looks the most helpless, and I feel the most helpless as a parent. It is, odviously, very fustrating to have to just sit and watch.

We have a male nurse tonight, and he is pretty cool. It is a very different experience having a male nurse. Instead of polite laughter at my inappropriate jokes, I get to talk sports instead.

Enough of that, let’s get to the important stuff. On Monday, the Make-A-Wish people called my people (which means she called me), and let us know that they had approved Cole’s wish for a Disney World Trip. 7 days/6nights of Mickey Theme Park Awesomeness. Not sure when we will go, but Cole is crazy excited about it. We just have to figure out when we go.

I will be in the hospital until Thursday morning, so I will probably do more writing, but for now, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, the heavyweight champion of the Mexical Wrestling League who is more famously known as, “El Pateador Del Culo.”

5-20-11

2011-05-20T05:56:00.001-07:00

I have been in that fuzzy brain thing that happens when I get really stressed out. With each day I am more and more stressed out about the upcoming surgery. It is strange that the last time that I was really stressed out was on 2/11 (first day of Chemo #1). Since then, we have been in the program, and Cole has been doing great.

I guess I have to go back to last Friday to get you caught up. The fundraiser dinner and auction was amazing. I must give a special thanks to the Friends Helping Friends Committee, Karin Cunningham, everyone who came, and everyone who donated items for the auction. We had a great turnout, and it was a lot of fun.

I was worried about Cole going into the thing because he was coming off that crappy Chemo #5, and he had not really been feeling all that great. To my utter amazement, he not only stayed longer than an hour, he actually stayed to the end. When Elisa took Logan home to go to bed, Cole hung around with me to help finish up. I tell you, the kid is a rock star.

The weekend was good. On Saturday we went down to Grandma and Grandpa Rinde’s house to celebrate Logan’s birthday. Kathy (of Kathy’s Kreative Kakes, who also donated a cake and gift certificate to the auction) made an awesome pirate cake for him (that he is still eating), and we had a very nice time. Auntie Julia came down with us, and we learned all about laser tag and the correlation between laser tag and Canadian super models.

Monday and Tuesday were pretty normal. On Wednesday Cole had his CT scan, and then I had to take him to the clinic for a transfusion of red blood and platelets. That was a fun 5 hours at the clinic. Yesterday we were back at the clinic this morning for a bone marrow aspiration (which is a fancy way to say that they stuck a huge needle in his hips and pulled out some marrow…fortunately he was asleep). We had an appointment with the surgeon later in the afternoon so Cole and I decided to go to Valley Fair Mall to kill some time.

The reason that Cole wanted to go to this mall was that it has both a Weztels Pretzlez (2 actually) and a CPK. So we went and got a pretzel and then took said pretzel to CPK to eat it along with our cheese pizza and then followed that with a butter cake a la mode (which is French for 1300 calories). Dr. Taggart should be happy that Cole definitely made his calorie count today.

The meeting with the surgeon was good, but also a little crappy. I am not really ready to talk about the ins and outs of the upcoming surgery because I am still too stressed out about it. I do ask; however, that you keep him in your thoughts, prayers, meditations, animal sacrifices, etc.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, lead guitarist for the mega band “She Totally Nailed Me With Her Snot.”

5-13-11

2011-05-13T11:30:00.000-07:00

***Please note that I wrote this late last night, but the blog website was down, so I am just now posting it.***

Yesterday was a very interesting day. I totally didn’t have to use my AK.

To begin with some ladies from the Make-A-Wish foundation came by to discuss with Cole what kind of wish he would like. Now for those of you who, as I used to be, are working under the impression that wishes are only granted to those that are losing the fight, so to speak, don’t worry. The wonderful people of the Make-A-Wish foundation grant wishes to those kids who have diseases and conditions that are life threatening.

So anywhooo, these three ladies came by to talk to Cole about what kind of wish he wanted. His wishes were: Disney Cruise, Iphone (but Cole, you already have a brand new Ipod. Why do you need an Iphone? because Dad the Iphone is more awesome), and trip to DisneyWorld. The set up is pretty cool. If they grant his wish, they pay all the expenses and everything. Pretty Cool.

Also, just as the Make-A-Wishettes were leaving, our neighbors (see Prospect Insider discussions, infra…or is it supra….or is it just super) came by to drop off the brand new PS3 that she got Sony (her employer) to donate for the auction. She also said that the winner can pick two games of their choice to go along with it.

Speaking of the dinner and auction today, it looks like it is going to be pretty cool. The Congresswoman’s people (I love saying that) have informed me that she will probably come by around 5ish. For the auction we have tons of cool stuff including but not limited to: Aaron Rowand signed jersey, football signed by Jim Otto of the Raiders, signed photo of Dan Boyle of the game 7 winning Sharks, a cake from Kathy’s Kreative Kakes, some handmade wood bowls and clocks, homemade beer, Skateboard stuff, some jewelry, cupcakes from Sibby’s, homemade cards, Dinner for 4 delivered to your door (courtesy of Bash Catering), Giants’ tickets, etc etc. Come out, it is at St. Robert’s Church in San Bruno from 5-8.

In addition, The San Mateo County Times called me for an interview about the dinner. I must say that Cole is rapidly becoming famouser than Captain Kangaroo. Check out the paper’s article at http://www.mercurynews.com/san-mateo-county/ci_18053428. They did a very nice article about the dinner.

My last post was a little premature regarding Cole’s status, but only a little. He has most certainly been doing better than he was at this stage after Chemo #3, but he is still not back to where he was before going into Chemo #5. I am happy that each day he is feeling a little bit better, and each day he is eating more and taking less anti-nausea medications. He event went to Toys R Us with Elisa today to get a birthday present for Logan (who just turned 3 and I am happy to report that he has spent the entire week at school in underwear and has only been wearing a diaper at night. Now if we can just expidite the learning how to wipe his own butt, life will be super good).

We are going to the clinic today to get his labs drawn. I am hoping that all will be well. I will write something about how the dinner goes tomorrow night, but for now, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, pitcher for your San Francisco Giants.

5-9-11

2011-05-09T00:15:00.000-07:00

First to some blog business. I have enabled comments on the blog, so feel free to comment if you would like. I had originally disabled comments because I was not emotionally strong enough at the beginning to have a discussion. I was just writing to vent, and to get things off my chest. I think that now; however, I am more ready to engage in conversations.

On to new business.

If Cole were a little bit older, this is what he would say to Chemo #5…”How you like me now?” For those of you who have been with us for a while, Chemo #5 is the same set of drugs as Chemo #3 and they are nasty little buggers. Last time this set really knocked him on his butt. He had to stay at the hospital for a couple of extra days, and in the end the only thing that really pulled him out of his nausea and lethargy was the threat of a feeding tube.

This time could not have been any more different. He had no problem eating (he did not eat much, and did not really have an appetite, but what he did eat stayed down), and no problem drinking. His spirits stayed high all the way up to discharge (which was not delayed at all). He did get a little sick this evening before bed, but not even really that bad. I tell you, that kid is so much stronger that I could ever even hope to be.

So now my little man is home, and we are 500/600ths of the way done with Chemo. We do have one more little twist before we can get that last Chemo done. The surgery. We are all set for surgery on 5/24. This means that in a mere 16 days Dr. Sullivan is going to go in and pull the remainder of that little bastard out of my son.

In advance, I want to say good riddance, and f#*k you to that damn tumor. Who do you think you are, trying to take my son away from me? How dare you. If you were a person, I would have killed you long ago, and I would have done it with my bare hands.

After the surgery we will have one more round of Chemo (we bought the package deal, buy 5 get the sixth for free), and then we will be done with the destruction phase. After that we will commence with the Marshall II plan. We will painstakingly rebuild the good stuff inside him that we had previously destroyed (collateral damage).

For now; however, let’s keep taking one step at a time. Please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Governor.

5-6-11

2011-05-06T21:19:00.000-07:00

Thus endeth the 48 hour run of Wii. Of course we did not play for the entire 48 hours. We would play for a couple of hours and then do something else.

During the last two days I have learned some things.

Number 1 is that I am old. I remember back in the day when I could play well over 24 continuous hours of a single video game with nothing but chips and Dr. Pepper to keep me alive. Now; however, after playing for just about an hour, I was ready to call it quits. Cole kept me going, the little taskmaster. Granted it was easier for him because when he grew tired of playing, he would just stop, but make me continue. How can you say no to a kid in a hospital bed.

Number 2 is that I still love Mario. I love all the secret puzzles and tricks that, once discovered, make the game much easier.

And C, if you play one game long enough, images of said game will burn into your retinas so that every time you close your eyes you will see, in this case, Mario running and jumping around in your brain.

Another thing I learned is that the advances in the field of medicine (especially oncology) are amazing, and my son will eventually owe his life to these advances; however, we (as a society) have obviously chosen to put our efforts into medical advances to the detriment of the potential advances in chairs that are in hospital rooms that theoretically turn into beds. Seriously, we are in the 21^st century, and we still can’t make something comfortable for me to sleep on? What’s up with that?

Let’s put my grumbling aside for a while. Cole had a pretty good day today. He did not feel like eating anything, but he was not really feeling nauseous, so that is a partial victory. This round of Chemo is some bad stuff.

We have been very proactive with respect to the anti-nausea medicine, and so far he seems to be doing better after two days than he was after two days of Chemo 3.

I am hoping that he can bust out tomorrow, or Sunday at the latest; but for now think of him, and raise your glasses and toast Cole, Financial Advisor.

5-5-11 Heureux mai cinquième

2011-05-05T14:49:00.000-07:00

So it has begun……a (mom approved if you can believe it) 48 hour run of uninterrupted Wii session. Well sort of uninterrupted. These doctors keep coming in and bothering us with stuff like medicine and information and other such nonsense. I am happy to report that despite all of those distractions, the princess has been successfully rescued by the dynamic plumbing duo. Now we have moved on to the bonus secret level. It seems that it will keep us occupied for quite a while.

We started the first day of the 3 day cycle of Chemo #5, or as I like to call it..Chemo Number 5. This is the nasty cycle (see cycle 3), but this time I am making sure to be as proactive as possible with respect to the anti-nausea medicines. They even brought out a new one for us that apparently has only recently been approved for human Americans.

