Update
Wow I can’t believe our latest update was a month ago!
As of Hutton’s last scan in February her tumor is shrinking. Praise the lord!
In August 2025, we found out that Hutton’s tumor was not responding to her treatment the way we had hoped and was actually growing…not the news we wanted to hear, especially since we were only a couple treatments away from finishing that protocol. But her amazing team at UCLA was ready to pivot and start a new chemo protocol. Well, this new protocol was really, really, hard on her body, which had already been through so much, including the 7 weeks of radiation. It was so hard on her body, that her numbers were not coming up like they should have been, and she was needing what seemed like weekly transfusions, something her team did not like. She should have been getting her 5-day in hospital chemo every 2 weeks, but because of her numbers, even with transfusions, she was going 4-5 weeks between sessions.
Her doctor decided to delay one of her 5-day chemos, to see what her scans would show. Since her last scan showed the tumor had shrunk a little bit, her team decided to pivot again. She is now getting only one chemo (she was getting 3) and she is able to get it every other Monday at the infusion center. This means no more hospital stays! We go up early Monday morning, get chemo and then get to come home! The belief is that it is better to hit the tumor more consistently and frequently rather than 5 days hard and an entire month off.
We are praying this will be the case because Hutton has been responding great to this new protocol. She is not throwing up, she does not have mouth sores, she is not nauseous all the time. She can eat and drink, she is in a good mood, and she is growing hair! She is VERY excited that she has eyebrows now.
She has started equine therapy to get her to walk again, she has been venturing out more, and she even went to school one day! We are taking baby steps (no pun intended) but we are moving forward and praying we can continue making positive progress.
