I've made the decision

After discussing it my sweetheart, and many prayers, I have made the decision to treat the cancer aggressively. I'm relieved to have the decision made. The doctors office will call today to get the pre-auths they need from the insurance company and then we'll get started. The duration of the treatments will be about 6 months with each cycle lasting about 3 weeks.

The side effects are the typical chemotherapy side effects. Lovely, right? Thankfully, they have meds to treat most of them.

A funny thing ... with this chemo there's about a 50-70% chance that I will loose my hair. With this in mind, I decided I might as well color it red. I'm always nervous about doing reds and I usually shy away from them because they require a lot of maintenance. But, if I might loose it any way, I might as well have fun with it. So, watch for the red to come. :)

And, please, keep the prayers coming!

An Update on Cancer Stuff

I haven't posted recently about the cancer, because I'm a little sick of the whole subject. But, in keeping with my promise to be really open about it ... here's the most recent stuff.

I had my digestive tract fully scoped and reviewed. A few biopsies were taken and everything came back normal. Whewhoo! No cancer in the GI tract. That's a relief.

Unfortunately, now I have to decide what to do with the cancer that is still there. I met with my Oncologist about 10 days ago. He had attended a conference where *the* specialist in my cancer spoke. He learned that the itching and fatigue are hallmark symptoms of active disease. So, I suppose it's no surprise that the itching has returned with a vengeance and that I'm back to being so tired that it's ridiculous. (And, I don't mean ridiculous in the way my 15 year old daughter uses the word.) He also learned that it definitely IS a relapsing Cancer and that for about 1/3 of the patients with this Cancer, it will become a more aggressive form of cancer.

So, if I weren't symptomatic, we could just wait to treat it until the symptoms start. Unfortunately, I am symptomatic which means we need to treat it. My Oncologist consulted with this other specialist about my case and he called me yesterday to go over the options.

My options are chemotherapy. There are 2 types of chemotherapy that I can choose from. I've read a little about each of them and I'm not sure which to choose. One is a more aggressive treatment than the other. What I don't know is if one will provide a longer remission than the other.

I don't know and I'm out of time (and energy) for discussing this right now. I'll keep you posted.

Please keep us in your prayers. We appreciate and feel the strengthening power of prayers!

The Zoo

Jacob had his first TAKS test ever. It took him about 2 hours and then we picked him up. All of us went to brunch at Magnolia Pancake Haus. We had a yummy breakfast ... and lots of silliness, too.


After we pulled ourselves together from the silliness, we went to the San Antonio zoo.

We first went to see the Komodo dragons being fed. We were a little early for it, but we waited ... and waited ... and waited. We finally gave up and moved on to other things. But, we were there long enough to get this great picture of Johnathon.

We made our way over to the Africa Live part. We saw these two beautiful birds there! The pictures probably do not do the vivid blue justice. It was really beautiful!


Ryan was about finished by this point, but on our way out, I agreed to let the little munchkins go into the Lory Landing display. It's this caged area that you can walk through and it has lots and lots of birds.

The first time I went in, we bought stuff to feed them. Sounded fun to me. Reality wasn't as fun. They kept biting me instead of just eating the food. Definitely not my idea of fun. Plus, if you know me really well, then you might know that I scream when an animal moves on me unexpectedly. (Remind me to tell you about the Hawaiian sand crabs sometime.) So, I stayed outside while Aunt Joyce ventured in with the kids. (No, I didn't mention my previous experience to her. Someone needed to go with the munchkins.) :)

Nearly as soon as David entered the Lory Landing, a beautiful bird landed on his head and there it stayed for about 15 minutes. If you close in the following picture you can see it on his head. (If you click on the picture it will enlarge it for you.)

Another little girl inside the Lory Landing was really entertained by the bird on David's head. But the most entertaining part was actually what the bird was doing... at least entertaining to me.

The bird spent the entire time picking up something out of David's hair and eating it. No, David doesn't have bugs in his hair ... although the thought did occur to me. I think the bird was eating at David's dandruff. Gross, right? It was really funny. I think David was just really lucky that the bird didn't poop on his head. haha...

Deborah didn't last long on the inside. She's like me in that she preferred looking at the beautiful birds from the other side of the cage.

It was fun to have Aunt Joyce with us. We really enjoyed her visit here in San Antonio and can't wait to see her again! We love you, Aunt Joyce! Thanks for a really good time!

(PS I think we wore her out.)

I love this man!

Which picture do you like better? This one or the one above?

The Blizzard of 2010

We had a San Antonio Blizzard today. Our family is calling it, "The Blizzard of 2010." I think the picture says it all:

I found these 2 pictures on my camera. It appears Johnathon took them. They made me smile. I hope they do you, too.

More Good News

I went for more tests and biopsies yesterday. Thankfully, there is NO cancer in my GI tract! Whewhoo!!!! And, thankfully, that test is over. I'm so thankful for my good friends: Jana who took such good care of loopy me, Jamie who took care of getting Jessica to and from school, Mary and Ally who managed 4 of the kids for co-op and the afternoon, and to Myrna who once again took made sure Ryan had a great day! Thank you all!

And, yes, Jessica, I now remember that Sister Wilson brought you home. :)

Happy Birthday, Dwight and Jessica!

Today is Jessica's 15th birthday and Dwight's 42nd birthday! We had a very nice day.
Jessica had the day off school. Unfortunately, Dwight did not have the day off work.

We had yummy cake and ice cream. I made the cake. Can you tell?

One of Jessica's sweet friends brought her a fun Sponge Bob balloon and a cupcake. I'm glad Jessica has such good friends.

We don't get many pictures of Jessica or Dwight.

So, it was fun to get some good snapshots of both of them.

