Today......

     Tonight's update will not be a long or deep or involved post... bit too drained from today and frankly the weekend to allow for lots of literary and free thought.  But since I know there have been so many of you praying and thinking of us this weekend, it's time for a little update.
      Sunday morning, we woke to beautiful sunshine, warm temperatures and a feeling of great happiness in our hearts, preparing to bring our second daughter, Ava Grace, to church for to receive the sign and seal of God's faithfulness to her through the sacrament of baptism.  This baptism felt for us such a milestone - here we were with the child that was covered in prayer and held in her Heavenly Father's hand so carefully for the last five months, ever since my diagnosis.  A special day in which to bring praise to God for His love and care, His provision and His blessing of a healthy baby girl after such sorrow and agony.  And so we gathered with many many of our family and friends, to be honest, looking over the crowd was pretty overwhelming - here was our support system and our church family united as one, bringing praise to God in song (you all sounded amazing from the front of the church!).  We held our precious baby clad in the antique family baptism gown, so old that I feared to rip or tear it as we moved her around but yet well aware of the history of this garment, that the first person baptized in it was my great-uncle in Smilde, the Netherlands in the year 1917.            And now, 100 years later, our dear child is being brought forward to receive the same covenent promises and blessings, to know that God has been faithful through the generations and to know that this was the gown that my Oma, my mother, my sisters, myself and all our children have worn through the years was pretty special.  But more special still were the words that we heard - of God's protection and faithfulness, of His love for our baby, of His promises to us as a covenant family and of our responsibilities as parents to raise our daughters in the fear of God's name.  That part was probably one of the most daunting things for me to comprehend - how can I make this promise, knowing that if this disease has its way, that I might not even be here to fulfill this promise.  That was super hard but I know and have to trust that God will continue to be faithful to our family.  And knowing that we were surrounded by our dear friends and family and that I stood next to my dear dear husband, who has been my strength and rock during this whole thing was overwhelming.  We joined together with everyone in a delicious and special luncheon afterwards and were so blessed to share our Ava with so many of you. 

My dear parents holding Ava

Receiving the sign and seal of baptism

Really, Mom, all this dress for such a little person?

Our little sweet peanut

Snoozing after the big day

Hanging out with Mom after the busyness of the morning...

     And after the busyness and happiness of our baptism day, we were brought to the day when we would receive our CT results from last Friday morning.  I'm super glad the weekend was busy to make sure that my mind was distracted from dwelling on the worries and anxieties that came along with waiting for these results.  For the last thing on my mind and the first thing this morning... was what would the doctor be telling us?  And so at 9:30 we went in for bloodwork and 10:00 (okay, closer to 10:45) we met with our doctor.  I'm just going to put a few facts down here and probably leave it at that.  We still have some questions that maybe have poked up since we've had some time to mull things over but in general our large list of questions was answered.  

    The CT showed us that there are some small nodules in the lungs - the only imaging of the lungs that we've had in the past was a chest xray which the doctor explained would likely not have shown up these lesions since they're so small.  Nevertheless, they are present and that was a blow to us - we had thought that area was clear.  So now every area that there would be likely metastases to is involved - the lungs, the lymph nodes and the liver.  We knew about the liver of course, the good news was that some of the lesions that could be compared with ultrasound showed some shrinkage.  There are also some areas in the peritoneum (abdominal area) and one up by my shoulder.  All this was pretty discouraging to us but the doctor kept reminding us that these pieces were likely there at the beginning but because CT was off the list when we were expecting, that they wouldn't have seen these things and this is our new baseline.  We have been trying to encourage each other by saying that maybe these things were even bigger in the past and have shrunk some with the chemo but since we have no previous scans, we can't know that for sure.  My bloodwork was all relatively stable, but I will still receive an iv iron treatment tomorrow to make sure things are topped up in time for chemo.  

      So chemo will resume next week Tuesday (always seem to pick holidays - July 4, my birthday, Halloween/Reformation Day)  and will involve the same drugs we used prior to Ava's birth, the Oxaliplatin and 5FU.  Once we receive permission from the health ministry, they will be adding in a third drug to the regimen which has some benefits but also more side effects so we will be watching carefully to see how the new regimen goes.  Not that I'm looking forward to having a numb tongue, a mouth sensitive to cold, peeling hands and lots of GI upsets, but I guess I'm somewhat glad to be starting up the fight again to bring this monster to heel and under control.  The doctor is always very cautious with his words and never seems to give us times or dates and maybe that's something that's beyond his reckoning, since our times and lives are not in our own hands.... there will be a CT to reassess in 3 months or so.  

    So that's where we leave off for tonight...spirits a little bit dampened, like tonight's weather and hopes a little crushed and hearts a little sore.  It's hard to summon the strength to walk into the cancer centre at times, but I'm always super glad to have my faithful husband at my side and to know that we never walk alone.