Hi everyone! Taylor is doing fantastic! He even started eating a little today! I had my sonogram today! IT'S A BOY!!! His name will be Cameron Richard Marmet! Richard was both mine and Matt's grandfathers name. They were both so truly special to us, and now they are both with the Lord. The girl who did the sonogram said their is no doubt that he is male! From what we can see, he is pretty well endowed, so there's no mistaking him for a girl! Click here for more sonogram pictures of Taylor's little brother. My doctor said that he looks great and he's about 1 pound 2 ounces right now. Matt and I are so thrilled to be the parents of two wonderful little boys! Taylor is so excited to be having a little brother. He says he wants to play cars with him and push him on the swings. This little guy will be so loved and a welcomed blessing, especially after this year. God has been so good to us! We love you all, Jen

Hi everyone! Taylor is doing well. He's is eating a little more now and he asks for food throughout the day! He seems happy and feeling good. He will be having his scans done next Thrursday and Friday. His line will come out the following week on February 19th! What a milestone!

We put a note of thanks on the front page of the web site for all of you who have so generously contributed donations for Taylor during these past nine months. ALL of your contributions go toward Taylor's treatment! We are so grateful to you for your financial help. Some of the donations have gone toward the daily cost of going to MSK. It costs about $50 a day! We have also been putting it toward some of the bills we have recently been receiving in order to cover some of his treatment that is not covered by insurance. We are so grateful for your continued generosity. The Lord has used you to help provide for us during this difficult time! We also extend our thanks to my parents who purchased a new front window for our home. Taylor enjoys his nice warm living room now! We love you all, Jen

Hi everyone! Great news! Taylor is feeling great and has a lot of energy! Were it not for his bald head, you would think he was a perfectly healthy and normal 2 1/2 year old! Actually, he very likely is in perfect health now. He is cancer free and seems to have recovered from the chemo. The only issue he is dealing with is his appetite. I'll feel better once his broviac is removed though! He is still at risk for an infection as long as he has that thing in him! He's eating a little more every day. He is only on the feeding tube at night and for 3 hours during the afternoon. I'm slowly weaning him off of it. As for his legs, he will not need any physical therapy after all! His legs are getting stronger every day. He hops, jumps, runs, skips, and "tippy toes" around the house all day long. He really hasn't fallen much at all from a lack of strength or poor muscle tone. Kids bounce back so fast from even the most horrific things! We are still planning on doing swim lessons as soon as his broviac is out and the area is healed.

We have a prayer request for all of you. I had mentioned in the past about there being several cases of Rhabdomyosarcomas in the area were we live (at least 6, actually). A 16 year old named Jessica from Pompton Lakes is one of them. We met her and her mom at MSK several times during the past 9 months. Sadly, Jessica passed away this past week. I don't know too many details about her particular case of Rhabdo, but I do know that by the time she was diagnosed over a year ago, she was stage four, it had already spread, and the tumors were inoperable. The reason I'm passing on this information is so that this family can be lifted up to the Lord in prayer by as many people as possible. I can't imagine what their going through. Please say a prayer for them everyone! We love you all, Jen

Hi everyone! Taylor had a fantastic weekend! We are really enjoying having our son... and our life back! We forgot how much fun he is and what it's like to enjoy parenting! The three of us went out for dinner to Fuddruckers last night and as we were getting out of the car Taylor said with surprise, "We going in Mama? He hasn't been "in" anywhere other than MSK for the better part of the past nine months, so this was such a treat for him. He went on the merry-go-round two times and he loved every second of it! To him, it was Disneyland! We also brought him to church with us today! Matt and I decided that we will not be putting him in his Sunday school class until May though. His little body has been through so much and he needs to rebound fully before he can join large groups of children. However, he is back to being our energetic, funny, and happy boy! We just look at him with new eyes now. I can't explain what it's like as a parent to watch your baby suffer like that, then to finally see him happy and healthy again! It's just this amazing joy that we're experiencing now that the storm has passed and his pain is over. I'll say it again and again...God is so good! We love you all, Jen