Cole has had a wonderful Alone With Daddy Playing Video Games All Day I Have Cancer And Am In The Hospital Getting Chemotherapy So I Can Eat Whatever I Want diet so far today. The AWDPVGADIHCAAINTHGCSICEWIW Diet consists of an entire quart bag of Goldfish crackers, almost an entire super stack can of Pringles, and a fruit cup. As a sign of solidarity, I also partook in an almost entire super stack can of Pringles. For lunch we will be having mint chocolate chip ice cream. Cole is planning on writing a book called, “The AWDPVGADIHCAAINTHGCSICEWIW Diet…..the last diet you will ever need.” I imagine it will be a best seller even before it is written. In fact, there is not really a point in actually writing it since its best sellerness is a foregone conclusion. The best seller store can simple just mail us a check. Thanks.

Right now I am witnessing a fight between modern science and the stubborn willpower of a 6 year old. Cole was just given a dosage of Benadryl that I think is what they give to mastodons to help them sleep. Cole does not want to sleep, and is fighting the wonderful effects of the drug. I had to make a deal with him that he had to lay there for 30 minutes, and if he is still awake after 30 minutes, then he does not have to take a nap. He lasted about 45 seconds before nodding off. I hope his dream’s soundtrack for this nap is I fought the law and the law won.

We have a nurse today that we have never had before. I find that kind of amazing since we have spent so much quality time here. We have been moved to the other side of the hall which is nice because the view is vastly superior on this side. In a situation like this it is the little things that are important.

Well that does it for me for now. Please raise your glasses and toast Cole, best selling author.

5-3-11

2011-05-03T22:30:00.001-07:00

So, here is something cool. Congresswoman Jackie Speier’s office emailed me to RSVP for the dinner on 5/13 (still can’t get over the fact that it is Friday the 13^th.). This means one of two things. Either the Congresswoman is very cool and really wants to help, or (and the odvious actual reason) the government is finally on to me.

Ms. Speier will be at the dinner sometime between 7 and 8. And if her presence alone was not presents enough, she is going to auction off a lunch with her (possibly in DC in the Member’s Lounge….sorry flight not included). We are working out the details with her people (for years I have been trying to interact with someone else’s people and have always been thwarted….how sweet it is….how sweet it is) on how that is going to work exactly, but regardlessly, it will be fun.

And now for the reason that we are all actually here together tonight. Cole has been doing well. He went to the clinic today, and instead of getting his blood drawn, he received a bucket and was told to not only pee in the bucket for the next 24 hours, but to store said pee in the ‘fridgerator until tomorrow.

On a separate not, Cole has decided to start a lemonade stand. Best chilled lemonade in the Bay Area.

Tomorrow night Cole and I will check back in to a little B&B that we like to hang out at every three weeks or so. This will be the fifth such trip of the hero in training. Yes, you may not have known this (Royal Order IV prohibited me from discussing this until after he had passed certain trials), but Cole is a hero, of the olde schoole varietye, in training. Thus far he has progressed through the training program with more success than even Baldor the Fat. Epics will someday be written about him. If anybody knows any blind poets that are looking for a job, please let me know.

All kidding aside, this round of Chemo is the nasty one. This one really lays him out with the nausea and the lethargy. Last time we had this set (Round 3), there was some sort of mix-up regarding the anti nausea medications, and he did not get everything that he could have gotten. I think it was only the thought of his AZ cousins (and the threat of a feeding tube) that pulled him out of it. Unfortunately this time we will not be able to pull out the AZ card, but I am hoping that if we use effective strategery with regards to medications (for both of us), we can get through this nasty round.

Assuming that we do, with little to no complications, we will be all set for his surgery on 5/24. I have to say that I have gotten used to the Chemos, the hospital, the clinic, and the drastic change in our lives; however, I am petrified of this surgery. Of course, Cole does not see it as a big deal. Once I told him that he will be asleep for the whole surgery, he was totally fine with it. I am not.

Well, let’s cross that bridge when we get to it, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, restaurateur.

5-2-11 Fundraising Dinner Update

2011-05-02T21:59:00.000-07:00

I am going to blatantly plagiarize someone else for this blog. As you know the wonderful community of San Bruno is putting on a fundraiser dinner for Cole on May 13th (Friday the 13th.....awesome......). The following is an email that the President of the PTA at Allen Elementary (yeah I know what you are thinking....wow Jim [by the way this is the first time that I have ever referred to myself in the third person and I feel delightfully dirty for doing it] how do you know so many powerful people? All I can tell you is that the answer to the question can be found within the question itself.....yeah that was deep. I think I have been hanging out with Julia and her decadent ways too much lately) sent out into the www world. I will post some more concrete details as well as a very entertaining description of the items being auctioned off.

From Karin Cunningham:
Hi Friends,

Today, I am promoting a pasta dinner fundraiser for my son's teacher's 6 year old son at Allen School, San Bruno. Little Cole Baker has stage 4 cancer and receiving on going chemo treatments. He was diagnosed just this year. His father, Jim, is writing a daily blog/journal for the public to read. I don't know if her realizes that he is a very good writer and is guaranteed to make you laugh and cry. The link is posted above.

I reposted this blog link on Facebook to get the word out that some help might be needed and was approached by the Friends Helping Friends Committee at St. Robert's, also in San Bruno. They are putting together a pasta dinner fundraiser to help with the almost $30,000 extra dollars needed to help with medical bills. The Friends Helping Friends Committee is a a community group that helps raise funds for people in our community who are battling an illness.

Cole's Pasta Dinner Fundraiser:

Friday, May 13, 2011 5-8 pm Hennessy Hall, St. Robert's Church, San Bruno

Eat in or take out $10. Adults, $5. Children, $25. Family (up to 4 member)

Raffle and silent auction

Come show your support and enjoy a pasta dinner with friends!

Sincerely,

Karin Cunningham (David and Jasmine Ochoa's mom)
Allen School PTA President

***
Thanks Karin

4-26-11

2011-04-26T21:21:00.001-07:00

You know I can handle the vomit (although thankfully there has not been that much, and even less on my watch), watching the needles go in, watching blood transfusions, hair loss, etc. Mind you it is not easy, and I do not mean to make light of all the crap we are going through, but at the end of the day, I can handle it. I can deal with making plans for surgery, stem cell transfusion, and multiple consecutive sessions of radiation with no problem. I can deal with all of these big things, but it is the little stuff that kills me.

Today I was at the oncology clinic (more on that later) with Cole and I saw a little girl about Cole’s age walking with an ever so slight limp. All of a sudden I was filled with guilt at the memory of an unaware dad pulling his son through the streets of San Francisco and trying to force him to “walk normal.” How was I supposed to know that he had a monster eating him from the inside out? My main thinking brain knows that I could not have known; however that does not alleviate the guilt.

Also the last few nights Cole has asked me to scratch his back. Laying there in his bed scratching his back took me back to the time before diagnosis when the only think that would help Cole sleep or just stop crying for a minute or two was for me to scratch him (his ass specifically). I remember feeling a little bitter that I was not getting a good night sleep because I had to lay on that uncomfortable futon mattress for hours on end. Now when I come out of scratching his back I feel like someone punched me in the stomach.

OK we are done with that, and with feeling sorry for ourselves for now. On to the updates… Today Cole and I went to the clinic to meet with Dr. Taggart and get his labs drawn. For the previous 24 hours Cole had been kind of droopy and did not really have an appetite. As soon as Dr. Taggert walked into the exam room, she noticed that he looked a little pale and said he would probably need a transfusion.

Sure enough our normal 20 minute clinic visit turned into a 4 hour tour…a 4 hour tour. Fortunately we had the run of the place which means that we had uninterrupted use of the large screen TV to play Wii on. That is a mischaracterization of what happened. You see, I had gone to get lunch and all Cole wanted was ice cream. So while Cole ate his ice cream, he directed me on how and what to play on the Wii. Then, after he was done eating, he was so cold from being in a doctor’s office (seriously why does it have to be so cold?) and eating ice cream, and getting blood (they said the blood was cold…is that why Cole has started growing scales?) that he just wrapped himself in his blanket and continued to direct me. I was very fortunate to have a good Wii coach, and I must say that I performed admirably on Wii playground.

Back at home later this afternoon, Cole was feeling better but had problems eating his homemade hamburger, fries, and pickle due to his mouth sore which is right on the front of his tongue (looking back maybe a bunch of salty foods were not the best menu choice). The plan for tomorrow is for him to eat some egos and then try and find some fairly bland food to try and get his calories up.

Also I am pleased to provide a little update on the May 13^th fundraiser dinner in San Bruno. As of right now the auction will be a silent, blind (not sure the exact verbage) auction. This means that each item will have a box attached to it. If you want to place a bid, you will put in a piece of paper with your name and amount. At the end of the night, I will figure out who has the winning bid for each item and contact that person. We already have some pretty cool stuff. We have a signed Giants’ Jersey (Aaron Rowan), a gift card to Draegers, a gift card to Half Moon Bay Brewery, a gift card to 231 Ellsworth, a few passes to the Discovery Museum in Sausalito, some skate gear from Atlas Skate Shop in San Bruno, some items from San Mateo Lock Works, a cake from Kathy’s Kreative Kakes, and I am sure there are others that I can’t remember off the top of my head, but please come by and have some awesome spaghetti and bid on some items.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Veterinarian.

4-21-11 Let's Go Giants

2011-04-21T12:47:00.000-07:00

Dear Blog it has been four days since my last entry. During that time I have been busy spending time with my family and enjoying life.

Cole came home from the hospital on Sunday evening, and has been doing very well all week. Elisa has been home on Spring Break, so the two of them have been having the best of times hanging out.

Cole had a clinic visit on Tuesday, and his labs came back very good. His WBC was so high that they took him off the shot. He has labs again tomorrow, and will likely be back on the GCSF tomorrow evening. He is not too upset about that though because he has grown accustomed to the shot, and now it is only a minor annoyance.

He has been operating at a nice and high level of energy, and is even going to go ride bikes with his buddy Noah tomorrow. All in all he has been doing well; however, I am not looking forward to the next round of Chemo as it is the same set of drugs that was in Chemo #3, which floored him. At least this time we know what to expect and will be much more proactive in attacking the nausea.

I want to give everyone a heads up that on May 13^th there will be a fundraising dinner in San Bruno. There will be a donation box at the door as well as an auction. We are still getting the items for the auction together, so if you have anything you would like to donate, or if you are a business owner, or know one, that would like to donate gift certificates and such, that would be greatly appreciated. Drop me an email or catch me on facebook. So far we have some pretty cool stuff that has been donated (even a signed SF Giants thing……stay tuned for what it is….if I feel like telling you…..which I will probably do later……I just like writing like this…….).

I will post again after Cole’s appointment tomorrow, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, Federal Magistrate.

