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Poor Ally is struggling again. I knew it was coming, but I am not glad for it to be upon us. She was pretty lethargic today, not wanting to do much. But more than that, she had several episodes of real extreme pain. To the point where she is screaming so loud that I am wondering if the neighbors hear us. And there is nothing I can do to stop it. I feel so helpless. I feel bad for her and then I feel bad for me...and then it starts this whole downward spiral. I start to question whether I have the strength left in me to make it 11 months of intense treatment. (and then many more months of maintenance)

I am tired today. I had a bad night last night, not falling asleep until I saw the clock turn 4am. I am usually not too bad like this, but last night I was. It was not Ally causing me to stay up...it was me. A local boy here, Blake Laforce, just died the other day and he had ALL. He had received a bone marrow transplant and had some delayed complications. I heard about it on Saturday and it has really bothered me ever since. Always on my mind. I don't even know him, but I feel like I do. I started googling his name and found some great stories in the Dayton Daily News. He had a huge army behind him, just like us. A great family, it seemed. He was 18 when he died, after having the ALL for a year and a half. Then I stumbled upon the blog that his Dad kept for him. He was real diligent about doing it, just like me. Over 100,000 visits to his blog! It was over 100 pages long, and I didn't read it all, but I kept looking for similarities etc. I think I was torturing myself. I couldn't figure out why he needed the BMT, and I worry that we may have to go down that path. So then I started doing even more research on the BMT from my books and stumbled upon the potential life long side effects from having cranial radiation. And that part we do have to do. See the downward spiral that I sent myself on? I am like a gerbil in its little running wheel and I can't get out. And I can't turn off my mind and go to sleep like a normal person. And then I start thinking of weird stuff ...someone told me yesterday that those little baby carrots you buy in the grocery store are soaked in some crazy bad-for-you preservative and never to eat them again. Come to think of it they do taste a little different than say a regular carrot with the nice green tops. And to think, those tiny little things...that is what I used to worry about....