picture update

(Konner's shirt says: Dont blame me, I was born awesome.)

So here are some recent pictures of Konner. We are sitting here today in our hotel room waiting for tomorrows appointment. Konner will go to his new clinic tomorrow at the University of New Mexico. We are excited and nervous at the same time. Tomorrow Konner will have his monthly urine test and also another blood test to check his ANC Levels. We hope they are climbing and not still dropping. Please pray for Konner. I will post and update as soon as we can. Konner has also turned 5 months old. He is a happy baby and absolutely loves his brothers. His hair has also started to grow back!!! Also our house is done so we will close as soon as we get back home. Then we will have internet up and running a couple of days after and I can keep up with weekly updates!

Sorry I have not posted pictures or updates on The Run for Konner's Fight and Konner's benefit Concert. I am still waiting to receive the pictures for both and the winners and such from the concert!

Enjoy the pictures. sry for the quality.. taken with my camera on my phone!

An update on Konner

So Today Konner had an appointment at the clinic. He had to receive his IV treatment of Pentamidine. He also got a blood count done and his counts were great except for his ANC levels. They were a little concerned because it has been awhile since his last chemo treatment and his counts should be somewhat normal by now. Well they just keep dropping for some reason. They gave us 3 possible reasons.
1.) It could be from the Bactrim the medicine they took him off of. This is the least likely reason because he has been off of bactrim from about 6 weeks now.
2.) It could be that he has an infection. So they tested his bowel to see if they can find anything wrong.
3.) It could mean that the cancer has spread to his bone marrow thus making it hard for his Neutrophils count to go up.
So we are scheduling him an Appointment at his new clinic University of New Mexico pediatric cancer center next week. There they will do another blood test to check his counts to see if it has changed. If it went down more then they will do more Bone Marrow aspirations. They will also do his monthly urine test.

Please continue to pray for Konner as his battle is definitely not over yet!


Today was also Konner's last Dr's appointment at the Phoenix Children's Hospital Oncology Clinic. It was a bittersweet see you later. I say see you later because that is the honest truth. These people have been so amazing to our family and most of all to Konner. If you could see the smiles that Konner brings to peoples faces it would melt your heart. They have become part of our family there. They have known Konner since he turned 2 months and he is now 5 months. I know that is not a long time but Konner has definitely endured alot in his short 5 months. PCH will always be apart of our family. Right now I would like to thank you All for helping make Konner feel so comfortable and helping him through this process. You will be missed and never forgotten.

Also thank you to Dr. Wilcock for always bringing your A-Game to work and for sending Konner to Dr. Price who then also brought her A-Game to work. If it weren't for you ladies Konner would not be where he is today. So THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart! You are also so very special to us and I look forward to future visits!

Thank You to Dr. Adelson and Dr. Acosta for operating on Konner and for getting as much of the tumor out as possible! Thank you for being apart of Konner's treatment and for always being so understanding to all the MILLIONS of question we asked you. Thank You for Helping out our baby boy!

A thanks and big bear hugs to:

Dr. Allison Wilcock (Konner's Pediatrician)
Dr. Harper Price (Konner's Dermatologist)

Dr. Francis Eshun
Dr. Andrea White-Collins ("A")
Dr. Michael Etzl
Sharon Denny (Konner's Nurse)
Marcia Soldavini (Konner's Case worker)

Dr. David Adelson (Konner's Neurosurgeon)
Dr. Juan Acosta (Konner's General Surgeon)

A TREMENDOUS THANK YOU to ALL the nursing staff at PCH! All the nurses and Dr's in PICU F! All the Nurses on Floor 2! Thank You for your long conversations with me. Thank you For being so amazing with my son.

Konner Dowdy Benefit Concert!

So this Saturday July 17 at Long Wongs in Tempe. Some Amazing people have put together a concert to benefit Konner!! It is sure to be lots of fun! For all ages!... Games, Music, Food and many more!!!!
Come by and check it out!!!

When: Saturday July 17th, 2010 ~ 10:00am-2:00am


Location: Long Wongs at the Firehouse.
1639 E. Apache Blvd.
Tempe, AZ 85281

Mixed info....

Hello Everyone. I just wanted to share a little bit of into with you all. There was recently an interview posted about Konner and his benefit concert. Some of that info that was given was incorrect. I know how it can be to easily mix information up and be nervous and say the wrong things. So there were a couple of mistakes but I would like to fix the 2 major ones.

1st konner did NOT have a brain tumor. He had a tumor in his abdomen next to his kidney that spread to his spine. He did have surgery to remove the tumor. but only the part on his spine was successfully removed. The one in his abdomen was not removed due to it being connected to nerve endings.

