Duke Trip No. 3

We’re in North Carolina again. Mike is scheduled on Monday the 25th to begin Cycle 3 of his current regimen. However, we had to begin this trip a bit early due to some concerning blood counts. All is stabilized right now. Read on for more.

Of Platelets and Nosebleeds

Home health is currently coming twice weekly for IV fluids, bloodwork, and physical therapy. On Tuesday, his results showed his platelets were pretty low. Platelets are the part of your blood that allows it to clot, so if they get too low, things can get dangerous. I called the Duke on-call physician to ask their advice on whether it was emergent or just a “wait and see” situation. Based on Mike’s history, he advised that we get to the ER. Since we were already planning to travel over the weekend for his Monday treatment appointment, we just started the trip early so there could be seamless continuity of care —and hopefully, no delays in treatment.

We left early Wednesday morning and got here in the afternoon. About an hour out from the hospital, Mike got a nosebleed that would slow down, but not stop. Needless to say, they got him into an ER room fairly quickly. By the time he got back to the ER room, the nosebleed had thankfully stopped.

He was admitted for testing and monitoring. They were concerned about him having developed a rare autoimmune disease that sometimes occurs when a person is on the combination of drugs and therapies he’s receiving. In the meantime, they supported him with some blood product transfusions and he started feeling better. After thoroughly checking him out for any source of bleeding, they felt comfortable that he didn’t have this autoimmune disease and discharged him late Thursday evening. I think this was his fastest encounter with a hospital ever!

We will follow up with his oncologist on Monday and we’re praying hard that his blood counts will have recovered enough for him to receive his scheduled treatment. Would you join us in this prayer?

Blood for Everyone!

Mom also needed blood this week. She’s still doing well, but her treatments hit her blood counts hard, too. She went Thursday and got her tank topped off as well. As I mentioned in a recent update, her oncologist is very encouraging about her prognosis once she completes treatments. She just has one more to go!!

One thing you can be praying about for her is her back pain and stiffness. She had lots of spine issues for years before she was diagnosed with cancer, and all the inpatient hospital stays for her treatment have her back really messed up. Please pray that once she’s finished with treatments, she can regain strength in her back and that the pain lessens. She refuses to let the pain stop her from living life and punching this cancer right in the face, though, and I am so blessed to witness her grit and tenacity. Go, Mom!

Thanks Again

I just want to keep thanking you all for your love, prayers, and support, both practical and emotional/spiritual. We are overwhelmed by the love. We’re, frankly, frightened heading into the vast sphere of transplant unknowns. We know that the financial, physical, spiritual, and emotional burdens are going to get even bigger and we have no idea how we will face them. So, once again, we’re making the daily deliberate decision to trust God, even though we don’t feel like walking through this trial. We’re tired of this particular journey and no matter what anyone says, there is no good thing in cancer. NONE. Cancer is not good. It’s evil. It’s a consequential reality of our sin-sick earth and it’s hard and bad. This is why the quintessential “bad thing” analogy is to call it “cancer.” I’m not looking for the “good” in cancer. Sure, there are blessings along the way; but the cancer itself and how it ravages every crevice of your life? That’s 100% bad, traumatic, and it makes me angry.

I have lots more to say about the anger, lament, and evilness of cancer and other hardships, while holding all that in tension with faith and hope, but this is not the place for that. I will write it out in a separate article for those who are interested, and I’ll try my best to remember to come back to this one and link it when it’s done. For now, suffice to to say, cancer really does suck and that’s not an unfaithful thing for a Christian to say. I hate cancer. I want to punch cancer in the throat. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy, and I’m devastated that two of the people I love most in the world are facing it. It’s not how things are supposed to be. God had wholeness of mind, body, and spirit in mind for humanity. I feel the tension of that every day and I long to be in the blessedness of the new heaven and earth. I know you feel this tension, too, whether you profess Christianity or not. I hope I can help you understand it a little more when I work this out in the next writing.