I love the two of you! Don't ever forget it.

Happy Valentine's Day

This has been a great Valentine's Day. Dwight and I actually celebrated Valentine's on Friday evening. We had a yummy dinner together. We decided we'd celebrate with the whole family today. So, this is what Valentine's Day looked like at our house today: It started with beautiful roses.

Then Dwight and I spent the afternoon in the kitchen cooking up some yummy dishes for the kids to enjoy with us.

Dwight made some mango pico de gallo and shrimp to serve with plaintain chips that he fried himself and some blue corn tortilla chips. Delicious!

Dwight also made wonderful steak, shrimp and melt-in-your-mouth scallops. (The scallops were a HUGE hit!)I made this yummy roasted brussel sprouts dish. It has granny smith apples, red onions, lots of bacon, and of course, brussel sprouts. So good!

And, of course, what Valentine's Day meal would be complete without a little chocolate? I dipped some large, flavorful strawberries in white and milk chocolate. The kids were really tickled by the tuxedo design.

Hope you all have had a loving Valentine's Day!

Deborah's been playing with my camera. Here's one of her better shots today (minus the thumb).

More Art from Jacob

Today Jacob had an art assignment where he worked "together" with the teacher to express his feelings through his art work. Here are the resulting pictures:

I promised some pictures of Ryan's feeding pump and here they are. You can see from the above picture that it's just a little unit that hangs on an IV pole. The pole is adjustable and easily moved, which is really nice. We also have a little backpack that we can put the pump in and take with us. So far though, we've opted to just leave the pump at home. We're usually only gone with him for a few hours at a time and it just feels a little easier to not deal with the pump feedings then.
You can see from below how we just place the IV stand next to Ryan. We can still hold him and play with him. Here he just happens to be hanging out with the other kids.

David was playing with and reading to Deborah while Johnathon finished the book "The Lightning Thief." If you haven't read it yet, you should. It's a really fun book based on Greek Mythology. It's a pretty easy read and it seems to appeal to a wide range of ages. Jessica is almost 15 and she enjoyed it and Johnathon is only 7 and he's loving it!

Man, it's been a long day!

The t-shirt says: "Judge me by my size, do you?"

More biopsies ordered...

I met with yet another specialist today. This time it's a GI Specialist. I really like him. (Thanks for the referral, my Relocated Angel!)

Anyway ... he explained that it's common for Lymphoma to present in the GI tract, most commonly in the stomach. So, next Tuesday he will be doing biopsies of my GI tract. Thankfully, I'll be asleep during the whole procedure.

And, THAT brings up another point ... Why will they put me to sleep for this procedure (and insurance will pay for it), but NOT for bone marrow biopsies?? Really? Who made that decision?

Oh, well, it was worth the $307.

I love my job! Today.

I was just watching last night's American Idol episode and doing laundry. You know the routine ... hanging clothes and folding towels, sheets and pillowcases. Such a mundane task. Then during the first commercial break, I went into our bathroom to put away the folded towels and replace the used towels with fresh towels.

That's when it occurred to me. As I was taking down my husband's towel that was still slightly damp from his morning shower, I felt such joy! I love my job! I'm not sure if he even realizes that I give him a fresh towel every time I do laundry. But, I love that I can serve him. In such a simple way, I can do something nice for him.

I haven't always loved this aspect of my job. So, why do I now?

Perhaps, it's because of a conversation I had with a friend last night. She commented on how sweet she thought it was that when Dwight spoke in church last week about maintaining faith while enduring trials, the only thing he talked about as a trial was my health issues. It was just me that was at the top of his radar. She thought it was sweet. I hadn't really thought about it.

It was sweet.

She also shared with me a conversation she had with a friend. This friend had attended one of the conventions they have about families. I've heard of it. You probably have too. It's a worldwide conference to discuss ways that we can strengthen the family in these days when the idea of family is really being attacked. One of the comments that was made by a woman from another country was directed to the women of the western culture. In her country, women have been forced to start their children in government run schools by the age of 2 (or was it 3?) and they are required to go to work. She spoke of her confusion as to why women of the western culture would willingly choose to do those things.

I recognize that not all women willingly choose to put their kids in school early and I am truly aware of how many women are returning to the workplace when their heart's greatest desire is to be a full-time homemaker. However, with that said, and understanding that I am not placing judgment on anyone's situation, I think she has a very valid point.

And, today, I am very thankful for the mundane tasks like laundry, cleaning bottles, changing diapers, vacuuming, etc. I am thankful for the opportunity I have to serve my family, to have my children with me, and to (do my best to) make my home a little piece of heaven.

I hope you love your job today, too. Whatever that job may be.

Johnathon and I slipped away for a yummy treat at our favorite breakfast place! We had lots of fun this morning!

If you've ever wondered what I do all day, just look at all that laundry on the floor. :)

"If thou canst believe,
all things are possible
to him that believeth."
~The Savior

Well, the news isn't exactly what we'd hoped, but ...

The dermatologist's office called today. The spot they biopsied from my leg is just scar tissue. We thought it would be, and we're glad it is. Unfortunately, the spot they biopsied on my back still shows cancer cells. The good thing is that it is still the same type of Non Hodgkins Lymphoma. It hasn't mutated.

So, how am I? Ummm... I had a large slice of pineapple upside down cake (yum) and now I'd like to do nothing for the rest of the evening. I'm a bit bummed.

But ...

I also know without a doubt that everything will be alright. I know that prayers are spoken on my behalf frequently and I know that God hears those prayers. I have felt the burdens lifted from my shoulders. As the Apostle Paul admonished, "[I] believe all things, [I] hope all things, [I] have endured many things and hope to be able to endure ALL things."

Bummer.