Racing stripe

My double chin is a bit off center

This would cover a few flaws

Well, it is Thursday.  I am out of the hospital as of last night.  I have both ears, contrary to that stupid dream I had.  I;m a little loopy.  The graft looks very strange but they tell me that is normal at first.  I'm not sure if they meant that the graft usually looks strange or that I look strange.  The later is fairly certain.  Right now the graft area in the neck is really large.  It looks like they took the double chins off of a whole room full of high priests pasted them on my neck.  Oh, well, there goes my chances at the beauty pageant.  I guess I will just have to excel in the swimsuit division.  JoLynne talked about having me wear a Arabic turbin.  That could be cool but I would want a scimitar to go with it for sure.

Racing stripe

My right thigh is....different.  They took a huge chunk out to rebuild everything.  From my hip to my knee.  And then some dang fancy stiching.  I guess the microvascular surgeon told them that he didn't think it would be possible to sew it closed.  I think that must be like operating room trash talk or something. So, two surgeons jumped on my leg with suture needles flying.  At least that is how I remember it but I was asleep.   Needless to say, they got it closed.  It's tight though and I have to be careful how I move it for now.  Shortly after I woke up JoLynne said "Do you want to see your leg?"  I was still drugged or or I probably would have said "No".  But she showed me.  The first thing I thought when I saw it was "Hey, a racing stripe!"  I can walk but very slowly and it helps to lean on something.

I am having a little trouble controlling the movement in my right eye.  Because of that, I was wearing an eye patch last night when my granddaughter Vivian called.  She took one look at me in the computer and said. "Grandpa, I want to see both of your eyeballs"  I told her why I had a bandage on my eye, she thought about that for a minute and said "Okay, I want to see grandma then"  That's okay, we will get it all figured out.  They arrive here on Saturday.  I am sure looking forward to that.

Cancer must be catching

Just a few empty seats

It has been a little over a week since my last post here.  I really should have written sooner  It was a wonderful week.  I am learning through personal experience more about this chemo business.  Hitting your "low" is no fun and feeling good thereafter is amazing.  Boy it brings that "opposition in all things" scripture to life in a very real way.  

Last week JoLynne and I traveled back to Minnesota again for follow up visits with the surgeons.  Mayo clinic will always be a place of miracles to me.  The surgeons were delighted to see how I was progressing.  As we visited with one of the surgeons, an LDS man, he said, "You know, I can always tell when we operate on someone who is being prayed for.  Things just go differently in the operating room."    He then told us that a number of such miracles occurred during my surgery.  I think we are aware of many of them but he told us something that we hadn't heard.

Apparently, when the tumor was removed it was given to the pathologists who were in the operating room.  While they began their initial analysis, the surgeons proceeded to take out borders around the tumor to make sure that the cancer hadn't spread into adjacent tissue.    After a bit, the pathologists announced that my tumor was benign.  (They changed their mind later, as you may remember).  Our surgeon told us that the normal protocol at that point would be to discard the borders that had been harvested.  It makes no sense to analyze the borders of a benign tumor.  He said that they were about to throw them in the garbage can when one of the surgeons said, "I just don't feel good about that.  I think we need to have the border evaluated still.  Send them to pathology."  They proceeded to send them to pathology and, as you know the tumor later proved to be malignant.  The borders that were sent and reviewed were all clean.  If they had not analyzed the borders they would have had no way of knowing that it hadn't spread and I would have had to go through radiation therapy as a precaution.  It would have made my recovery much more complicated.  So, for those of you who have been kind enough to pray for us through this challenge, THANK YOU AGAIN! Prayer really makes a difference!

Our trip home was also good.  We had a little extra space on the airplane, as you can see.  My guess is that there are rumors going around that cancer is contagious.  With those kind of rumors we may have trouble getting plane tickets in the future if the airline industry sees a pattern.

Well,  on Wednesday I began another series of chemotherapy.  I felt well enough today to go into to office.  I was grateful.  I was able to provide some services to some of my sweet patients.  We will see what tomorrow brings.  "One day at a time"; that is my motto these days.

Hey, I'm alive!

