On Wednesday, June 11, we went up to the mountains for a family
retreat. Thursday, all was normal. Derek played freeze tag and was active and
energetic. Mid day on Thursday, I learned via text message that the son of a
friend of mine had relapsed his leukemia. I was shocked and saddened, imagining
what it must be like to face such news.
Friday morning, June 13, Derek woke up saying his neck hurt
a lot. I thought perhaps he had slept wrong in the motor home or was sore from
playing tag the evening before. It hurt badly enough that he wanted Tylenol,
which I gave him after breakfast. It did not seem to help much and the pain
continued throughout the day. After lunch I gave him more Tylenol and again it
didn’t seem to do much. He was not interested in playing tag and sat with me on
the sidelines. I massaged it gently, but it didn’t seem to help.
During the Friday evening meeting, Derek felt a little warm,
and by the end of the meeting, it was quite obvious he was running a
fever. We went to the motor home and
took his temperature. It was 101.2. We were concerned it could be viral
meningitis, and I called Derek’s doctor. She said to bring him in right away.
So I collected our things and
