Time

As I mentioned, I've been busy. I apologize for the delay. But I have a little time now so I will let you know what's going on.

We closed on our house last Friday, and after cleaning and getting things ready over the weekend (with SO much help. THANK YOU to everyone who helped!) we began moving in on Tuesday. Now, pretty much all our boxes are unpacked though not everything is organized. It's functional, so the rest can be a work in progress.

Today, we bought a 2nd car. It's a 2007 Ford Fusion. Woohoo! Pictures to come... Now, no more spending money for a while. :)

Yesterday I made the mistake of letting myself begin to feel sorry for myself. We were unpacking while watching Eva learn to crawl (she's getting scary good), and I let bitterness creep in. I let feelings of "this would be the PERFECT life if I didn't have cancer" take root, along with thoughts of "God, what are you DOING? I'm trusting you to heal me, so why hasn't it happened yet?" And then, of course, one negative thought lead to another: I hate that I don't have hair and have to wear these stupid scarves. I hate that everything that's supposed to be joyful is overshadowed by this dark cloud. I hate that I've never abused my body yet this still happened. Hate hate hate. Wah Wah Wah.

Now, I'm not saying it's wrong to be sad once in a while, but letting these types of thoughts live for more than a moment is unfruitful and unhealthy and frankly disobedient. I am to be joyful in all things (yep, that's ALL things, even cancer). I am called to trust. I am told to take all thoughts captive (2 Corinthians 10:5) and make them obedient to Christ. To me, what that means is to stop these thoughts in their tracks and not let them go where they please. When I do let them go where they please, I end up like last night, in bed sobbing, feeling sorry for myself. When I take thoughts captive, which I am generally in the habit of doing, I am joyful and faith filled. It is where faith exists that I give God room to work. And more than ever, I NEED Him to work in my life.

I am praying for my relationship with God to become more real than it has ever been. I don't want the relationship to be all about my healing. I want it to be about knowing Him and understanding His love and letting that love transform me. I feel like I'm on the brink of something big. I'm not sure what, but it's going to be amazing.

I never wrote about this, but a few weeks back my brother and I went to Minnesota to the Andrew Wommack Gospel Truth Seminar. I had hoped to meet Andrew and have him pray for me, but it didn't work out that way. Instead, I met a woman named Melinda who is head of their prayer team. She was one of those people who I just trusted from the moment we began talking. She has seen miracles happen: she has prayed for cancer to be healed before, and it has been healed. And her husband was a quadriplegic who was told he would never walk again or use one of his hands. I met him. He does both.

Anyway, Melinda prayed for me. She knew nothing about me except that I had cancer. I didn't spend time telling her my story like I do most people. She didn't pray for my spirit of fear to be gone, like other people have done (which was refreshing since I don't have fear.) She prayed for the cancer to die and leave my body in Jesus' name. Then she stopped and asked if I had any kids. I told her about Eva. She said, "You want more, don't you?" Now for those of you who don't know me, I have always had one dream and that is to be a wife and a mother. I have always wanted 6 kids. I have always known that I would fight to have a good marriage and choose to love and respect my husband in all things. When I first was diagnosed I was sitting at Pizza Hut with my mom and I was angry. I was telling her that while I knew God could do great things with me through this trial, this is NOT what I wanted my ministry to be. I wanted to be a good wife and a mom, and help other people to be good wives and mothers. THAT is what I wanted my ministry to be. Anyway, back to Melinda. I told her that yes, I wanted to have more kids. She smiled and said something along the lines of, "You will. You'll have lots of kids. I can just see them all with you. And...you'll help other moms who are having trouble. That is your purpose." I began laughing through my tears. It was God reassuring me that he has a plan for my life, and it is not to end here or anytime soon and that he will give me the desires of my heart. I have never had anyone speak about my future like that, especially someone who doesn't know me. It was powerful, and I am grateful for the experience.

Well, I should go. I think Matt and I are going to play some Mario Kart Wii and then go to bed. I will try to write more often now that I should have more time.

-Please pray for my physical health as I approach another round of chemo on 8/5. I dread these treatments more than anything.

-For perseverance as I press on in faith. I am struggling with worrying about what other people will think as I step out in radical faith, so I pray for complete abandon to His will.

-For Matt and me - for our marriage as we face trying and stressful times.

Busy Busy

Just a quick note to say I'm sorry I haven't been writing. Ever since recovering from my last round of chemo, I have been SO BUSY!! We're closing on our house in 2 days, and are in the process of moving and doing all the lovely things that accompany moving.

Things are going fine, but I would ask for your prayers. For Matt and for myself, I ask for prayer for a childlike faith that doesn't question what God is doing, but just believes.