4-17-11 Que Sera Sera

2011-04-17T13:32:00.000-07:00

I love the Universe and all of her little jokes. For those of you who are in the know, you know, prior to Cole being blessed with this wonderful little sum bitch Cancer, I had applied to Golden Gate Law School. Well after Cole’s diagnosis, I had all but decided that there was no way that I could possibly start law school. This was for two major reasons.

First was that we did not know what kind of timeline we were going to be working with respect to Cole’s recovery/hospital stays/etc so I did not want to lock up a large number of hours with Law school only to have to drop out because I had to attend to Cole too often.

Second was that it did not seem wise to take on cxx dollars in additional debt while at the same time asking people to donate money to Cole’s fund.

I had accepted that I was not going to go to law school, and was completely happy with the decision. I was really enjoying being home with Elisa and the kids every night, not working on weekends, and just enjoying life (or at least as much as that is possible when you kid has an advanced Cancer).

Well the Universe decided to throw another curve ball at me. In yesterday’s mail, I received my acceptance letter from Golden Gate Law. I was not surprised that they accepted me. What did surprise me was that they are offering me a full ride dean’s merit scholarship. Under any other circumstances I would have been bouncing off the walls and today would be nursing a hangover, but given Cole’s situation, it just makes for a crazy hard decision. Thanks Universe. You definitely keep me on my toes.

Speaking of Cole, he is all set to bust out of the hospital this evening. We are just waiting for the last medication drip to get finished (should be around 6:30 this evening), and then we should be able to get out of here.

Cole has tolerated this round of Chemo fairly well. His nausea has been manageable (not one vomit…knock on wood), and he has been active and alert the whole time he has been in. He has not really had too much of an appetite, but he eats when pressed, and he has been drinking well. The Doctors are very happy with his progress, and so am I.

It amazes me how well he takes all of this. He has completely accepted the fact that his life now includes all of this medical stuff. He truly is an amazing kid.

That is all for now, and we will speak more in the future, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, project manager.

4-14-11

2011-04-14T20:34:00.001-07:00

I am in heaven and Carne Asada is its name…er something. Thank you Papagayos for a wonderful burrito.

I am in the hospital with Cole and the wonderful Rachael nurse lady. Hopefully we will have a quiet overnight nurse.

We are watching 110 minutes of SpongeBob Squarepants. Elisa for some reason hates me so she pulled the movie out of the DVD cart right before her and Logan left. SpongeBob is weird.

So far Cole has been handling the Chemo well. He ate a large cheese quesadilla and about MC chips, complete with salsa, guacamole, and crema….mmmm crema….

Tomorrow Cole and I are going to brave the dungeons and maybe face a dragon or too. I also brought Pirate’s Cove, so maybe we will play that.

I am hoping that Cole feels like going to sleep early tonight because I am exhausted, my brain still feels like mush. I want to snap out of this, but I am not sure how. I think that when we get closer to hospital time, my stress level increases which causes my brain fogginess.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole Cartoon artist.

4-13-11

2011-04-13T21:19:00.000-07:00

I have been finding it harder and harder to write as each day passes. I am not sure if I am starting to wear out or if I am just settling into my new life that includes a kid with cancer, but irregardlessly, it is harder. It is not harder to actually write. It is harder to make myself sit down, open the computer, and get started.

I also have been noticing that my brain is intermittently sluggish. You know when you are trying to watch a video on the internet (hey, enough of that. This is a family blog…not those kinds of videos), but you have a slow connection. The video will play just fine and then freeze for a while, and then play just fine again. That is kind of how my brain, and my me-ness has been. I will be going along just fine and then suddenly I freeze inside. I appear to be moving along as regular, but it is just a ruse. My body moves by rote, but my mind is frozen. Then all of a sudden, I am moving and thinking as normal again. It really sucks.

OK, boring emotional and crazy stuff is done. Let’s move on to Cole and the rest of the team. Cole is back in the hospital for Chemo. Elisa has the first overnight and then duty tomorrow. I hate when she is there because I cannot sleep when she is not in the bed. I sleep better at the hospital on that god awful chair bed thing than I do in my nice comfortable bed without her.

Cole should, hopefully, be back out on Saturday. The doctors said that this round of Chemo will be less nauseating than the last round, but a little more than the first two rounds.

Cole has been in really good spirits for the last couple of weeks. He has been eating well, and has even been learning how to cook. His weight is up, and he has almost breached the sought after weight of .025 tons. He has developed a taste for milk with whipped cream to go along with the staples of Totinos pizza, pancakes, grilled cheese, and the fattiest salad dressing in the entire world.

I’m done for the night, but until next time please raise your glass and toast Cole, lyrical gangsta.

3-8-11 (sort of...started writing on 3-7-11)

2011-04-07T00:32:00.001-07:00

Now as a rule I am completely unable to watch any show or movie that has a kid being hurt, or being evil, etc, and ever since this thing with Cole has happened the list of self-banned material has increased. With all that I somehow found myself watching a show (Criminal Minds, a show that I normally really like) that involved a man who had lost his entire family over something that was out of his control (in this case drunk driver killed his family) and a kid that was seriously sick (sociopath. I know it is different but a sick kid is still a sick kid). I should have known better than to watch it, but I could not turn it off.

It got me to thinking about how sucky (yes it is a word) this whole thing with Cole is. If Cole had gotten Cancer because I smoked around him, or because I fed him lead paint for breakfast, or I made him an asbestos sweater. But none of those things happened. Cole just drew the short end of the stick. He lost the lottery. What a shitty thing this is.

Now you are probably thinking that Cole must have been having a few bad days, or the vomiting has been severe, or something else bad has caused me to start dwelling on the unfairness of it all. Actually the opposite is true.

Today Cole and I had a super fun day. We played Wii for way more hours that will make Elisa happy (Elisa, you are expressly forbidden from reading this paragraph). I taught Cole how to add with carrying (now called regrouping). I helped him to start writing a story. I made him cook his own lunch. We made cupcakes. We laughed, and generally had an awesome day.

So there I was watching this show that I should not have been watching when I heard Cole cough twice within a span of 2 minutes. For all of the rest of you with kids, you know that when your kid coughs, your ears perk up but you otherwise continue with what you were doing. I, on the other hand, ran into his room with a bowl just in case he was going to be sick. He was not, but after I ran in there I looked down at him and saw how fragile he still really is. He is not that robust, healthy, chubby little boy that I remember from just a few months ago, and it is just not fair.

With all of that Negative Nancying (yes it is a word, stop interrupting please or we will never get done) over and done with, I am happy to report that Cole is doing well. He had an appointment at the clinic on Tuesday. He counts were high enough that he did not need a transfusion, so that is good. He is still getting his daily shot though.

We go into Chemo #4 next week. We are inching closer and closer to the surgery. I think that right now that is my biggest fear. It is not the surgery itself that scares me, but I am scared that they will look at his CT et al and say that they can not operate. I don’t know if I will be able to handle it.

I am hopeful that everything will continue to go according to plan, but in the meantime please raise your glasses and toast Cole, FBI agent.

4-2-11 Cole is 6!!!!

2011-04-02T23:20:00.001-07:00

Forgive me blogger for I have sinned. It has been 5 days since my last blog.

This has been a crazy 5 days. You know when you have those weeks that seem to last forever (whether for good or bad or interesting reasons), and then when you look back on it, you are amazed that it was only 5 days? Well that has been my week. It has been such a crazy week, jammed with awesome, difficult, and interesting things that for the first time in the history of my life I had to go back and review my last posting to see what I had last talked about.

After reviewing my last post (and I must say I am a wonderful blogger), we are ready to begin.

Cole finished his chemo medicine on Sunday afternoon, but had to stay in the hospital Sunday night for post hydration. Sunday night turned into Monday night and it wasn’t until Tuesday that he finally got to go home. This third round of Chemo really kicked his ass with respect to nausea. We scrapped the super big Arizona Baker surprise and Chris spent the night with him on Monday night. We did manage to have Chris, Jackson, and Sophia do a muted surprise at the hospital, which helped a bunch.

On Tuesday one of the doctors came in to talk about Cole. At that time Cole had not eaten anything or drank anything that had stayed down for about 48 hours, so you can imagine that my little boy was just laying there like a blob. He was completely withdrawn and would not talk to anyone. The doctor started to talk about the likelihood of putting in a feeding tube into Cole’s nose. Cole rose from death’s doorstep and said, just like John Wayne would have (except make the exchange from the gun), “Give me an animal cracker.” Not too long after, Cole and Chris busted out of the hospital. They keep telling me that the hospital actually did discharge them, but I remain skeptical.

Iregardlessly, once we finally got him home, he was still very weak and had trouble keeping anything down. Jackson, Sophia, Logan, Elisa, Chris, and I used our magic powers of awesomeness to bring him around to the point that he is back to eating his frozen pizzas every day (Totinos…$1.50 per pizza…..42 grams of fat and about 1,000,000 calories which means that it is the most efficient calorie/$$ machine in the history of the world….and they are also strangely addicting….I think someone should look into this), being sassy, and most importantly smiling again. I can not begin to describe the effect that Jackson and Sophia had on Cole, and I can not thank them enough for coming. I really look forward to them moving out here for good.

I did have one very interesting and sobering moment. One evening Cole was not feeling super great, and he asked me to scratch his back for a while. As I was doing this, I thought back to when he first got sick (before we had any idea of what it was), and he would wake up crying in pain and feverish, the only way to get him to sleep was to lay with him and scratch his back. It was very painful for me laying there thinking about that and how at the time I was not overly concerned with Cole (I just figured he had the flu or something. I mean Cancer, really? ). Now I am not the sort of person who usually dwells on things or lets guilt get to me (some would say to my fundamentally shallow range of emotions), but that night, thinking back, almost crushed me.

As we approached Friday, April 1, 2011, the amount of stuff that Cole was acquiring was reaching critical mass, so we authorized some early birthday present opening. He got some very cool stuff (games, Sponge Bob, and the like), but one gift blew him away. Elisa’s friend, and former co-worker, teaches in Cupertino (or somewhere down that direction) and has been talking to her class about Cole. These kids took it upon themselves to raise enough money to buy Cole an Ipod Touch 4G. Unfreaking believable. I hate to say that this gift totally overshadowed the gift that we got him (a new bike), but you should never feel bad about getting beat by the best (especially all you Wildcat fans).

On Friday Cole, the AZ Baker, and I all played some D&D (for those of you who are either not nerdy enough or too young to know what D&D is, please go find a 30ish nerd to explain), and Cole really got into the imaginative story aspect of the game. This is a game that I played as a kid, and it makes me so happy to share it with Cole.

