Hoping for answers

Dear Jack

I only slept about 15 minutes last night.
In the morning, you had another blood test, which was again very traumatic.
I called our neighbour Kate Maree. She came to the hospital a couple hours later and did a lot of drawing with you. By then, dad had gone home to pick up the girls.
You had a finger prick to see if your red blood cells were high enough to go ahead with the bone marrow aspiration. They weren't, so they told us you needed another blood transfusion.
Dad arrived with the girls. Kate Maree went home. After a little while, dad took the girls back home and you and I walked to another ward for the bone marrow aspiration. We got a visit from the Clown Doctors, who called you Doctor Smartie because they thought you were so smart.
You kept asking me if you were going to get any more needles and I reassured you that nothing bad was going to happen. I was wrong again. The fluid they ran through your cannula made your hand sting very badly and the gas they put on your face irritated your eyes. You were crying and I felt like I had failed you again. With tears in my eyes I left the operating theater. They told me it should take 20 minutes.
I quickly went downstairs to get some food. When I came back up, you were not in recovery yet. It took forever and I kept asking the nurses to go and check on you. When you finally came out of theater, after an hour, they told me they'd had to do two punctures because they couldn't get enough bone marrow out.
Dad joined us in the room where you were recovering. I went to the bathroom and ran into aunty Shelley. She joined you and dad while I went for a little walk. Because you'd had to fast since 5.30 this morning, I had promised you you could eat whatever you want after the procedure. Boy, did you eat! We joked about you not leaving any food in the cafetaria for the other patients.

Back in the room we had to wait several hours for the test results. You were the life of the party the whole afternoon. You were talking non-stop and it made me realise how flat you had been in the last few weeks. The second blood transfusion had suddenly brought our old Jack back.

Eventually, three doctors came into the room and took us into a conference room. They told us the tests were inconclusive because they had not been able to extract bone marrow - it was just blood. We'd have to wait until Monday to get the results of the biopsy. However, Prof. Marshall, the oncologist said he had ruled out an infection and the result was going to be some form of leukemia or another bone marrow malfunction which was just as life threatening. For me this wasn't really news, as I spent a bit of time online last night to check out the symptoms of leukemia and knew already that you weren't just having an infection. In fact, I was reassured by the doctor's explanation about the various treatments, which were all much shorter than I expected. I think for dad the news hit really hard.  I went back into the room with you while dad went to have a chat with aunty Shelley.
Dad and I had a chat about the 'plan of action' from here on whilst aunty Shelly stayed with you.

In the evening, I finally called opa to tell him what was happening.
Dad went home to be with the girls. I stayed with you. You were full of life and didn't go to sleep until 10.30pm. What a wonderful kid you are!

Lots of love
Mum