A NEW YEAR A NEW ROAD

October 20, 2017

It seems that every year there's a new road to walk. This year in late November I was sitting long enough at the store that when I stood up my legs had gone to sleep. When I went to take a step I just went down, bending my leg real sharp. It hurt like the dickens! I thought I had done some real damage to my knee, which has been replaced. I made it home and when Jennie got home I told her I thought I needed to go to the doctor. I don’t avoid going to doctors, but I just don’t go very often, so wanting to go meant I must have hurt myself pretty badly.

My regular orthopedic doctor couldn’t get me in, so they recommended that I go to their new Urgent Care facility. We were early, and being the day before Thanksgiving the doctor and the nurse had plenty of time to spend with Jennie and me. After a set of x-rays it was determined that I had just pulled a muscle.

I’ve never understood why nurses always take your vital signs, but fortunately they do and my heart rate, which is normally down to 75 or a little lower was pumping at 138 to 140 and I couldn’t get it to go down, even by just relaxing. After about an hour the doctor sent me to my primary doctor who did an EKG and then a chest x-ray. He determined that there was something over my heart that wasn’t there two years ago when I had my physical. The doctor’s fear was that it is an aneurism or an enlarged lymph node. He called the ER and sent me over in a wheelchair. After another EKG and then a CAT scan it was determined that I have follicular lymphoma. I think the amazing thing is that both Jennie and have continued to have great peace which I think was granted to us from God, as no one likes to hear that you have cancer.

I have since had a biopsy of the lymph node, a bone marrow biopsy, and a new test called a PET scan. All this to determine that I am in stage two, which denotes the spread rather than the aggressiveness or seriousness of the disease. It has not spread to my bones or below my diaphragm. I started treatment with a combination chemo and immune therapy with my next session being January 11, 2017.

I wanted to send all this info to let everyone know that because my white blood cells will be low for a portion of the time between treatments, I’m being restricted from being in public, as I am more susceptible to catching something. My treatment program is every 28 days for 6 months, depending on the success of the drugs. I plan to go to Arizona to the Lymphoma Center for a second opinion in the middle of January, so we can have another doctor looking at my symptoms.

As I travel this new road, it gives me the opportunity to watch God continue to direct our lives. His care is not just for the great circumstances, but He will travel with us in the difficult times as well. I look forward to what He has to teach me during this journey.
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