We also had a great party on Friday. Given Cole’s iffy state with respect to how he was feeling, we tried to keep the party small. We told him to invite 4 boys to the party. In my mind it was going to be a pretty laid back party that would probably involve some video games. Well I did not figure in the additional family members that those kids would bring, the AZ Bakers, nor the Rindes. By the end of it all, we had a full house and a front yard full of screaming kids. It was a little overwhelming for Cole who spent most of the party in a corner of the deck watching. I know he was happy to have this return to a normal life event that was not defined by his Cancer even if he did not seem to show it on Friday.

Cole opened the rest of his gifts on Friday evening, and I must thank all of you who were so generous (most of you above and beyond what you have already given or helped) to help make Cole’s birthday one that he will remember for all the right reasons. Thank you.

Today we all went to the local nerd cave (also known as Gator Games) and Cole got to pick out a character figurine and some dice. Welcome to nerdville my son. The AZ Bakers left, and we then headed down to SJ to hang with the Rindes. Cole got to ride his bike around (and so did Logan who inherited Cole’s old bike), and we just enjoyed the nice weather.

All in all it was a nice week and I am glad that it is ending with Cole feeling good. We still have a long road ahead of us, but for now please raise your hand and toast Cole ESPN analyst.

3-28-11 Bear Down

2011-03-26T13:54:00.000-07:00

Cole is back in Chemo this weekend. He went in on Wednesday night and Chemo started on Thursday. He had a little problem with nausea on Thursday, but since then he has been doing very well. He does not have a monster appetite, but he has eaten some. He even ate some of the leftover taco meat that I had brought for me to eat for dinner. His spirits are high, and he is blissfully unaware that Uncle Chris and his cousins Jackson and Sophia are going to be visiting all next week, and will be in town on Sunday. It is a secret so don’t tell him. When he comes home from the hospital, they will be waiting for him.

We got the test results back from his MIBG, MRI, CT, and Bone Marrow tests. I was initially told that the tests showed no disease, and that the tumor was gone. While looking back there was an obvious miscommunication, at the time I thought that we had been given a miracle. Unfortunately, but now obviously, that was not the case. That being said; however, the tests were very encouraging. The tumor itself has decreased from 6X6 (cm?, m?, km?, fathoms?) to 4X4. Also the MIBG tests showed no disease in the bone marrow. The bone marrow aspiration test showed no disease at the more than molecular level (is there a word for that? If not, I will dub the term supramolceluar). At the molecular level, there was still a very small (test result used the word rare) number of disease cells. All of this together means that Cole’s body is responding to Chemo exactly how we want it to. Hopefully we will stay on this path, and beat this bastard.

We have been doing well at home, and have settled into a routine where Cole’s treatment is just part of the routine. Logan is having fun in school, and recently made the best rainbow in his class. I know it is early but he definitely shows promise as a rainbow engineer. There is good money in that field…not everybody knows that.

We have used up all of the gift card money that my work gave me (thank you all for that by the way), but fortunately so many of you have been so generous with donations and dinners, and other forms of help that we are still doing ok. The goal is to get to the summer, and then go from there.

For all of those who are interested, Julia is hosting a happy hour birthday party for her/fundraiser for Cole on Tuesday at a bar in SF. We have a flyer going around, and if you bring in the flyer a portion of your tab will go towards the Cole fund. There will also be a raffle of some of the most awesome raffle items I have seen in my long and distinguished career thus far. Julia posted the flyer on her facebook, and I will post on mine. If you are not on facebook, send Julia or me an email and we can get one to you.

Cole has asked me to re-post his birthday wish list. Again I caution you that this list has neither been approved nor edited by Mom, but here it is:

Ipad, Ipod touch, Iphone, ITunes credit
Spongebob Stuff (slippers)
Art supplies (paper, crayons, etc)
Jeans
T-Shirts
Sneakers
Crazy 8 Socks
Baseball Caps
Knit Caps
Books (Junie B Jones, Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew, Phineas and Ferb, etc.) that are at a 1^st or 2^nd grade reading level
Games (Guess Who, any strategy games)
Stuffed animals
Bag of balloons
Flip flops
New bedding (Spongebob, Cars, Mickey)
Amazon.com credit

Please review the list, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole the Zombie Farm super player.

3-22-11

2011-03-23T00:44:00.003-07:00

Cole has the madness….March Madness. For every game that is on, he paces back and forth screaming for his team to win. He puts up signs and when they win, he dances around like a maniac. His ultimate chosen team this year is San Diego State. They are still in it, but have a tough contest against UConn. Cole is winning the pool after the first two rounds. He picked both the

Morehead St.

and Richmond upsets and the Richmond victory over

Morehead St

On to updates. Today Cole had a minor procedure called a bone marrow aspiration. Basically the doctor made two very small cuts on the backs of his hips and pulled some bone marrow out to test it. Tomorrow (although now technically today because it is well after midnight when I am writing this) we are going back to Kaiser for an MRI, a CT Scan, and an MIBG test. Cole will get sedated for the MRI. Hopefully these tests will show that the tumor has decided to leave completely and that Cole will be back in school on Monday. OK maybe it is a pipe dream, but it is my pipe dream so leave me alone.

Tomorrow night Cole will head back to be admitted for Chemo Round 3. Dr. Wong said that this round of Chemo will have much more severe side effects, so Cole needs your thoughts and prayers even more than before.

For now however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, the biologist.

3-17-11 Should-Have-Been-Birthday

2011-03-17T21:30:00.000-07:00

Today Cole and I went to UCSF to do the stem cell collection. With the fact that we had to be up in the City by 7am, and due to my anxiety about the upcoming process, I had a great deal of trouble sleeping. I remember seeing the clock run the down the back side of 1am and I woke up at 4am. Thank you Peet’s for getting me going this morning. I would not have made it without you.

We made it to UCSF in time and met a wonderfully quirky nurse who got Cole ready for the installation of the new IV line in his leg. Cole was a little scared that it was going to hurt going in despite the fact that they kept telling him that it would not. I think Cole has hit that point where he understands that adults who speak to him like a child will always lie to him about how much it will hurt. In this case however, it really did not seem to hurt. They put some numbing cream on his legs and then injected some more numbing medicine, and then gave him an anti-anxiety relaxing medicine. Cole, the nurses, and I talked about Ipods while the doctor did his business. The tube they put in his leg was, to me at least, a ridiculously long tube given Cole’s small leg. I decided to not speak up and let doctor go ahead and install the line. I figured there was no need to embarrass the doctor with my clearly superior medical knowledge. I know that you are probably thinking that the doctor has been to medical school and has been doing this for a while. But for all I know he spent medical school researching pancake recipes. After it was all said and done, I had to accept, albeit grudgingly, that the doctor did an outstanding job and Cole never made his pain face.

We then headed down one floor to the collection room. As we walked out the door, one of the nurses had to run back to get an elevator key. I figured this was to activate the employee elevator. I was wrong, and the reality was way cooler than my imagination (which is something that has very rarely happened in my life). The key gave us priority to the elevators. Now when I say priority, I don’t mean that the elevator comes to us first. This super awesome magic key (totally have to get one) sends the closest elevator directly to you, and then tells all the other occupants that they have to immediately get out and let us do our business. AWESOME!!!!! Now I know what it feels like to be royalty.

****Interlude******

Today is the day that should have been Cole’s birthday. Cole and I decided that he should celebrate his should have been birthday as well as his real birthday.

*****************

The collection was, as most procedures that give me a great deal of advance anxiety, pretty unremarkable. They hooked some tubes up to his new IV line and cycled his blood for a few hours. Cole played Ipad the entire time (have you noticed a continuing pattern with Cole and Ipad and getting through tough times? Thank Mr. Jobs), and before I knew it, we were all done. They came in and took out the IV line. The only part that hurt was when the doctor intern (or resident, not sure but I know that she was about 12 years old….Geez I am old) had to put a lot of pressure to stop the bleeding. That ten minutes aside, Cole had no problems and we were able to come home this evening. The goal was to collect 15M cells. If they were not able to get that many today, we would have had to stay overnight and do another collection tomorrow. My man said, “You want 15M from me. Here is 36M, keep the change.” OK maybe he did not say it out loud, but I know he was thinking it.

This evening Cole was introduced to the show Wipeout. He found it super funny. What we found funny was that he was sneeringly making fun of the contestants, saying that he could do the crazy activities so why couldn’t they. It was awesome.

Time for some quick shout outs. Please forgive me if I do not mention anyone specifically, but the amount of help has been so overwhelming and abundant that I could not possibly begin to name you all. You know who you are, and please understand that I thank you from the bottom of my heart. I would like to throw out a special thank you to the San Mateo Rotary Club for their generosity. In addition I would like to thank the schools (Cole’s, Elisa’s, and others) who stepped up and helped out Cole.

Many of you have asked how you can help. As many of you know, you can check out the dinner page as well as the donation page as possible ways to help. In addition, we ask that anyone who is able to give blood, please do so. Cole has had multiple transfusions, and will likely have many more. Now it is not possible to give blood directly to Cole, but if you can add to the general blood bank, it will ultimately help Cole.

Tomorrow we are heading down to Grandma and Grandpa’s house for some Corned Beef and Cabbage (for me. Cole, Logan, and Elisa will eat Irish Bread). For now; however, I ask you to raise your glasses and toast Cole, NCAA Champion winning Head Coach.

New Blog Post for Cole Baker

2011-03-16T08:15:00.001-07:00

http://www.aboutcole.blogspot.com

3-16-11 64 means 64

2011-03-16T07:45:00.001-07:00

I must apologize for my extended absence, but I have learned something interesting. Artists always seem to be going through some emotional crisis when they do their best work. While I am not so daft as to truly see myself as an artist, I am beginning to understand that it is, not easier, but more productive to be able to tap into a very strong emotion when trying to produce something creative.

With that as a (I must say so myself) wonderful reason (being lazy just does not sound as awesome) for my failure to update for the last few days, I am happy to report that the last few days have been amazingly uninteresting, which is most certainly a good thing. We had a good visit from Grandma Kathy last week. She came in and allowed Elisa and I to work all week, and thus save up some sick days/pto days. On Saturday, I took Logan to soccer, and the family pretty much just played all weekend. Cole and I took the cars to car washes and had little mini walking adventures while we waited for them to get cleaned.

Cole has been feeling great, and acting as sassy as ever. His counts have looked pretty good, although his white blood cell counts were low on Monday. On Monday we had to increase the amount of medicine that Cole gets in his daily shot. I was really worried that he was going to freak out, but for the first time he did not cry at all. This increase happens for the three days preceding his visit to UCSF for the stem cell collection.

