Monday, January 18, 2010

New plan update

It's Monday, MLK day and many of you are probably home from work and/or school. Hope you have a great day off! Relax and enjoy.

It's quiet here in Houston this morning. The sun is shining bright and the temp is supposed to go to 65 degrees today - 70's for the next 2 days! Yikes!

I took Greg to the airport this morning and he'll be arriving home after lunch. Ian left yesterday to return to DC. Tiffani will be with us for another week.

Tomorrow, Matthew will begin his new chemo that was specifically chosen to enhance the radiation treatment.

This past Friday, Matthew had a "simulation" to give the radiologist the information to formulate the plan for the radiation. She (Dr. Fran McAleer) will be working on that plan this week. Depending on how long it takes her to sufficiently prepare, Matthew will begin the treatments by this Thurs or Friday, or at the very latest, Monday of next week.

Instead of the 2 weeks that we were told originally, it will be 4 weeks of radiation treatment (weekdays only). Each treatment will most likely take about an hour - beginning to end. That along with the chemo treatments will put us at the hospital a minimal amount of time which is good. Matthew will have plenty of time to rest. Two of the most prevalent side effects are fatigue and nausea which increases over time as he takes more and more of the radiation. Fortunately, one of the chemo drugs has very few side effects but the other does. Matthew has taken both of these before. The doc has given Matthew meds to help at least tolerate some of these.

Since last Wednesday when the surgery was cancelled and the plan completely changed, we have been adjusting. I must admit, I haven't been able to answer emails very promptly - I just didn't have it in me. But many of you have sent emails & Facebook comments of encouragement and reminders that God's timing & plan is perfect and we must trust that. Thank you. We have needed to hear that in the midst of our disappointment. A good friend reminded me of the "Footprints" story where there was only one set of footprints on life's journey and that was when Jesus carried the person - we are definitely being carried in the arms of our Lord at this point. Thank you for being His angels as you help "carry us" with your prayers, love, cards, calls, and emails. We are SO blessed to have you in our lives.

When I have more information on the radiation schedule, I will let you know.

May God bless you wherever you may be today.
Love,
Nancy
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4 comments:

nbta said...

Bless you all. May the Lord continue to carry you.

quig said...

I will echo NBTA's comments - bless you in this journey. May the peace of Christ be with you. John

Lisa said...

Nancy, I want you to know that I pray for Matt every night and will continue to do so until his cancer is gone. I think about him often and it's comforting to know that he has the Lord behind him on this journey. I love you both.
-Lisa McCune

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