Well, I'm sorry about the short entry last night. I was completely exhausted but thought that I had enough energy to write about one sentence. Getting my wedding ring back was the most important thing that I could think of. JoLynne and I have been married 28 plus years. I don't think in all those years I have been without my ring more than a few hours. She wore it for me while I was going through all of this. As she put it "It will be safe here and look, it's really close to mine."

I really appreciate Shanelle keeping everyone posted while I was indisposed. She is a sweet daughter in so many ways.

I am so appreciative of each of you for your love, your prayers and your faith. I believe that God hears and answers prayers. Sometimes things don't turn out just like we would like them to, but when we really pour out our hearts to God, things do work out. In the bible dictionary, under prayer, it says:

"As soon as we learn the true relationship in which we stand toward God (namely, God is our Father, and we are his children), then at once prayer becomes natural and instinctive on our part. Many of the so-called difficulties about prayer arise from forgetting this relationship. Prayer is the act by which the will of the Father and the will of the child are brought into correspondence with each other. The object of prayer is not to change the will of God, but to secure for ourselves and for others blessings that God is already willing to grant, but that are made conditional on our asking for them. Blessings require some work or effort on our part before we can obtain them. Prayer is a form of work, and is an appointed means for obtaining the highest of all blessings."

I believe that statement.

This has been an amazing week. Shanelle has shared much of what has happened. There are some things that probably shouldn't be shared. Suffice it to say, we have felt and seen the Hand of God and I have never felt that I walked this path alone.Yesterday I was discharged from the hospital, ahead of schedule. The original plan called for 7-10 days in the hospital. I think we are basically on the "custom plan" schedule now. The tracheotomy tube came out a day or two early. By the way, for any of you who may have had those in the past, I really apologize for not showing you more compassion. All I can say is "WOW AND YUCK". The NG tube that allowed them to feed me through my nose to my stomach came out Friday, 10 days ahead of schedule. One of the older nurses told me that she had never seen one come out in less than two weeks in a case like mine. All the rest of the pumps, tubes, IV's, and cast came off Saturday Morning. They then told me that I could be discharged early if I wanted. It helps to have my son in law Mike here, he is an ICU nurse for Utah valley and a darn good one. Or maybe I was just so dang grouchy they would do anything to see me out of there. That is quite possible. I was thrilled to be discharged. Oh, and JoLynne gave me back my wedding ring! I was so grateful for so many kind, knowledgable doctors and nurses who took care of me. Many of them had the opportunity to hear my testimony. I plan on sharing that more often.

There has been a lot going through my mind these last few days. I believe I will survive this cancer. I have been given another season in my life to see what I will do. I try to think of what I can do better and what the Lord wants me to learn from all of this. My nights have been largely sleepless as my mind races in circles. Friday night sleep wouldn't come. At about 3:00 am I finally sat up in bed and said, "Hey Heavenly Father, are you there?" I had that warm feeling that he was so I said "Are you having trouble sleeping too?" Sometimes I wonder why he doesn't just zap me and get it over with. Anyway, we had a good talk during that night.

(The view out our windows)

Well, this is too long. JoLynne rented, (for $80 a night) a beautiful house that looks out over the river. That woman can find a bargain! I hope she didn't choose me because I was cheap. I prefer to be considered "a good value" We will be here until Oct 31 for a few follow up visits but mostly to make sure I don't have complications that need to be attended to. Thank you again for all your love and support. We look forward to being home.

Okay, God must think my faith is weak or that I need constant reminders. JoLynne just called me over and pointed out the plaque hanging on the wall here just as you enter the door.

Ready for a miracle

Just arrived at the hotel in Rochester. Surgery is at 6:00 am tomorrow. I feel calm, yet another blessing.

Most of our sweet children traveled to the airport to see us off. Boy, I'm going to miss those kids for the next two weeks.

Thank you everyone for your prayers. I have had so many expressions of love and concern. They make me cry, but the good kind of crying. I am so grateful to be surrounded by such good, wonderful people.

I plan on sleeping tomorrow. I am going to be fine. Please remember my wife and children in your prayers. I worry about them.

Shanelle has promised to post updates to this blog. I think if I were to post anything the next few days it might be a little too entertaining. Thank you again. I appreciate you.