Our next appointment

This Wednesday, Galen has his first appointment with his oncologist since starting his chemo treatment.  For the past 5 weeks, Galen's been taking his treatment and getting weekly blood draws.  It's allowed us time to just get away from the fire hydrant of information that we have been forced to swallow and just take information in as we've been able to.  I have found some accredited websites that are specific to Galen's rare cancer and I have been able to educate myself about research, his actual condition and responses to his treatment.  We are just now at the point, knowing what most of his side effects are, that we can look into some ways to alleviate them.  We are looking into diet changes and specific nutritional guidelines that may help the treatment behave better.

 

We already know from talking to the lab techs that his WBC is back in the normal range and his uric acid levels are also back to normal.  This is absolutely wonderful news, knowing his treatment is working.  However, it's only the first step in a LONG process to move towards any type of remission.  Once again, according to his oncologist, there is no current science to support taking Galen off his treatment ever, despite remission.  But we remain in prayer, believing otherwise and believing in complete healing.

 

So, I don't know what the doctor is going to want to talk about with us on Wednesday.  But we figure he is going to go over the results of his blood draws that we already know about.  I would just like some good news because I just really hate going there.

 

If you want to pray for us, here are some specific ways:

 

1.  Now that Galen's WBC is normal, we want it to stay that way.

2.  Pray that there will be no positive presence of the Philadelphia chromosome.  This is a long, long process.  So long that there are different "stages" of clearance.  For example, they'd say, "less than 35% of Galen's cells test positive for the Philadelphia chromosome".  So, we'd like to see a decrease and for it to eventually to be undetectable.  It will require a lot of tests along the way.   After this, there are still other things we need to pray for, but this is just the next step in regards to healing for Galen..

3.  We can get in quickly on Wednesday, the past two times, we've had to sit in the waiting room for an hour and a half.  We hate waiting... see my post about that ;)

4.  We can ask the right questions.  We are still learning and we are no experts, but we'd like wisdom and discernment to be asking proactive questions.

5.  That Galen's body wouldn't become resistant to the medication or develop a mutation that could prove harmful.

 

6.  God would continue to strengthen us as individuals and our marriage.  No, our marriage isn't in crisis, but cancer is a trial,  We don't want to be too proud to admit we could always use the extra prayers for us as this disease is challenging the both of us as individuals.

 

We continue to be humbled by all the prayers of support and words of encouragement.  We know there are more people than we realize thinking and praying for us.  We don't take that lightly or for granted.  God continues to guard our minds and grant us peace, we continue to be thankful for His provision.  Thanks to so many of you!  God is teaching both of us about Himself and about ourselves.  We are grateful for this time, which although is very trying, as it is building our faith and refining who we are.

 

We have so much to be thankful for!