Progress

Monday we saw David’s radiation oncologist. They did a CT scan of David’s head, so they can start mapping out how to go about the radiation on his brain. She has to wait to get the brain MRI done to be able to finish doing the work up, so he won’t start radiation until probably the middle of next week. As of right now, we are expecting 5 days of radiation on his brain.
We also spoke about the increased pain/loss of strength he’s been having on his right side. She’s thinking it might be due to the tapering down of the steroid he’s been on. So we upped it a little from where we were at and we will give it a few days, then check in with her again. Also, he will get an MRI done on his upper back this weekend to check in on things up there and compare them to scans he had done while in the hospital.

Another small victory: David was able to walk with a cane instead of a walker! He definitely can’t officially graduate past the walker completely right now, but it was nice to see him use the cane for a bit and actually use the steps instead of the ramp. He’s slowly building up his strength again! Of course David is concerned about the loss of his muscle mass (he always thought he was stronger than what he really was [just kidding, David]), and he claims he was getting chicken legs. His brother in law, who loves to give him a hard time, decided to give him some socks which matched his perception of himself.

Yesterday (1/28) he had blood work done and had an appointment with his melanoma oncologist. The Dr agrees with the radiation oncologist about the steroids, so we will be continuing to try that. He is also ordering his own set of images that he wants done in about two weeks, at the same time, David will have his follow up with him again. He’s optimistic about the progress David has shown so far while on these medications. He explained to us how it’s all a timing thing about when to stop these current medications and start doing immunotherapy.

This morning (1/29) David has his appointment with his PCP and she is going to take him off his diuretic at the end of this week. She was really impressed with how quickly it worked and how well David is looking. She is also ordering an evaluation to be done regarding physical, occupational and speech therapies. So that should be scheduled soon too. Now this afternoon is his brain MRI.

I feel like having a “real moment” with y’all. It’s been tough adjusting since leaving the hospital. I heard this analogy and it seems to fit how I am feeling: It feels, oftentimes, that David had a traumatic accident on Christmas day… he was in the hospital for a couple weeks, and now he’s home… and it feels like this is the part that he should continue to heal and get better… recovering from the “accident”. Then reality sinks in and I realize that it wasn’t an accident. It’s this horrible cancer, and we continue to pray that he gets completely healed from it, but it’s REALLY hard to think that there’s a possibility that he may not. Day to day life is hard. We want to see him getting better… and in SO many ways he is. We celebrate those and we share those, because those are the things that lift our spirits. However, there are downs too. There’s a lot of pain and weakness that David is still dealing with and it can be really discouraging to see. I don’t particularly like to share those thoughts, because I don’t like focusing on the negative. However, I want to be honest with you guys too, so you have a better understanding of where our hearts are at and where we need prayer the most. With every scan that’s done, or blood draw taken, we wait with both excitement and trepidation. We pray for the good news, that things are looking better and improving, yet at the same time, we prepare ourselves for the possibility of bad news, that things may look worse. This is a crazy, crazy roller coaster and I wish so badly that we could get off. But we can’t. All we can do is hold on tight and lean into the strength that our Savior has given us.
We love you all and appreciate your prayers and support more than you could ever know, please keep on praying! Thank you!!

Prayer requests:

• For complete healing of David’s body
• For all of David’s strength to return fully
• For the pain to go away
• For the fluid to not return once David stops his pills
• That all the tumors shrink
• For peace while waiting for all the scan results to come back
• For us to be able to continue spending quality time with our kids, making good memories
• For our children to be open about how they are feeling
• For our family, as they continue to help watch kids, that they are renewed daily with energy, patience and joy