Today Cole and I are going to the clinic to check his counts, get his dressing changed, and make sure that he is ready for the stem cell collection tomorrow. Speaking of the stem cell collection, Cole and I have to be at UCSF at 7am tomorrow to begin the process of collection. They have to install a new IV in his leg. Hopefully they can get what they need on Thursday so that we don’t have to stay overnight.

Yesterday I also told Cole about the bone marrow aspiration procedure coming up next Tuesday. He was pretty scared at first, but due to my rapist (sp?) like wit, he quickly got over it.

Today Cole is filling out his NCAA pool. He started off using a modified wife/kid/geo system whereby whichever school names sounds more interesting gets the pick, but also, as a tiebreaker, the school closest to him gets the nod. He has progressed into a mathematical probability system that seems to involve picking all favorites.

Anyone who wants to go against Cole in the pool can email their picks to me at aric44@gmail.com, and deposit $10.00 into paypal. The winner will get half of the proceeds and the Cole fund will get the other half. I will post his picks later this afternoon.

In the meantime, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, the revolutionary leader who returned sanity to March Madness by outlawing the play-in games (“play in games”…it’s called the season folks)

3-9-11

2011-03-09T14:22:00.001-08:00

Sorry that I have not written in a while, but I just have not had the energy.

Grandma Kathy came out for the week to hang with Cole. It is nice because this way Elisa and I can work all week and save a few sick/pto days for the future. Today is Wednesday, which is usually my day to stay with Cole, and I find the very idea of being at work intolerable. I am just wandering around the office in a fog, and all I can think about is how I feel like I am missing out on precious time that should be spent with Cole. Don’t get me wrong, I love that my mom came out to help us out, and Cole loves hanging with Grandma. I just miss my time with him.

That aside, let’s do some updating. Cole was discharged from round 2 of Chemo on Monday. Thus far he has been doing extremely well, and has only had a couple of instances of nausea/vomiting. His hair is mostly gone, and the hair that remains is a very light color, almost translucent, which sits atop his head like a strange clear helmet. Like any 6 year old boy, he is indifferent to how he looks and acts like a regular 6 year old kid. I know that he is very smart, and knows more than I sometimes choose to believe which makes his positive attitude all the more uplifting.

I talked to the medical staff yesterday and learned that the next rounds of chemo are less than 5 days (4 for each of round three and five, and 3 for each of round four and six). They also gave the possibility that some of the future Chemo can be done at the outpatient clinic, which would be awesome.

I want to thank everyone out there who has been so generous in their support for Cole, and for our family. The financial donations that have been given have been a true blessing, the dinners prepared have helped us maintain some sanity, and the general love and support has been overwhelming. I thank you all. We are only in the beginnings of this fight, and I am certain that our victory of the bastard will come as a result not from me nor from Elisa alone but from all of you. Keep the well wishes coming, and I thank all of you who have helped, and I thank all of you in advance for the help that I am certain will come our way as we proceed through the process of getting rid of the monster in my baby.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole Supreme Court Justice.

3-6-11 Sleeping Boy

2011-03-06T00:19:00.000-08:00

You it's funny, or strange, or...well I don't know what it is, but when Cole is awake and acting like a normal 6 year old, I can almost forget about what is going on even when we are in the hospital room (which we are now). When he is sleeping; however, that is when I see him as a kid with an illness. I am not sure if it is because he is not moving, or because he has no expression on his face, but I know that as I sit here writing this, I am looking at my son lying there in that bed and it breaks my heart. I am pretty good about being strong most of the time, but not when I am alone and staring that that boy knowing that he is fighting for his life, and there is nothing I can do but be supportive. I wish I could do more, but I don't know what else to do.

Not really in the mood to write anymore tonight, so please raise your glass and toast Cole member of AARP.

3-4-11 Get Ready for 4/1/11

2011-03-03T20:09:00.000-08:00

Cole has asked me to let all of you know some things that he is wishing that he will get for his birthday on 4/1 (yes he was born on April Fool's Day, and yes it is very fitting for such a knucklehead), so here it is...unedited and very much not approved, by and large, by Elisa:

Cole’s Birthday Idea List:
Ipad, Ipod, Iphone, ITunes credit
Spongebob Stuff (slippers)
Art supplies (paper, crayons, etc)
Jeans
T-Shirts
Sneakers
Crazy 8 Socks
Baseball Caps
Knit Caps
Books (Junie B Jones, Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew, Phineas and Ferb, etc.) that are at a 1st or 2nd grade reading level
Games (Guess Who, any strategy games, Pictureka board game[not card came])
Leapster 2 games
Stuffed animals
Bag of balloons
Flip flops
New bedding (Spongebob, Cars, Mickey)
Amazon.com credit

Tonight I have the overnight duty with the big man, and will also be here all day tomorrow. Julia will probably take the overnight tomorrow night, and we are still waiting on Prez. Obama to see if he will be taking Sat. night.

I may have a further post later, but Cole wanted me to get this list out asap. But for now, please raise your glass and toast Cole Tap Zoo champion of the whole world.

3-2-11 Happy Birthday

2011-03-02T21:12:00.000-08:00

We must first begin this evening with a happy birthday wish to Elisa. Her strength has kept this family together on more than one occasion, and I don't just mean with respect to Cole's cancer. I can never tell her that I love her enough times to fully express my feelings for her, so all I can hope for is that everyone in the world reads this blog so that everyone in the world knows that she is my whole life. I love you Elisa.

Last night Cole and Julia picked up an ice cream cake from Cold Stone Creamery, and we lit some candles and had a little birthday party. One of the presents that Cole got for Elisa was a little magnetic frame. What is so awesome about this frame is that when Cole and I went to UCSF for the stem cell consult, he was allowed to pick out a toy from the big toy box. He picked this frame out for the sole purpose of giving it to Elisa for her birthday. If you don't know Cole personally, that is who he is. That is how he rolls.

Today Cole's other best buddy Chris (Noah being the other) from school came over to play. They had a great time, and while playing, Cole's loose tooth came out. Sometimes I forget during the midst of all this medical stuff that Cole is still a kid growing up. I have to work to keep that in mind.

Cole and Elisa went down to the hospital tonight so that they can get Cole pre-hydrated before starting Chemo tomorrow. Wish him luck and keep him in your thoughts. For now please raise your glass and toast Cole, the graphic designer.

3-1-11 Seriously?

2011-03-01T09:06:00.000-08:00

Ok, to sum up, here is the status of the universe at my house. Besides Cole and all his stuff (which apparently is not enough for us. I mean I hate to be able to sit down and rest anyway), my dryer broke the other day (shout out to Jaci for the use of her dryer), the Toureg needs brake pads and rotors, and then to top it all off, Logan has come down with a fever. Super

So today I find myself at home (unscheduled day for me) trying to keep Logan at one side of the house while Julia keeps Cole on the other side. As I write this, Logan and I are watching Elmo teach us how to run while Julia is outside riding bikes with Cole (Julia has not been on a bike in a long time. Too funny to watch)

And, because that is not quite enough, they moved Cole's Chemo schedule up a day. Not a big deal, but the change in logistics is kind of a pain in the butt. The reason they moved him up one day (start Thursday instead of Friday) is because they want to better time the Chemo with the stem cell collection (they use the word harvest, but I don't like that word) that is set for 3/17.

All in all, a heightened stress week here at the house. Fortunately I was able to relieve some of it last night courtesy of a glass of Scotch (shout out to Ms. Koss). Also, Elisa has a crazy week at work with report cards coming up, field trip, state writing test, etc. Good times.

Today is March 1st. I say welcome to March, and good riddance to February. What a shitty month. May have to cancel February next year. For all of you who have birthdays in February, please make arrangements now to move them to another month.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, winner of the Tour de France.

2-26-11 Peloncito

2011-02-27T00:18:00.000-08:00

Yes the hair loss has begun. It started yesterday. Cole first started finding hairs on the dining room table as we were eating dinner. He thought they were Elisa's, but they were obviously not. Now we knew that this was going to start happening around this time, but I had been delaying telling Cole about it. The reason for this is twofold. First every time I have to tell him something that is taking a piece of his childhood away, or takes another piece of control over his own life from him, it makes me sick. Second is that I wanted him to have as many normal days as possible, especially in light of the unplanned hospital stay earlier this week before dropping another shitty bombshell on him.

Of course once we told him, he accepted it as he has accepted everything else. He said, "ok" and then went about with the rest of his dinner. We did talk more about it, and gave him some choices of what to do. We said that we can leave it alone, we can shave it now (Elisa's choice), or we can do something crazy like shave his name in his head (my choice). He has, so far, decided to to do nothing. So far the hair loss is not extreme so it is only a minor annoyance. I am sure that once it becomes more annoying and noticeable, he will choose to have it shaved. Hopefully he will let me shave some designs in his head.

On another note, we went to UCSF yesterday to meet with the doctors there regarding the stem cell collection and transfusion that is part of the treatment. The meeting went well and on 3/17, Cole will be back up there for the process of collecting his stem cells. It seems like the process is not overly sucky, but it will not be a super fun time for anyone. They have to sedate him (but not with general ), and put an IV line into his leg. The collection will take all day, and possibly the next day as well.

I had an interesting day today. Cole was in great spirits and seems to really have taken to his high fat, high protein eat anything and everything crappy for you that we can eat. Of course, and purely out of fatherly affection and to show solidarity, I have been eating the same stuff. Cole's best bud, Noah, came over today and they had a great time playing, and even went outside to ride bikes and scooters. While that was great, I took our car into the shop and found that it needs break pad and new rotors. Yea for me.

So Elisa and I were watching Love Actually this evening. She went to bed before it ended, and I found myself watching the end. I have this sickness whereby any movie that I am watching, I have to watch the end. It doesn't matter if I like it or not, I have to watch it through. For those of you who haven't seen the movie, there is one character who is a 10ish year old boy who is madly in love with a girl in his class (who happens to be a world class singer, but that is beside the point, and I am sure he just loves her for her bad teeth....it is set in England after all). As I watched this cute little romance play out (which concluded in an awesome pre 9/11 run through the airport with the cops hot on the boy's heels as he tried to catch his love before she flew away), I suddenly was hit with the thought that there is a chance that Cole may never get the chance to make a complete fool of himself in order to impress the girl of his dreams. That means he may never fall in love. He may never feel that feeling that I have every time I see Elisa. That thought just killed me. It really pisses me off that I am getting to the point where I can't remember not feeling like someone has kicked me in the nuts every single day, and I am getting tired of it.

That being said; however, I ask that you please raise your glasses and toast Cole, distiller of fine spirits.

