Bad to the Bone Marrow

I’ve had lots of people ask me how my sister Katie is doing.

If you haven’t met Katie, or are new to this blog, I have a sister who’s spent the last 4 years kicking a very rare, fast-growing cancer–leiomyosarcoma–and now she’s fighting leukemia, too.  If you want to learn more about her, you should watch this video:

Here’s a recent picture of her family:

Aren’t they the sweetest??

It’s been nearly a year since the fundraiser–which turned out amazing (here’s the blog post about it)–and it’s been a rocky road getting the stars to align.  The doctors were insistent that she not have any new tumor growth for 6 months, and even if that happened, because the odds weren’t great, we didn’t think the insurance would cover it–and without it, the bone marrow transfusion would be over a million dollars (!!!!!!!!)

Around Thanksgiving last year, the doctors broke some bad news.

Katie’s leukemia was getting pretty bad.  She would have to have some intensive chemo for several months in the hospital.

She checked in Thanksgiving Day.

She couldn’t see her family much because if anyone of her kids brought a cough home from school or something, she might catch it and she wouldn’t have an immune system to kick it.

They all missed each other.

Katie’s not the type to lie around though.

Every morning, she’d get up and walk the halls, up and down.  She counted and realized going up and down 7 times = 1 mile.

The doctors got nervous about her wandering the halls like that, so they got her an exercise bike to put in her room.

She learned the harp.

She taught piano to her kids via skype.

She crocheted some seriously awesome sock monkey pants.

Katie was able to come home and be with her family for Christmas, and guess who got those seriously awesome sock monkey pants??

YESSSSS!!!!

They are the best thing I’ve ever owned.  I’ll post an instagram picture sometime.

A big holdup in all this was the leukemia doctor.  When he saw what cancer Katie had, he refused to approve a bone marrow transplant…he didn’t believe for a second she’d be able to fight it, and he even told her so (!!!)

And Katie was like, well my plan is to get the bone marrow transplant and kick this cancer!

And that darn doctor was like:

It was a fight for months.  That doctor couldn’t believe how well Katie was responding to all her chemo’s, and he kept dragging his feet in approving that bone marrow transplant.

My mom–you know she’s someone you don’t mess with–started praying for this doctor, and even put his name on the temple prayer roll.

(My mom has unshakeable faith.  She really is an amazing woman.)

Only a few weeks ago, this doctor had suddenly changed his tune:

And ever since then, he’s been firmly in her corner!

He was the one to pitch Katie’s case to the insurance.

…along with a lot of other doctors!

It didn’t seem like there’d be much of a hope that the insurance would cover it…Katie’s leukemia was pretty far advanced.  But I’ll be darned…we got news just 2 weeks ago that the insurance was gonna do it!!!!!*

*I have absolutely no doubt my mother’s prayers had something to do with this.

SHAMELESS MONKEY PANT DANCING

Now we just had to decide whose bone marrow it was gonna be!

I was a match…and so was my sister…and so was my other sister.  (The perks of having a big family!)

Well sister #1 is training to be Zuster Dixon in the MTC…so that’s out.  (She heads to the Netherlands in just a few weeks…we have a whole list of distant relatives there for her to convert mwahahahaah)

So then it was me, my sister, and our thumbs!

…she won.

Katie left just a few days ago for the hospital, where she’s now prepping for the bone marrow transplant.  On the morning she left, we heart attacked her lawn!

This was Katie’s face when she saw it:

It was a good moment :)

Katie has a long battle ahead of her.  Right now she’s in a hospital prepping for the transplant, and there’s have been some rocky days already.

Any prayers or thoughts you could send her way would be deeply appreciated…She’s a fighter.  You watch and see :) :)

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