2nd we DO have insurance. The army has been AMAZING with helping and covering all of Konner's medical cost up until now. We are now off army insurance due to my husband being Honorably released from the Army. He has since moved and started working and they have also been great to let Konner on insurance and not call it pre-existing condition. So we do have insurance but we will still have to pay for treatment. the cost for just body scans every 3 months is around 18,000 before insurance. I should not need to explain myself or share personal info about our bills. But this seems to keep coming up. Because people keep thinking that we have no insurance and that the Army was not treating us Fairly. So The Army has been amazing!! Has helped with EVERYTHING.

Those were the 2 major corrections I wanted to make. I am sure everyone had good intentions and things can get mixed so easily with everything that has been going on. My family and I are so GRATEFUL for all the help everyone has given to Konner and our family! Thank you for all your support cause we seriously could not have made it with through with out all the positiveness. If that is even a word lol. Again we thank You for your understanding.

Pictures to come of the run and recent pictures of Konner. Just dont have a fast enough connection where we are at.

Been awhile.

So it has been awhile since my last update on Konner. He is currently doing ok. We spent all last night and early morning in the E.R. due to another allergic reaction to something. He also has alot of scratches on his head and ears from the itching that they were concerned about. They dont want him to get an infection because his ANC levels are low. So they have him on Augmenton (sp). He also had developed a hole in his ear drum due to a silent ear infection that popped. So right now he will take this antibiotic for 10 days and then have another check up. Other that then he is doing good. Happy most of the time. Konner has done great so far given his situation. We are thankful for the way everything has worked out. He has been given the best of the worst situation. I am thankful for everyday I have with him!

Successful Run

Today was the Run for Konner's Fight!! It was a HUGE success. I would like to thank ALL Volunteers and All those who Participated!! Victoria Heuett You are an AMAZING person. I am so proud to call you my Friend. Thank You for doing so much and for Organizing the Run. Karah Flake Thank you For the Wonderful job today and for taking all the picture. I cant wait to post them!

Decisions, choices, decision....................................

So Kyle and I have made our decision about Konner and his treatment. To us this is the right choice and we know that Heavenly Father has us pointed in the right direction. So we have decided to leave the Tumor in Konner. At times I think to myself how can I come to this conclusion. How can I leave Cancer inside my baby, The thing that made him so sick in the first place. Well here is our reason...... Konners tumor shrunk 80%. That is what the doctors were hoping for. When you look at the image scans it really seems unreal. All of Konners Doctors have said the same thing about his tumor and I know they have his best at heart. Chemo stays in your body for up to 3 months after treatment. So that could shrink his tumor more. They also said that these tumors have a tendency to grow a layer of calcium over them which will make them become inactive. Yes his tumor will more than likely have to stay in him for the rest of his life. But it will be a dead tumor and will not bother him. I asked the question..."What is the likely hood of it spreading or returning if we leave it in him?"And the Doctors response to that was...

"Konner has a 10-20% chance of the cancer spreading or returning in a different area. But he also has that exact same chance if we were to take it out. Cancer has microscopic cells which you can not see. So even if you think you took it all out there might be some left over which could grow another tumor some place else in his body or spread."

Right now we have made the decision to watch it and have urine tests done every month and scans every 3 months for the 1st year. Then for the next 2 years do urine tests every 2 months with scans every 3-6 months. If something changes or his urine spikes then we know something is wrong and he will go through all tests again. And possibly start chemo again depending on the cause of the problem. We don't want to do another round of chemo cause although it shrunk the tumor it is also poisoning our baby. We also don't want his type of cancer to become immune to the chemo cause then that can make it more aggressive. This is the best thing for Konner.

Our other option would have been to remove the tumor (which is still deeply embedded into a nerve) and see how he does. This option though sounds better at first has its setbacks. If we cut that nerve it could cause him to loose function of his bowels, or urinary tract or possibly cause him to be paralyzed. All 3 of those don't sound ideal. and he would still have the 10-20% chance of the cancer returning. He would still have to have all the check ups and possibly more.

It has taken me awhile to write to you about this. I feel that our choice is right but at times struggle with the fact about leaving it alone. I know that he will be closely watched and if Kyle and I feel like anything is wrong we can ask for tests and they will do them. I know that Heavenly Father will watch over Konner. Konner has a lot of Angels in heaven watching over him. His brother Kade, 2 other angel baby brothers, my Dad, my cousin Ashley. So that is our choice and decision.

Thank You for your continued support and prayers...