Welcome to my blog! My name is Peggy Sutcliffe. I am a mother of 3 awesome children. My oldest, Langston, is 12 and will be entering 7th grade next fall at HP Middle School. Sterling, who is almost 9, will be going into 3rd grade at University Park Elementary. My baby girl, Peyton, is almost 7 and will be going into 1st grade at UP. I am your typical stay at home mom who loves her family....the only difference we may have is that I almost lost one of my children to a blood disorder....and one of my other children saved his life.
March 21st was the worst day of my life. I had taken Langston in for his 3 year check-up and the platelet count came back low. We were immediately sent to Children's Medical Center here in Dallas to see what was going on. The doctors said that they had to perform a bone marrow aspiration. My husband, Steve, went in with Langston during the procedure and I stayed right outside the door. I will never forget the horrifying screams that came from that room. Tears streamed down my face as I fell to the floor knowing I could do nothing for my little boy as he endured the pain. While we were waiting for the results of that test, Steve and I were trying to keep Langston busy around the hospital as we were terrified that the news would come back that he had Leukemia. Hours later the doctors called us in....their words were “We are sorry, it is not Leukemia”. At first I only heard it is not the cancer we feared then the words 'we are sorry' sank in......what do you mean you are sorry? Langston has a blood disorder called aplastic anemia....there is a very low survival rate and no known cure at this time.....although bone marrow transplants seem to be having positive results at this time......
I was 6 months pregnant at the time of diagnosis. Of course a sibling match would be ideal but there is only a 25% chance the baby I was carrying would be a perfect match. Langston had red blood and platelet transfusions weekly and if he had a fever of 101 we would have to stay at Children's for at least 3 days....the months that followed were tedious to say the least.
Sterling arrived on August 1st, 2001 and we harvested the cord blood for the transplant just in case....6 weeks later we found out that Sterling was a perfect marrow match for his big brother! Our prayers were being answered! The doctors wanted to be safe so we waited until Sterling was 6 months old just in case we needed to get the marrow from him. Good thing they waited. The cord blood was stored in California and the courier “Sterling Courier” damaged the cord blood in transit back to Dallas.
The bone marrow transplant took place on February 13, 2002. The months that followed were very scary and Langston was a trooper....it was amazing to watch how strong a 3 year old could be both physically and emotionally!
Langston is now considered cured from this blood disorder and is now a healthy, active boy who loves baseball! Although Sterling does not remember the procedure, he now loves to remind Langston of how he saved his life....by the grace of God and his marrow, Sterling did just that!
Peggy