Hello everyone! Taylor is still doing great and he has so much energy! We are working on the eating though. He'll take a bite here and there, but it's a start. He will have a CAT scan tomorrow (Thursday) and a PET scan on Friday. His broviac will come out next Thursday! After that, he will only need to go in for monthly check-ups for a while and scans every three months for 18 months. I wish that he can be as excited as we are! He has no idea what he's accomplished and why. We are planning on printing out this entire web site and giving him a copy one day when he is old enough to understand it all. Please pray that all goes well tomorrow and Friday! We'll let you know how he does. Thanks everyone! We love you all, Jen

P.S. Baby Cameron Richard is also doing well! I'm 24 weeks now and getting larger by the minute. He is pretty active, but it's getting cramped in there at this point. He responds to Taylor's voice now! It's really cool!

Hi everyone! Thanks for the prayers! They worked! Taylor did really well today. He had a CAT scan this morning and it went very smooth. I had mentioned in the past that he has a hard time with anesthesia. He needed it every day during radiation and for all of his scans. He wakes up a wild child almost every time! It's always very stressful dealing with him for that period of time afterwards. He was under for such a short amount of time for his CAT scan today, so that helped the situation. He's not afraid anymore when we walk into any of the scan rooms and he always says, "Good night Mama" as he drifts off to sleep. To him, all of this is normal. This whole routine has really become a part of life for him. When he woke up from the scan today, he kept on saying, "Let's do it again!" Well, I guess I'm glad that he enjoys it! Dr. Meyers had examined him this morning and he said that he looks terrific! His counts were also very good. His blood and platelets were well into their normal ranges. This was good news to us! Sometimes patients have a difficult time rebounding on their own after that much chemo! He did test positive for RSV again today though. He tested negative when he was discharged two weeks ago! Apparently, RSV can reside in his blood stream for two or more months, even when there are no longer any symptoms! And a negative result is not always accurate. He will have his last scan tomorrow. Taylor will probably be disappointed that it's the last one. He loves that anesthesia! We'll keep you posted as to how he does. We love you all, Jen

Hi everyone! Everything went very well yesterday at the hospital. He had his last scan and he did very well again. He was yelling, "More radiation...do it again!" after his PET scan. He had 17 days of radiation this past fall so he thinks that every time he goes to "sleep" with the anesthesia, he's getting radiation. The great news was that the preliminary report came back from his CAT scan that he had on Thursday, and it stated that everything appears normal and there is no evidence of recurrent disease! The MRI he had a few weeks ago stated the same thing! Praise the Lord! He is scheduled to have his broviac removed next Thursday! I will be sure to let you know how he does on Thursday night! Please pray that his procedure will go well! Thanks everyone!

You know something, as we waited for Taylor's scan yesterday, I said to Matt, "Here we are, finally at the end of his treatment and I still can't believe that we're sitting here! I still can't believe that we have a child who has had this cancer! I accepted it soon after his diagnosis and dealt with whatever came our way these past nine months, but believe it or not, it still sometimes doesn't seem real! When Taylor was first diagnosed, I remember being on my knees in front of my bed crying as I prayed to the Lord about my little one's condition. It was the day before we had brought him to MSK to meet Dr. Wexler, and we had so many unanswered questions. I remember praying, "Lord, whatever happens...please use this! No matter what the outcome may be." Everything that I have written on this web site is from my heart. All of these thoughts from a mother's point of view are truthfully a reflection of how I've felt and dealt with my son's illness. Most importantly, the strength you've read about is not of my own, but truly from God alone. Matt and I have often said to each other during these past nine months that we can't imagine how people get through life without the Lord. Even under the best of life's circumstances, I can't imagine existing with a void that God so perfectly fills. In the entry that I wrote during Taylor's surgery called, "How a Mother Copes" I mentioned that I had accepted Jesus as my Savior when I was a child. Salvation is a free gift to those who believe that Jesus died to pay for our sins and that He rose again. We can do nothing to earn our way into Heaven. He paid that debt for us. He loves us that much and wants all of us to believe in Him! That's just the beginning! He's my rock, my peace, my hope , and my strength every day of this life! And because I believe, I know that I will spend eternity with Him in Heaven! There is a bible verse that has helped me through these past months, as well as through other trials in my life. It says, "The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us in Heaven." Romans 8:18. How cool is that? If you read this web site and you've never made the choice to trust Jesus as your Savior...you can have this same peace, hope and strength in your life as well! This choice is all that matters in life...and death. As Taylor's parents, Matt and I hope and pray that God will have used our little boy to touch someone's life and to demonstrate His power and grace. We love you all! Jen

