Day 0: Our summer ends...

Our family was looking forward to Camp Lawrence Family Camp on Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire. The morning was hot, and Madeline hadn't had much, if anything, to drink during the 3-hour drive. When we stopped for lunch before getting on the ferry to Bear Island, Mady fainted after standing in line for 15 minutes. She was somewhat dehydrated, and after drinking some water she no longer felt faint, so we continued on to camp. We had a nice week, but Mady's shoulder hurt where she fell on it, and she started to have a bit of a fever in the evenings, but it went away by morning.

The camp nurse gave her Ibuprofen for the fever and pain, and said that if Mady were her child, she'd stay at camp and bring her to her pediatrician upon returning home. I was really worried about appendicitis, but she assured me that Mady would have some rebound pain near her appendix. We stayed and all had a nice time. Although Mady was still feeling tired, she did most everything, but just quite a bit slower than usual. Must be just a viral thing of some kind.

When we got home, we took Mady to her pediatrician right away. He examined her and said she probably just had one of those things kids get... some virus most likely... she just needed plenty of fluids and rest. Six days later she was still tired, still had the low-grade fever at night, and now began to complain about "floaters" in front of her eyes. Chris called the pediatrician's office and described her symptoms to a different doctor, and he said we should bring her in the next morning for a blood test... which we did on Monday, September 10, 2007. We expected the lab results back in a day or two.

Shortly after returning home, however, we got a call from the doctor's office. They asked Chris to bring Madeline to the Mass General Hospital emergency room right away for more tests--they gave us no other information. I came home from work early to hang with Julia, and while I was there I got a call from Mady's pediatrician, who sounded a bit shaken. He said her blood had low red and white cell count and low platelet count. He said that there were viruses that could cause this, but another possibility was... Leukemia.