2-25-11

2011-02-25T07:13:00.000-08:00

Well today sure is a rainy, stormy day. Hopefully it is not a metaphor for Cole's day today. He had a great day yesterday. His appetite seems to be back, and is embracing his diet of high fat foods like any normal 6 year old (yes I know he is not 6 yet but his birthday is less than 2 months away so leave me alone) which means that he pre-ordered doughnuts for breakfast this morning.

Yesterday was a fun day with Cole. He turned on his radio and moved his chair and rug out of the room, and created a dance floor. Just in case anyone got lost or distracted in the living room, he made signs directing all the party people to the dance floor in room 7. Cole also received a visitor from his school, Noah (his best buddy). Noah brought Cole his homework and various other things from the class. Cole was very happy to see his friend, and he may be having a playdate with his two buds this weekend.

We have a busy day today. We have to go up to UCSF to meet those folks, and presumably do some paperwork. UCSF is where the stem cell transfusion will take place. They (not sure if Kaiser or UCSF...need to check on that) are going to harvest Cole's stem cells after the second round of Chemo (which starts 3/4), and then after all 6 Chemo treatments (and a surgery for good measure), Cole will be up at UCSF for a couple of weeks while they give him his own stem cells back.

I would like to take a moment to comment on the overall awesomeness of modern medicine and science. There, I commented.

Cole also needs a dressing change for the dressing on his chest, which covers his Broviac (permanent IV), and the Kaiser people have asked UCSF to do it when we go up this morning. If UCSF is unable to do it, then we will have to drive down to Kaiser Santa Clara to get the dressing changed. Hopefully we will not end up having to experience another unforeseen stay at the hospital.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, news anchor for Channel 2.

2-23-11 Back Home

2011-02-23T22:00:00.000-08:00

Cole is back home!!!! More on that to follow.

I would first like to take an opportunity to offer up a special thanks to someone. Now there is no way that I could, in this posting, possibly thank everyone that has helped us thus far in this process. I would like to; however, share an amazing story with you that comes to us by way of Washington.

My neighbor, Joe, is from Washington. When he heard about Cole he reached out to friends of his up in the rainy Northwest. Cole's story was told on the radio, was tweeted, and ultimately ended up at www.prospectinsider.com. Just putting Cole's story on his website, which is a sports site, was a wonderful thing to do, but Prospect Insider went even further. He offered a forever subscription to his website for anyone who donates $50.00. None of these people know me nor my family; however the generosity of these people has been astounding. Washington is being well represented, and for that I thank you Prospect Insider.

Now on to the reason that we are all here. Let me quickly recap the last few days. On Monday Cole and I went to the clinic for his scheduled blood draw. It took all of five minutes and we found ourselves back on the road home. We had a great day. Some neighbor kids came over and played. Cole spent some time outside. Then the call came. Cole's blood counts were lower than expected, and they wanted him to come in for a transfusion. We were initially told that we would only be in for a few hours and then would be able to go back home. Of course Cole showed a fever once we were in the hospital, and we were stuck in room 3204 once again. He had a good night on Monday with no fever, and we again were hopeful of a quick return home. Unfortunately we were yet again thwarted by gods of fate. We were then told that he had to be fever free for 48 hours before he could go home.

Cole was pretty upset, but he is a tough kid, and he had his awesome Auntie Julia to help him Cope. To be honest; however, I am not sure if it is Auntie Julia that he loves so much or her I Phone. Regardless we planned (I am sure that thwarted plans will be a continuous theme for some time to come) for a 6pm(ish) Wednesday departure. Of course fate was not done playing with us for this adventure. Auntie Laura called me at around 11 am and told me that Cole was going home in about an hour.

While I was extremely happy for Cole, I was totally caught off guard. The closest car seat was up in San Bruno. Fortunately Grandma Rinde picked up a seat and they were able to get Cole home. I cannot tell you how happy I am right now knowing that Cole, Logan, and Elisa are, right now, soundly sleeping in their beds at home....where they all belong. Trials and tribulations aside, we ended up in the right spot.

This little adventure did make me realize that I have to get some ready gear together so that we will be prepared for any situations that may pop up. I will be spending the next few days putting together a bag (that will, because I am a Baker, very quickly expand until we will have to rent a U-Haul truck) with a few changes of clothes, some toys/activities, important documents, etc (yes they will all be in Ziploc bags) that will be able to travel with Cole where ever he is, regardless of who he is with. So that is my homework for the rest of the week.

Cole is set to go in for his next round of Chemotherapy on Friday 3/4, so please keep him in your thoughts. But for now, please raise your glasses and toast Cole, video game designer.

2-21-11 Room 3204 Redux

2011-02-21T18:25:00.000-08:00

Well this sucks. Cole has been progressing well over the last few days. We even, in an abundance of caution, called the doctor yesterday. She said that everything seemed normal.

This morning we went to his first blood draw appointment. It took about 30 seconds and we were back on our way home. The doctor said that they would call if the numbers were low, and if we had to come back in. As I drove home I was confident that all was well. Of course, Kaiser ultimately called and wanted him to come in for some more blood.

Once we got to the hospital, Cole developed a fever. With his low white blood cells so low, any fever is a great concern. As a result, they decided to keep him overnight to give him some antibiotics and to monitor him. So here we are again, Cole in a hospital bed in room 3204 (very nice of them to save it for us) and the rest of us scrambling to get the logistics together to have someone watching him in the hospital, taking care of Logan and making sure Elisa and I get to work tomorrow. Fortunately Julia was coming to the house this evening anyway so that she could watch him tomorrow, so we just moved the whole operation south about 45 minutes.

I have to say that this really sucks. This weekend was so nice. I got to watch Cole’s personality come back, his energy come back, and we almost had a normal weekend. Back to reality I guess. When we were here last week, we heard a story of a kid who had gone through the entire Chemo process without ever having to come back into the hospital for unplanned visits. While I understand that the doctor was saying that this kid was the only such case in her years of experience, I still had had dreams of Cole following that path. 5 days later, here we are. This sucks.

I am hoping that this stay in the hospital will end tomorrow, and that Julia will be able to bring him home in the morning. In the meantime, please raise your glass and toast Cole, the television producer.

2-18-11 Today it was a good day

2011-02-18T20:30:00.001-08:00

The last two days have been great, but bittersweet. Cole came home on Wednesday evening but was very tired and did not interact very much. Thursday was better, but he quickly tired and getting him to eat was a chore. The doctors had at one point told me that Cole’s tumor was pushing on his stomach a little which makes him feel full even if he has not eaten very much. Take that problem back about a month and it is understandable why he looks so skinny. When I say skinny I mean that if he were older I would have thought that he had anorexia. Cole’s diet is supposed to be high fat, high protein. The problem with that kind of diet is that it is very filling in a normal situation. In Cole’s situation, the premature fullness is magnified.

My solution (and I am pretty sure it is a brilliant one) has been to have him eat a small, snack size, amount of food every single hour. His “snacks” are as high in fat and protein as I can find. He eats tuna with mayo on crackers, salami and cheese, and goldfish crackers. I know what you are thinking, but goldfish crackers have a crazy amount of fat (omg, who knew? omg, I just said omg. omg I did it again. omg, I am possessed and I can’t stop.). We spent yesterday and today easing into this new routine. I like it because it gives Cole a fairly consistent stream of energy, and it also gets him used to eating again in lower stress environments (not eating is such a foreign concept to me that I have trouble when my kids do not eat. For me when I feel bad, I eat. If eating makes me feel worse, I eat faster.).

For dinner tonight we had steak. I have been dreading this meal since I first saw the dietary restrictions. Many parents will not understand how traumatizing it was for me to tell Cole that we had to cook his steaks well done (for me as well as him, but this is not about me. It is about Cole. Please stay focused) To my amazement and supreme happiness, Cole not only ate all the steak that Elisa put on his plate, he also ate all his green beans and his salad. To top it all off, he even ate all his seconds of steak and asked for thirds. He did not get through his thirds.

I have spent a great deal of time in the last two hours since dinner trying to figure out why we were so successful in getting him to eat. It is, I am certain, a two part solution. The first is that Elisa clearly put in some mommy magic into the cooking. I am convinced that a mother can will her child into health given the right circumstances. The second is that we cooked his steak in Baker BBQ sauce, and gave him some Baker BBQ sauce on the side. I am not sure which was the primary factor in him eating (Elisa don’t read this……It was clearly the BBQ sauce that I had made, and for those interested we will soon have the BBQ sauce for sale on the donations page. Stay tuned), but regardless he ate, and I am happy.

I am, in fact so happy that I think the California Bakers are going to be treated to some Daddy Waffles tomorrow morning for breakfast. As you know, Daddy waffles are very different that Daddy pancakes.

I am happy to report that for the first time since this whole thing started that I will go to sleep with a fair degree of confidence that even though the Balrog pulled us off the precipice, we are no longer falling helplessly. We have begun to fight back. For that reason please raise your glass and toast Cole the award winning author.

2-16-11 The Eagle will soon be landing

2011-02-16T12:19:00.000-08:00

As I sit here with my Subway sandwich (Thank you Sandi), I am giddy with excitement. You see, Cole is coming home from the hospital in just a few hours. You know that feeling you get on Christmas Eve? The anticipation. The excitement. Well multiply that by about a million and that is how I am feeling right now. I am having so much trouble focusing on work. I just want to go home and see my son back at home.

I know that I have to temper my expectations because we are just one small step into this whole process of recovery; however, for me it is a huge step. No more IV bottles keeping my man down. No more watching him sit all day in a tiny little room. We have been in that hospital for two weeks, and it is time to go.

Cole’s spirits are high and he is already asking for some comfort food (Ribs and potatoes. That’s my boy). He will have some dietary restrictions which are basically super clean and very well cooked food (sorry son, no more runny gooey oozing pancakes). For those of you who have so generously expressed an interest in cooking dinners for us, please get a hold of Julia. She is organizing that aspect and has access to the calendar and the dietary rules.

Did I mention that Cole is coming home today? I am so pumped up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (was that too many? Too bad) !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry for not writing in my usual sophisticated (or is it sophomoric?) high literary style to which I know that you have grown accustomed, however, I am having enough trouble just sitting in a seat much less writing intelligently.

I think I am going to go run laps around my office or something, but for now please raise your glasses to Col Cole Baker, Pilot, USAF, Ret.

2-14-11 Day 4 of Chemo

2011-02-14T13:55:00.000-08:00

Sorry for not writing last night, but I spent a wonderful evening with Elisa and Logan. Elisa made a nice dinner and we sat down and I was almost able to pretend for just a few moments that Cole wasn’t in the hospital but was actually over at a friend’s house for dinner. Of course that type of fantasy ends up causing more pain when the truth, as it always seems to do, comes crashing back in. Still it was nice to sit with my wife for just a little while and catch my breath.

