About Me

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My name is Jeff Flanagan and my daughter, Taylor, is now a 16 yr old Junior at Etowah High in Woodstock, GA. On October 28, 2010 she was diagnosed with AML, a very aggressive form of leukemia. Within 5 days she was started on extensive chemotherapy treatments. We were initially told she was going to have 5 total rounds of chemo, each lasting approximately 10 days and leaving her in the hospital for weeks with every treatment...but, she was the 1st in GA to only have to go through 4 rounds of her type of treatments. She was able to come home on Easter Day of 2011 and has been doing great since! My family and I thank everyone for all the prayers and thoughts over the last year! For more information on AML Leukemia, please see "AML Information" below.

Donation Page

All donations made will go to the Flanagan family to help cover any remaining out of pocket expenses for Taylor's medical bills. If you do not care to go through Paypal, you can also send donations made out to: Jeff & Ashley Flanagan P.O. Box 818 Holly Springs, GA 30142 Any and all donations are greatly appreciated, no amount is too small!

AML Information

"AML Information" - AML (acute myeloid leukemia) is diagnosed in about 20% of children with leukemia and approximately 500 children are diagnosed in the U.S. each year.

Leukemia is cancer of the blood. It develops in the bone marrow, the spongy center of the long bones that produces the three major blood cells: white blood cells fight infection, red blood cells that carry oxygen and platelets that help blood clot and stop bleeding. When a child has leukemia, the bone marrow begins to make white blood cells that do not mature correctly, but continue to reproduce themselves. Normal, healthy cells only reproduce when there is enough space for them to fit. With leukemia, these cells do not respond to the signals to stop and they reproduce, regardless of space available. These abnormal cells reproduce quickly and when they begin to crowd out other healthy cells in the marrow, symptoms of leukemia are experienced.

Symptoms of leukemia usually occur over a short period of days to weeks. Some of the signs and symptoms for AML can be tiredness or no energy, shortness of breath during physical activity, pale skin, swollen gums, slow healing of cuts, pinhead-size red spots under the skin, prolonged bleeding from minor cuts, mild fever, aches in bones, black-and-blue marks (bruises) with no clear issue.

Patients with AML need to start chemotherapy immediately. There are two (2) parts of treatment; induction therapy and consolidation therapy. The aim of induction therapy is to kill as many AML cells as possible and get good blood cell counts back to normal. When the aim of induction therapy is achieved, it is called a remission. Induction therapy is done at the hospital and most patients are there for three to four weeks. Combining drug types can strengthen the effects of the drugs and two or more chemo's are usually used together to treat AML. Most chemo's are given through a catheter placed into a vein, usually in the persons upper chest area. The first round of chemo usually does not get rid of all AML cells and most require more treatment. Usually the same drugs are used for additional rounds of chemo. Consolidation therapy is needed because some AML cells remain that are not found by common blood or marrow tests. Consolidation therapy is also done in the hospital and as with induction therapy, patients may be in the hospital for three to four weeks at a time.







Monday, June 27, 2011

Taylor's Sweet 16!!

Well, I haven't updated this thing since about Easter and I know so much has gone on since then but I am sure I will miss a couple things.

My baby girl turned 16 on Friday and she has gone through so much in the last 6 months! I think this was probably the most meaningful birthday to us and we are just glad she was through with everything so that she could enjoy it! Taylor didn't want a big party or to make a huge deal out of it, so Friday her mom took her out shopping and her boyfriend Justin took her out to eat Kani House. Then he brought her over to our house to spend the weekend with us. She was given the option of what kind of cake she wanted and she asked for Ashley's homemade strawberry cake. I would have got a picture to put on here, but the kids wouldn't wait long enough for me to get one before they dug into it haha.

Saturday we all got up and went to Helen to walk the shops and go tubing down the river. We met up with my brother Chad, his wife Daisha and her son Dayton. We ended up eating first then headed out for our 2+ hour tube ride. It was fun, Taylor and the rest of the kids had a good time but it was definitely tiring!!! From there we said bye to Chad and them and went walking the shops...although we didn't get too far. It was a little (very) crowded and really all the kids wanted was some ice cream and to raid the candy store! We came home, ate dinner and I think we all crashed pretty early.

Sunday we woke up, got everyone ready and went to have family pictures taken. They came out excellent! We met our best friend, Anna and our nephew J.W. there as they were having pictures taken after us. We attempted to have some pictures taken with J.W. too but he was having NO part of it! After that we went to Anna's house and spent a couple hours with her and J.W. He took to me pretty good, but wanted nothing to do with Ashley! I tried to rub it in until she reminded me that last time he wanted nothing to do with me and was all about her lol. We then came back up and met mine and Michelle's family at Joe's Crab Shack to celebrate Taylor's bday with everyone. I think we ended up with a crowd of about 20 total. We all wanted to tell them it was her birthday so they would make her dance around the restaurant in bunny ears or doing the chicken dance, but Taylor all but threatened us with our lives...party pooper...



Well, that was Taylor's birthday weekend! Since April she has had a few check ups and so far so good, all tests have come back great. She had her line taken out on June 15th and has since been able to go swimming, so to Six Flags, a braves game, spent a weekend in Gaitlinburg with Justin and his family, a weekend in Perdido Key with her aunt and uncle, and best of all she is now able to take showers...which she was the most excited about! Taylor has certainly come a long way since her 15th birthday and we could not be more proud of how she has handle the journey getting to her 16th!

No matter what age you are, you and Jenna will always be Daddy's Little Girls...always remember that!
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