Hi everyone! It's official...HE'S DONE! His broviac was removed by Dr. La Quaglia this morning and the procedure went perfectly! We are still going to keep the feeding tube in him until his first monthly check up. We have great news to report on that as well! Taylor has begun eating again and he's been eating like he never ate before! He eats just about anything we put in front of him. He didn't even do that before he was diagnosed...before all this treatment! We actually had a hard time getting him to eat any solid food at all. The chemo caused him to feel so sick for such a long time and food had a metallic taste to it. Now he's feeling good again and eating has a whole new meaning! Leaving MSK today had a whole new meaning for us as well. Matt and I left with such happy hearts and we feel like our little guy has accomplished the world...and before the age of three! God has done an awesome work of healing in that tiny body. He's also blessed us with Dr. Wexler, Dr. Meyers, and Dr. La Quaglia and their amazing gifts of wisdom. Matt and I are so grateful for the extraordinary care he's received from these men and all of Taylor's wonderful nurses at MSK! Ironically, we ran into Bella and her mom Maureen at BJ's as we returned home from MSK today. Bella is the little girl who lives a few miles away who finished her treatment for Rhabdo in July. She is also cancer free and she looks fantastic! When I first met them, Bella looked like Taylor; sick eyes, pale color, no hair, and just plain ill. It has been so uplifting for us to see her from time to time and watch her heal afterwards. Seeing her today with bright eyes, a healthy glow and a full head of hair just put the finishing touch on our final day at MSK. Taylor has made it through this aggressive treatment and the tumor is gone, but the physical and mental scars have yet to fade. He will soon forget all of this, however, Matt and I will be forever changed. Our faith is bigger. Our marriage is stronger. It's people, not things that are of most importance and hold precedense in our life. We've learned not to sweat the small stuff and only to worry when there is truly a reason. As I had mentioned before, we have learned to take each day one at a time and not to concern ourselves with tomorrow...that's God's job. Matt and I aspire to raise Taylor and Cameron with these concepts in mind and heart, and we pray that they will learn what Matt and I live.

Taylor will now begin his monthly check ups at MSK. I'll let you know the date of his March check up as soon as I schedule it. He will have scans every 3 months for 18 months, then every 6 months for the following 18 months. He will have scans once a year for 2 years after that. He will be finished with the scans 5 years from now...when he is almost 8 years old! I will continue to update his web site after each monthly check up and after his scans over the years ahead. We will also be updating you with pictures of Taylor as he heals and becomes a healthy, brown haired boy again...only new and improved now! And of course, we will provide you with pictures of Cameron after his arrival! We thank you again for all of the prayers, meals, financial contributions, blood and platelet donations, and emotional support that we have received this past year! So many people helped in so many ways and we've been very blessed by all of you. We also thank those of you who care about Taylor and have watched his web site, although you may not know us personally. We also thank those of our friends and family who stayed close by our side through this difficult time. You have helped Matt and me through this and you are all so very special to us. We love you all, Jen