To begin with, Happy Valentine’s Day. I usually am not a big fan of this day because I always thought it insulting that I needed Hallmark to remind me to tell Elisa that I love her. This Valentine’s Day is different. In the midst of this trying time it is nice to have this day to remind me, not that I love Elisa but, how much I love her. I know that she would disagree with me (probably more out of principal than anything, but that is another thing that I love about her), but I have been blessed for over 7 years with the opportunity to see that she is an amazingly strong woman, an amazing wife, and an unbelievable mother. I hope that she knows how much I truly love her.

OK, enough sappy stuff. I guess I have a couple of days of updating to do, so here goes. As I write this Cole is working his way through his 4^th day of Chemotherapy. He seems to be handling it well so far. They give him a substantial amount of anti-nausea medication prior to each treatment so that he will never (or at least be delayed in) associate the therapy with nausea. Over the weekend Cole had developed a fever which has been very concerning and has caused even more stress for Elisa and I (if that is even possible any more). With Chemotherapy Cole’s immune system is being suppressed and he is much more susceptible to getting sick. As a result, the doctors told us that if his fever has not gone away by Wednesday, he will not be going home as planned. As you can imagine we did not take this well.

I am glad to report however, that through a combination of Tylenol, blood transfusion (is it a transfusion if we only add? I think so.), and Elisa’s magic mommy vibes, Cole slept through all of last night without a fever and has been fever free all day so far. He has not taken any more Tylenol today, so hopefully we are in the clear. I know that he had a good temperature reading because Cole texted it to me.

That’s right, Cole can text. No, I did not buy him a phone. Chris set him up with a phone number through Cole’s gmail account. You may have noticed a button on the blog that says “Call Me.” If you call him, it will go straight to his voicemail and he can listen to it on the computer. He can also send text messages from the computer to cell phones. Amazing.

I want to send a general thank you to all of you who have helped thus far. We have managed to raise over $1,000.00, my big chest deep freezer (that fortunately I just got for Christmas) is practically full of food, my dog has been walked more in the last two weeks that the previous two months, I have hot water pressure in my house again, Cole and Logan each have their own rooms and Cole’s has been painted, etc, etc. I cannot even begin to express my gratitude for all the help, love, donations, and well wishes that have come pouring in. We could not have even gotten this far without you, and we could not make it through this whole process without you.

Please check back soon as we have some exciting fundraising events coming up in the near future. Outback will be sponsoring a curbside takeaway dinner night. I will let you know the date and how to purchase tickets for that. Also we are working on a raffle that will likely include some combination of original artwork from Cole, some world famous homemade Baker BBQ sauce, and there is even the possibility that we might have some signed Giants stuff (by Giants I do mean the World Series Champion San Francisco Giants) to auction off. Stay tuned, it will be exciting.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole the acclaimed film director.

2-12-11

2011-02-12T23:39:00.000-08:00

Busy Day Today

Happy Saturday Night to all. Cole had a very good day today. Auntie Julia spent the night last night with him and he seemed to show very little in the way of problems with his first day of Chemo. He had a slight fever which was treated with Tylenol, but was otherwise ok. He made a video of his room with Julia's phone, and had a great time with her.

Elisa was with him in the hospital for day 2 of Chemo. Cole seemed to not have any side effects from the treatment other than the slight fever. However, as the doctors do not seemed worried I guess it is not that big of a deal. I am slowly starting to realize that as we move forward I will need to make a more conscious effort not to treat Cole like he is made of eggshells. I have this overbearing desire to help him with everything (whether he needs it or not), and I know that I have to treat him as close to normal as possible.

Chris took the overnight tonight and I was delighted to hear that Cole was feeling well enough to conspire with Chris to try and sneak down to the cafeteria for some pizza. The nurses swooped in and captured them before they could complete the crime, and the two deviants had to settle for some pizza delivery. Oh well, better luck next time.

I decided today that Logan needed a day of Logan fun. His routines and schedules have been all screwed up during the last couple of weeks. And while he loves the playroom at Kaiser Santa Clara, all the travel has been tough on him. This morning I made Logan and Chris some pancakes using my special recipe that I have saved on my phone. Then Logan, Chris and I went to Daddy and Me Soccer. After that we acquired Auntie Julia and ended up at the Emeryville Market to get some Crispy Fry.

The Rindes really stepped it up today. I had 8 Rindes and Rinde affiliates in my house today doing all manner of awesome things to get ready for Cole's triumphant return to San Miguel. There was plumbing, cooking, painting, grading, shopping, and other various activities going on at the house. Thank you for all of that.

I have never written, or even read, a blog before so I am not sure if I am supposed to be writing in a more coherent manner with transition sentences; however, my mind is very coherent and almost never uses transition sentences so I am not going to use them. Please try and keep up.

This evening while Elisa was enjoying her newly much more pressurized shower, I took a field trip to the Outback in San Mateo to talk with Tana about fundraising. I am happy to pre-announce a couple of fundraising events that will be taking place in the not too distant future. The first will probably be a special curbside takeaway dinner. Tickets will be sold, and the purchaser will be entitled to swing by the Outback and pick up an awesome dinner to go. We might also be doing a raffle event at the Outback which will showcase some of Cole's art. There is a rumor also that some of the world famous Baker BBQ sauce will be release to the public through this raffle. Thank you to the Outback for your support.

I also want to thank those of you who have already sent in donations via the donations page on the top of this blog. I don't have the words to express how much that means to me.

Please stay tuned for upcoming fundraising events as well as further updates about our favorite little guy Cole, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole the Stanford Professor.

2-11-11 A Quick Thank You

2011-02-11T14:07:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday to me. Today I received a wonderful birthday present. My son took the first step to winning this fight. As I write this post, Cole is currently sleeping soundly and peacefully in his bed while the Chemotherapy attacks the tumor. God Speed to you medicine and I thank you.

On the topic of thanks, I cannot possibly thank everyone who has helped so far, and I know that there are a great many more helpers out there waiting in the wings. I do want to take a moment to offer up a great deal of thanks to my brother Chris. Among so many other things, he has helped me with the technical aspects of getting this blog off the ground and getting it read (last time I looked we had readers all over America, in Canada, Alaska, Germany, UK). In addition he created some pages which can be accessed from the tabs at the tops of the pages which discuss how you can help. There are many different ways to help, and we will gladly accept any and all help we can get. So far we have already been so blessed with so many well wishes, positive thoughts, and prayers. For that I thank you.

I will probably post another entry tonight to give an update about Cole's day, but I just wanted to recognize Chris for his help in organizing the helpers. For now, however, please raise your glasses and toast Cole the engineer.

2-10-11 The Storm Will Pass

2011-02-10T22:55:00.000-08:00

The last two days have been pretty exciting, and all in good ways. Well at least good within the context of why we are all here reading (and in my case writing) this blog. As an aside, I hate using the word blog. I feel like such a poser.

That aside, let's do an update on Cole. De-De-De-Dede-de-de-de (sorry teletype machine broke)
I hope you all saw the video of Cole on the bike riding down the hill. Needless to say (what a ridiculous expression that I can't stop using), I have been very happy with how he has progressed. His walking has gotten so much better. When he was first admitted to the hospital last week, he had already been unable to put any pressure on his leg for nearly one week. To go from that to having a surgery to being able to walk under his own power all the way down to the cafeteria (which for anyone who has not been to Santa Clara Kaiser is about 4523234 miles) and back is amazing and makes me so very happy.

The feeling however, is bittersweet. We have been pushing him to feel better and get better all the while knowing that tomorrow we are going to level him with Chemotherapy. I just hope that he can forgive me for what we have to do to his body, and I hope that eventually he will understand that we are doing what must be done. Please son understand that we are running a marathon here, and not a sprint. The bad stuff now will pay off in the long run.

So tomorrow it begins. The ultimate battle of wills. One one side we have one very nasty little bastard. On the other side we have the collective will power of hundreds and maybe thousands of people, all of whom will direct all energies towards defeating this monster. Cole rest assured that we will succeed and you will have to spend the next 15 years writing thank you cards to all of the people who have helped. And you know what my son? Your mother, your father, your brother, and your entire family will gladly help you. We will have the greatest thank you card writing party in the history of the universe. And that is all I have to say about that.

Now many of you have offered to help in a wide variety of ways. The amount of love and support that we have received thus far is staggering and amazing and uplifting, and we would have crumbled long ago without it. For that I thank you. We still have many ways that people can help. I promise that within the next day or two we will post via this blog, facebook, and emails the best ways to help and the best ways to organize all of that wonderful assistance so that we can maximize everyone's efforts in winning this fight.

Please spread the word about Cole, please stay tuned and in the meantime please raise your glasses and toast Cole, the Doctor.

2-8-11

2011-02-09T07:59:00.001-08:00

Ever since learning about Cole's cancer, I have had a pain in my chest. However, once Elisa and I decided that on Wednesday we would tell Cole that he has a tumor and that he will have to have special medicine and will then get to go home to rest for a few weeks, and then do it all over again I have had a horrible pain in my stomach. Last night's ramble is a testamant to my inability to sleep due to the pain.

The moment finally arrived and of course, Cole took it in stride. Kids are truly amazing. He asked a few questions and then told us that he probably would not be feeling good enough to go back to school after his five days of medicine. He did not seem scared of confused. I know that he has known for a while that there is something wrong and it is serious. He is a smart kid and knows how to listen to adults who sometimes kind of forget he is in the room so they have conversations that might be better had outside.

He seemed to be in good spirits for most of the day, thanks in large part to Uncle Chris. Uncle Chris and Cole were wheeling and dealing and negotiating everything. For example, if Cole wanted to eat a meal in bed, he had to first walk all the way down the hall. This approach by Chris was just what Cole needed because it pushed him, but still allowed him to be able to choose and control some aspects of his life.

This brings me to the best part of my day from (now yesterday as this entry is being finished on 2-9). COLE IS WALKING!!!!!!!! I cannot express my joy at seeing him walk around last night. It increased the amount of hope that I have, and every little bit certainly helps.

We will soon be entering the next phase of this whole ordeal: The treatment phase. Cole will start Chemo on Friday, and the first cycle will last 5 days. After that, as soon as he feels up to it, he will be allowed to go home for about three weeks before starting the next cycle of Chemo. Big picture is 5 cycles of Chemo, 1 surgery, 1 cycle of Chemo, Stem Cell Transfusion, Radiation, then Maintenance Therapy.

