mustard seeds.

R20 - day 81

Yes, I am still here! I have missed so much in 11 days, wow! Many of you know that we took a spur-of-the-moment trip to Texas to visit David's family. Our sister-in-law was recently diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer. She is my age.

We felt this tugging in our hearts to make every effort to be there. We wanted to encourage and support our family in any way we could. When you leave for a trip to Texas on 3 days notice, your world is a little chaotic. I had piles and piles of laundry to sort through. {It was a good reminder why I shouldn't be a laundry procrastinator. Ugh.} I wasn't sure if we would be able to pull it off because of all of these random details...David's time off, commitments here at home, our flights there and back were at later hours in the day, our seats were scattered all over the plane, the funds to take a last minute trip, layovers, travel to and from the airport, etc. No matter how much I started to worry, God was there taking care of those little details.

My sister-in-law had had surgery about a week before we arrived and still hadn't received any of her results. On our traveling day there, she finally received them and to the doctor's amazement with no explanation, they had removed all the cancer. There was also the possibility of not having chemo. She is truly a walking, modern-day miracle. I wanted to share a bit of her perspective from her journal entries...

Most of you know that we've been waiting on my path reports ever since my surgery & today I had a post-op appointment at Baylor. Well, PRAISE GOD, I guess I'm a miracle! There is absolutely no other explanation for what has happened. Before I had surgery when I received the results of my biopsy I was told that I would be going through chemo but that the chemo wasn't actually designed to target the type of cancer cells that I had but that many people live years with this type of treatment to keep it at bay. Not exactly what I was hoping for. However after my CT scans they backtracked a bit because they had expected to see that the cancer had spread throughout my abdomen & then, thank God, there was no obvious signs of disease anywhere other than what they had already seen. So then they said that there was a slim chance I might not have to have the chemo. We waited 11 days to get the reports back & here are the results.
They found abnormal/cancer cells in 1 lymph node, uterus, both ovaries, fallopian tubes and the abdominal tissue that they took out, however the cells don't seem to have spread but merely traveled, they do not show to be invasive! My tumor was borderline & they feel at this point that they were able to remove all of the cancer. I am officially the survivor of Stage 1 Ovarian Cancer. The next part is what is strange. I displayed all of the symptoms of stage 4 Ovarian Cancer, my symptoms are the ones that start showing up when it's usually too late to do anything but buy a little time, YET I was only a stage 1! I have none of the markers in any of the tests that would indicate Ovarian Cancer & I don't fit into any of the risk categories. They have now categorized my case as Highly Unusual & they are going to be having a conference next Wednesday with all of the Gyno-Oncologist to go over & study everything pertaining to my case. Yes, I'm officially a weirdo! My doctor says that there is a slim, less than 1% chance that they will come back from this conference with all the specialist & say that I do need to go ahead with the chemo. I pray that's not the case but the truth is that when she told me I wasn't going to have to do it I was a little scared. I was terrified of doing chemo but I almost feel as if I have to have it to be protected. There I go still trying to put God in a box. If by some chance they do decide that I need it, I'll of course do what needs to be done but I'm greatly encouraged by the fact that my doctor says she doesn't believe I'll have to do it.

I guess I should have warned you to get your Kleenexes out. ☺

Did I mention that this was a surprise to a large part of David's family?? We had to let a couple people know to work out our logistics, but our surprise was pulled off without a hitch. We showed up on Wednesday morning and I won't forget the look of surprise on her face. Yay, I love surprises! Our days were filled with lots of playing {well, all of the cousins anyways ☺}, a birthday, puppies, muggy heat, bug bites, lots of laughter, fellowship as a family, Father's Day, lots of eating {my favorite Texas things}, tears, lots of hugs and celebrating the miracle, that is my sister-in-law. It was so hard to leave and miss them a ton already, but it feels good to be home. I am so thankful for the time we were able to be there. We serve such a big and powerful God. I was reminded of that this last week, when we put our faith in God and trust him completely, we have the same faith as that of a mustard seed.

We love you, Maggie!

taken {2010}