Today was Skyler's last day in Interim Maintenance!  Yay, one phase down and two more grueling ones to go before we get into maintenance.  Skyler's counts today were great and his walking has gotten alot better so they upped his Vincristine dose to 100% again.  I actually asked them to do this because he has just gone too long without the full doses of his chemo.  In two weeks he will start the next dreaded phase called Delayed Intensification (DI)  This phase is just like the Induction phase,  and we all know how his body tolerated that...it didnt.  This is what Induction did to him:

Respiratory failure, Kidney failure, Removal of his spleen, Liver disfunction (almost complete liver failure) and all of this happening while trying to get rid of the cancer in his blood.

So to say Im scared is an understatement.  He has just come too far to have any set backs like this again.  It would be devastating.  The hardest part about this is that we dont know exactly what did this to him.  Was it a specific chemo, a combination of the drugs, or was his body just so sick from the Leukemia that the chemo just pushed him over the edge?  We just dont know.  I was talking with the doctor today about it and he was saying that since he has reacted so well to this phase of treatment that he thinks maybe the cancer was just so bad to begin with that his organs werent working right that the chemo just pushed him over the edge.  He was thinking (well hoping) that since his organs are now almost all recovered that he may tolerate this part alot better.  To be certain we will give him half a dose of one the drugs that is harsh and see how his body reacts.  He is also supposed to receive steroids in this phase but since steroids help fungus grow he will not be getting any.  I should be happy about this since I have heard steroids are awful, but thats just another thing he isnt getting to keep his cancer away.  He will also lose his hair again and his counts will also drop.  I have been dreading this phase and am so scared for him.  Its a miracle that his body recovered from the hit it took in the beginning.  Please pray that this doesnt happen again. 

Here are a few pics of clinic today:

Since January Skyler has gone from 106 centimeters to 107.4 I cant believe how much he is growing.

Here he is getting his chemo.  He makes getting poison pumped into him look so casual.

I may be smiling in this picture but I was super irritated with how long it was taking to get his chemo up from the pharmacy.  We got there at 8:00 am and we didnt get the chemo up until 11:00....so frustrating!

Watching the "yellow juice" going into him.