Life Updates

It has been really hard for me to get motivated to write recently. A lot has been going on the past month in my family, and between trying to deal with all of that, working nights, and sleeping when I can find time to sleep, I’ve been pretty beat and just get tired of talking about it all. I know that I have not been able to call as many friends as I would like, and I am so sorry to all of you if this is the first that you are hearing anything, but please know I will try to call you all soon. But for now this is the best way for me to process and explain things to all of you. And I apologize ahead of time, because this might be a long one...you have been warned.

On Saturday, Jan. 22, I was awakened to bad news. Why is it that every time the phone rings these days and it is one of my parents, I am worried that it will be to tell us that yet again, something happened. “Dad has cancer”, “Mom had a stroke”, and now for the second time, “They found a tumor on dad’s right kidney”. You’ve got to be fricking kidding me. I was still asleep after being up most of the night with my crazy schedule when Mike came into our room. You know it is never a good sign when someone starts by sitting down, and follows with “I just got off the phone with your sister and your mom”... I said, “Please, No. What now?” 

So many things have happened since then, the news constantly changing, plans going from A to Z within days; it’s been an emotional roller coaster. The initial plan seemed “easy”. Dad’s doctors thought that since there were no signs of metastasis outside of the new tumor, they would be able to do a partial nephrectomy to remove the tumor and a portion of dad’s remaining kidney. In the meantime, other scans were done and a biopsy of his lymph nodes was performed, and everything came back clear with no signs of cancer spreading. But with that bit of hopeful news came more bad news. The doctors were afraid by looking at the CT of his kidney that the tumor was actually bigger than they originally thought and they feared that they would not be able to do surgery without having to remove his whole kidney. If this was the case, it would place him on dialysis and a transplant list where he would have to wait 5 years until he was “cancer free” before taking that next step. Because of this fear, the doctors scheduled a procedure called an embolization which was done last Wednesday at Hershey Medical Center. With this procedure, they went in and stopped blood flow to the tumor which is supposed to prevent the tumor from growing and hopefully even shrink it. In addition to this, they may start him on an oral medication that works similar to chemo, which would hopefully help to shrink the tumor back even more so that a partial nephrectomy would still be an option in the near future.

Of course with the embolization procedure, as with any, there comes a lot of risks. Again came more discouraging news. They planned to keep dad in the hospital for a couple nights in order to monitor his kidney function. After a couple days there, dad’s levels were too high and the doctors told him he is basically in stage 3-4 renal failure. As his levels continued to elevate, they eventually stabilized enough that the doctors were hopeful the levels would start coming back down, so they sent him home last Sunday with a whole list of follow up appointments as well as more lab visits to recheck his kidney function.

Today’s appointment with dad’s surgeon brought with it more confusion and stress, and a reaffirmed realization that we are literally going to have to take each bit of news as it comes, process it, and find a way to get through it all together. Although it sounds cliche to say “let’s take one step at a time”, unfortunately it looks like that is what it is going to come down to in this inevitably long, exhausting journey. Along with dad’s doctors, we don’t know what is going to happen next, but we must hold on to hope as we go.

This has all been a crazy, emotional, shitty month for our family. I am so grateful for my sister and Angus who were able to be there for over three weeks helping my parents out through all of these tests and doctors visits and phone calls and up and down news. My sister was a wonderful mom to Calvin, while also being an awesome daughter to our parents. She did everything from taking care of her busy little man, calling friends and family with updates, cooking, cleaning, and most importantly giving moral support and love to mom and dad. Mike and I were able to get home a couple weekends ago, which was initially for dad’s surgery before the plans changed. Although I didn’t feel like we did very much being there, it was good for me to see them and to hug them. I just love them so much it hurts. It was also helpful for my sister to have a little break at times, and such a wonderful time for Mike and I to be the aunt and uncle that we have been dying to be to our perfect nephew. Also, I know that it meant so much to mom and dad to simply have us there to love them. 

Although all of this is hard for me to process and accept, the most difficult part is watching my parents have to struggle through all of this again. I feel helpless being so far away, but mostly being so out of control of it all. It breaks my heart to see my dad battling with all of these emotions along with his physical pain, and to watch my mom become that rock again in a time when she needs her own shoulder to lean on. My mom has amazed me, and although she tells me that she couldn’t do this without my sister and I, I have seen how strong she is and it is such an encouragement to me as a wife to see how she loves and supports and fights for her husband. I know things are crazy right now, but I have hope and I know that we will fight our way through this, come what may. We have each other, we have our family and friends supporting us, and we have hope and faith in God’s hand in it all.  I realized again just recently how both mom and dad have each already been healed once in the last two years after major life threatening events. Why shouldn’t we believe that there is hope this time when we have seen how those crappy situations were turned around for the best? I have faith that things will be OK, but it may take a lot of ups and downs to get there. 

As far as our travel status goes, my contract will be ending March 19th - less then one month away.  When all of this came up, without any doubts or second thoughts, Mike and I both knew that we wanted to try to go closer to our parents for a little while. Regardless of what happens, we know that we want to be there to help with whatever comes up, even if it is just going to doctors visits with dad or cooking them a meal or making them go out to have a little fun. In whatever way we can, we want to try to support them right now, and that will be a lot easier if we don’t have to buy a plane ticket every time we want to help out. That being said, I have been looking around the Lancaster area as well as Baltimore, Philly, and other east coast areas. I haven’t gotten a placement anywhere yet, but I am working on it and trusting that maybe this is another reason we were meant to travel. It is good to know that we are flexible, that nothing is permanent, and that we can just be where we need and want to be.  I know a lot of people feel helpless, as do all of us, but what we really need now is just to know that you care. Prayers, encouragement, and love is what really helps right now, and I thank all of you for doing these things to help support me and my family.