Fight Like A Girl.

A Quiet Moment. I hope you all had some time to relax and enjoy the holidays. Our Thanksgiving was not traditional but still very nice. We missed our yearly get together with the rest of the family but were joined with Wes and my sister Cathy and nephew Dan. We celebrated Dan's 25th birthday. Layla had treatment Monday through Wednesday. Wes accompanied her and got to meet Dr. Rosenberg and the nursing crew. Our Thanksgiving consisted of a pre-ordered Whole Foods Turkey+ Meal along with some home made stuff. It was delicious!  We might have a new tradition from now on! We hung out mostly at home. Layla was exhausted, a side effect of both immunotherapy and chemotherapy. We had rented a house for 6 days to bridge the gap between our Mexico trip and our third phase of treatment. Happy Thanksgiving! Layla modeling her new outfit dubbed the "Huggle" (gift from Cathy). Olaf is not sure about the portions! Family Thanksgiving Selfie. On Saturday...

Welcome to Mexico City Our trip home was full of wonderful events. We celebrated our bride to be, Amy, with an amazing group of her family members and friends and we attended Romeo Chocolate’s evening of chocolate and wine. There was a huge turnout. Thank you to everyone who participated! The fund raiser resulted in $1,700 dollars that will be added to our PlumFund to cover Layla’s medical expenses. Our Bride to Be Amy with Layla Our Bride to Be with her Crew Celebrating Amy Layla and her Tour Guides helping at Romeo Chocolates Great turnout at Romeo Chocolates We spent Monday traveling to Mexico City. We were picked up at the airport by a driver from Dr. Williams team. We are staying in the Santa Fe area of Mexico City conveniently located next to a mall called SAMARA. Upon check in at the hotel, the front desk clerk was very curious to know the meaning of my name going on to explain that the hotel is connected to a mall that bears the ...

Birds in the Parking Lot Today is the  the end of Phase I of our treatment. We are coming home for the weekend with plans to leave to Mexico City the following Monday. Nina and I packed up our place while Layla was getting treatment on Wednesday. Dr. Rosenberg's staff is allowing us to store few items in the office so we do not have to buy basic things again. We liked our place. It is only few minutes from the office. We will miss our lizard pets. Layla and Olaf  On to Phase II Packing with Supervision Moving Time We received good news last week : One of Layla's Tumor markers has come down after two weeks of treatment by almost 50%, while the other two have risen slightly (which can be less accurate during the early phases of a new treatment). Tumor markers are substances that are released in the blood by cancer cells. It is a blood test that allows us to monitor the growth or regression of Layla’s cancer. Although it ...

Saturday Morning Walk We are half way through the first phase of our treatment. It consists of three phases: Boca Raton with Dr. Rosenberg getting the weekly treatment for 4 weeks of low-dose metronomic chemotherapy, high-dose Vitamin C, Tauroldine and lots of re-purposed  drugs and supplements. We go to Mexico City with Dr. Williams for the CT-Guided Intra-Tumoral injection of OX-40 and CpG directly into the liver lesions. Then back to Boca Raton to continue the phase I treatment for 6-8 more weeks. There is no treatment on Fridays. We had a low key weekend that was mostly spent at home between reading, TV, lounging, cooking, etc. We managed to leave the house on Saturday to go to the movies. We watched “The House with a Clock in its Walls." It was definitely entertaining. We got to try Shake Shack for the first time afterwards and wanted to see if it lived up to its reputation. We remain faithful to In-N-Out! At the theater. At Shake Shack. ...

A touch of Fall. Thursday is the end of our week 2 treatment. Our weekly treatment is the same. It consists of two long days of infusing Taurolidine (antimicrobial agent) over 5-6 hours, A day of high-dose Vitamin C infusions and a day of low-dose chemotherapy with Hyperbaric Oxygen (HBOT) sessions. Layla getting low dose chemotherapy on Thursday. One of three chemo drugs infused. This is Adryomycin dubbed as the red devil (luckily she only gets 10% of the dose). Our main challenge has been keeping Layla's nausea under control. Our day started at 10:30 at the clinic with a slow long infusion of Taurolidine . She tolerated it very well with the anti nausea medicine. Our day ended around 5:00pm. She had lots of energy at the end of the day and managed to make dinner and experiment with trying out some ketogenic pumpkin pancakes. Layla Making Dinner on Wednesday. Olaf helping out with Dinner. Our morning routine consists of sorting out Layla's pi...