The amount of love and well wishes that have been sent Cole's way have been overwhelimingly wonderful. I know that everyone wants to help, and right now the executive committe of Destroy the Damn Thing in Cole's Belly Inc., are working on a plan that will allow anybody to help in the various ways that they feel most comfortable and they ways in which they want to help. We will be setting up some ways for people to help with physical things (dinners, help around the house, etc.), time (watching kids, etc), and money (if that is how some want to help). Please be patient, and we will be sending out the word on how everyone can help. Again the amount people who have expressed a desire to help, just to me much less Elisa or other members of my family, has been awe inspiring. I thank you each for that.

For now; however, please raise your glasses and make a toast to Cole, the Small Business Owner.

2-7-11 sleepless nights

2011-02-07T23:06:00.000-08:00

I know that we are supposed to use our support structure, and don't get me wrong they are great, but it kills me that I have been home the last two nights while Cole is in the hospital. I know I have to take care of me, but I miss my son.

Its not fucking fair that this is happening to him. He is such a good boy. He cares about others. He loves school and learning. He is polite to others. Why? Why? Why?

Fortunately I am going down tomorrow, and will be staying overnight and then will be there all day on Wednesday. It is strange that I am supposed to go home to recharge my batteries so that I can be strong when I am with him, but it seems to be working the other way around. When I see him, I am refreshed and know that I can take on the world, or at least the little bastard that is trying to take my baby from me.

This is not really an update. I just can't sleep right now. When I am awake and either working or doing stuff to help Cole (be it sitting with him, planning, logisticizing (yes that is a word), tasking others, etc) I feel much better than when I am alone in a dark room with only my thoughts which invariably turn to the worst case scenarios.

I also know that this is normal...no normal is the wrong word, nothing is normal in this screwed up situation.... I know that this is natural to feel this way and like Elisa said to me, if we can get through this first week of finding out about the Cancer, then it will get more manageable. It just really really really sucks.

On a different train of thought (because that is how my mind works)....this is the first time I have written a blog. It is a strange feeling because while I am writing it, I am doing so as if I am having a conversation; however, there is no other person who is immediately responding as would happen in a normal conversation. I know people are reading it because blogs keep track of such things, but I am kind of just talking to the air. I think that I understand Christian Slater's character much more now.

Enough about me, for now please raise your glasses and make a toast to Cole, the long haul truck driver.

2-7-11 Update

2011-02-07T10:48:00.000-08:00

I forgot to mention that I set up an email account for Cole so that anyone who wants to send well wishes can send them to this email. I will teach him how to access it and let him read them. Please remember that these emails will go directly to Cole (5 1/2 years old) so please write accordingly. Email address is aricson44@yahoo.com.

2-7-11

2011-02-07T10:34:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was a pretty good day for Cole. He was able to get his dressings and some of his tubes taken out. His personality came back and he was in very good spirits. In the afternoon Julia kicked me out of the hospital room to go take a nap, and when I got back I found out that he had sat up, and that he had been playing monopoly and monopoly deal with Elisa and Julia. Seeing him vertical (or at least his top half vertical) made me very happy.

Also yesterday Uncle Chris showed up to help out. He came armed with, I am sure, thousands of dollars of fun electronic equipment for Cole to play with including but not limited to a Nintendo Wii. The arrival of Chris also brought about another happy little battle won. Since his surgery on Friday, Cole had drunk about 15 apple juice boxes. On Sunday he finally was able to eat. The result of that apple juice and food apparently came quickly and unexpectedly. Sorry Chris (but only kind of) that Elisa and I had taken Logan home for the night before that.

I finally said the word Cancer out loud today. I did not really mean to, and I did not really plan to. I definitely did not come to any sudden realization nor did I find some heretofore hidden reservoir of strength. Someone and work just casually asked me if I watched the Super Bowl. After saying no, he asked why, and I said that my son had been diagnosed with Cancer and that I had been at the hospital. Strange how things that you stress over seem to resolve themselves in very anti-climactic ways. As an interesting side note, the person I was speaking with just happens to have the name Angel. Go figure.

Chris and Julia have been kind enough to take the duty for the next couple of days so that Elisa and I are free to spend time working, being with Logan, being with each other, etc. Elisa is going to go down and visit Cole this afternoon, and I am going to be at home with Logan. Trying to balance spending time with everyone is going to be difficult, and is very hard, but all we can do is do the best that we can.

Chris has been sending regular updates (I have no idea how people lived without text messaging and internet even though I am old enough to remember it). Cole has been up and has been sitting in chairs, so that is good news.

I may post again later tonight, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, the inventor of something even more awesome than the internet.

2-5-11

2011-02-05T21:55:00.001-08:00

2-5-11

Cole spent all day resting. The back to back to back nature of his three tests really wore him out. The doctors have all told us that he is recovering from the surgery well, but it has been tough on us (probably more so on Elisa. If I were a mother, I would have crumbled long ago. She amazes me every day) to see him just lie there. I was hoping to get him upright in a chair, but he is still just too tired. He still has not eaten, but we have been able to get enough fluids into his system that he is getting closer and closer to being sufficiently hydrated. Unfortunately we had to put in a catheter to empty the bladder, which was not a pleasant experience for him.

Julia, Elisa and I ordered some Itialiano food that was very surprisingly awesome. The chicken parmesan was very yummy. I was happy and relieved to see Elisa take a second helping. It is funny how she and I deal with stress differently. When I am stressed out, I eat and don’t sleep. Granted I always eat and rarely sleep, even during good times; however, when stressed it is even more so. Elisa is the opposite. She will get under enough blankets to create a furnace like atmosphere and go to sleep, but getting her to eat is very difficult. I guess that is why she made me go take a nap today and I told her that if she didn’t eat I would punch her in the nose.

After Julia and Elisa left to go home with Logan, I started blabbing on and on about different inconsequential things from my day. I think at first my babbling was grating on his nerves (as it does with many others), but he eventually started engaging in my conversation a little, so that was good. I am hoping that tomorrow is a better day for him, and hopefully he will feel like playing with his mama a little bit. He has always been a mama’s boy, and the sooner that he can reengage with her, the better.

************************************************************************

***This portion of the entry was written a couple of hours after all the rest. **********

It appears that the morphine is wearing off because Cole is not so mushy any more. He started to really talk a lot more. He also moved his head back to the center position. Ever since he came out of surgery yesterday, his head has been turned to the left. Part of the procedure involved something with a very small incision in the right side of his neck (forgot to ask the surgeon what that part was, but hopefully I can remember tomorrow.) so he had his head turned away from that side. All day today he did not want to move it. Not sure if it tightened up overnight, but he said it hurt. He is definitely coming out of his morphine stupor. Glad to have my kid back.

*********************************************************************

We spoke to Dr. Taggart today about the future and what to expect. It was a very difficult meeting but there were a few rays of hope. I still can’t make myself use the “C” word, but (thanks to my military training and many years working in restaurants), have been able to give the bastard inside my baby a whole bunch of other names. I will spare you the exact names so as to not have to put a restricted age warning on this, but you get the idea.

I know that I have to eventually use the word, because as Dumbeldore tells us, fearing the name of evil only gives it more power. I think that my hold up is that final piece of hope that rests in the fact that the 100% certain final diagnosis has not come in yet. That being said; however, we are moving forward with the assumption that Dr. Taggart’s (the oncologist that is very nice, and we feel very comfortable with her. The Midwest accent notwithstanding) suspicions are correct.

Please hope and pray, but for now please raise your glasses and toast Cole, the most excellent elementary school teacher.

Introduction

2011-02-05T00:05:00.001-08:00

I have always dreamed of writing something that people would read.  Of course I never thought I would end up writing something like this.

For  those of you who are just now finding out, and by way of introducing  this…whatever it is, let me tell you about what is happening to Cole.  

Cole has what appears to be a stage 4 neuroblastoma(sp?) in his abdomen.  He had been sick for about 3 weeks and then had been complaining of hip pain for about one week.  When we took him to the doctor they ran tests for two days.  The  tests were all inconclusive for either an infection or for a synovitus,  which were the two diagnoses which were initially put forward.  Since they could not pin down anything for certain, they admitted him on Tuesday.  On Thursday they ran further tests which included a CT scan with contrast.  This test found the mass.

The oncologist believes it to be a neuroblasoma.  Today, Friday, Cole had an extremely long day of tests which included an MRI, a bone scan, and then a 3.5 hour surgery.  The purpose of the surgery was to take a biopsy (do you take a biopsy, or do you perform one?  I  don't know) of the mass, install a permanent IV in his chest and to  pull a sample (think they called it a bone marrow aspiration) from his  hip.  

Fortunately the MRI and bone scan showed that the mass (can't use the "C" word yet.  Just not ready) has not spread to the spine or to any other bones in the body.  That was the first piece of good news that I have heard since this whole thing started.  We won't have the results from the surgery for a couple of days.

Cole, considering all things, made it through the day and as of 9:40 this evening is resting comfortably in his bed.  

The primary purpose of this blog is to have one central location for updates regarding Cole.  Between  phone calls, text messages, email, facebook, visits, etc., I decided  that there needs to be one place that everyone who cares about Cole can  go to get information.

I am not sure how else I will use this blog.  I may, at times, use it to express whatever I am feeling as a way just to get it out.  I would like to apologize in advance for any crude or crass remarks that I may make.  I do not plan to edit this blog for content or appropriateness.  On  that note, please be aware that some of the medical information, and  most likely many of my rants will not be appropriate for children of  certain ages.  I ask that parents take care with how much they allow their kids to read this.

With all that being said, I would like to end this introduction with a few special thank yous.  I never really thought about how much family I have, and how many friends I have until this week.  I apologize if I do not name some people specifically but everyone has been so caring and helpful that I can't name everyone.

I want to first and foremost thank Julia.  Without her dropping everything at work and being my rock, I would have crumbled.

Secondly I want to thank the Rinde family.  They have always been there for me, and without question or hesitation, cancelled their vacation plans just to be there for us.

Finally I want to thank the Bakers for their support and help.  I know that it is excruciating to be 1000 miles away but I know you are there.  More importantly Cole knows you are there.  I love you guys.

I know that everyone wants to help, and I am sure that there will be ample opportunities for each of you.  For right now, I ask that you give me a little time to get my head on straight so that I can figure out what we might need.  

For  those who want to come visit Cole, please email or call me before  coming by so that I can manage the number of people at any one time.  Cole is going through a lot and I don't want to smother him.  

For anything else, please feel free to email me at aric44@gmail.com.  I will let everyone know how they can best help Cole kick the shit out of this damn thing.

For now, please raise your glass and toast Cole, the future President of the United States of America.