Hi :)

I just love this picture. It's from Bay Beach that day I was supposed to go to chemo but didn't. :) I love how ever since we were dating, Matt would invite me to sit on his lap, but I would protest that I'm too heavy. He would say "No you're not." So I would sit, and he would inevitably at some point make some kind of groaning noise indicating that yes, in fact, I was too heavy. I think something like that happened in this picture. :)

Chemo has once again knocked me on my keester (not gonna lie...I had to look up how to spell that since it's not my standby alternative-for-backside term) and I hate it more than ever. I just keep praying that if this really is the way that God has planned healing for me, He will continue to give me strength to get through it.

The good news, however, is that the most prominent effect from it this time is exhaustion. Not the awful GI stuff I've had the last 2 times. For this, I am grateful. So very grateful.

As one of my inspirations, Niki Ochenski Weller, who went through 5 long years of illness before being healed said, "I used to tell God, 'I can do anything for half a second.'" I've felt that way many times over the last few days. God is there, always, without fail, in that half a second. He is NOW. He is not in the "What happens next time I have to go for treatment? Who will take care of Eva? How will I get through moving into a new house?" or the zillions of other things I could be worrying about. He is in the right now this instant. And in this very instant He is faithful. Of course He does hold my future, but we're not there yet. We're here, in this half of a second. And I thank Him for always being there.

More Info

I just spoke to the nurse practitioner Lindsey, and got some more information. For those of you who want medical details, here you go!

The latest scan was done at Waukesha Memorial. The scan that they're comparing it to was done at Froedtert. Since it was a different machine I'm told they can't compare the two scans in regard to size of tumors. (which to me begs the question, why didn't they do a scan when I first started treatment at Waukesha Memorial to use as a baseline?) But whatever...

-On a previous scan, they had seen a 6mm nodule in one of my lungs. It is no longer there.
-My enlarged lymph node has shrunk considerably. My M.D. Anderson scan had it at 10cm. It is now measuring 3cm.
-The large tumor in my liver has shrunk
-My tumor markers continue to go down. CA 125 was in the 200's, 2 weeks ago was at 87.2 and is now 74.5. CEA was in the 400's, 2 weeks ago was 125 and now is 110.61.

One thing that I need to work on is my belief that God can heal cancer. Of course on an intellectual level, I know that He can because He can do anything. And experientially, I've heard of so many stories of cancers being cured. But from time to time, it will enter my mind that cancer is especially tough. I'm sure this is because compared to a sinus infection, medically, it IS much tougher. But God who knitted me together in my mother's womb and created my inmost being (Psalm 139:13) and is able to do imeasurably more than all I ask or imagine according to His power that is at work within me (Ephesians 3:20) can surely take care of a little (or a lot of) cancer.

Sorry for the Delay

I'm sorry for the delay in updating. It's been a busy couple of weeks! I was scheduled to get chemo a week ago, and I postponed it so that I could enjoy a day at Bay Beach with my family, the 4th of July, and Matt's and my anniversary on 7/7. As I write now, I am at the hospital receiving my chemo pre-meds.

I received my PET scan results, and while they are not cancer-free as I had hoped, things look okay. There's really no new news to share except that my swollen lymph node that I was told at one point was 10 cm is now measuring 3 cm. Praise God for that!

I feel I should address the fact that it wasn't cancer-free as I had declared it would be. I believe that God's healing is powerfully at work in my body, even though it's just not physically evident yet. The scan was already 2 weeks ago, so who knows what's going on at this very moment! I don't understand the process, but I know the end result that I have been promised. By His stripes we have been healed (1 Peter 2:24). My prayer is that the physical manifestation of it will come quickly so that others will believe. I also want the manifestation so I don't have to have anymore of this awful treatment. I hate to complain, but it is really horrid. I ask for your prayers this weekend and all of next week as I deal with the side effects.

In the meantime, I am searching my heart for anything that may be hindering me from receiving my miracle. God has shown me a few things that I need to deal with, and I plan to do so just as soon as possible. I ask that you would also pray with me for wisdom as I seek His face and learn about anything He may want me to do. (note: I do not feel that I need to "earn" my healing by my works. Rather, I feel that in order to receive from God I need to have a good relationship with Him. And if I have bitterness and unbelief in any area of my life, that could hinder my receiving.)

I've had some very exciting answers to prayer. One was that I asked God to bring someone into my life who had been healed of cancer. Yesterday my friend Cindy was over, and told me about her friend Angela who was healed from Leukemia after Angela's brother Matt prayed for her. Tonight, Cindy, Angela, and Matt (who, "ironicaly" I know from years and years ago)are coming over to tell her story and to pray with me. Awesome!!!

I'll write more about the other answer to prayer when I have more details. But it's shaping up to be pretty amazing.

God bless you all. Keep believing!! God is so good!