Merry Christmas to each of you who are reading this blog. Some on paper and some on blogspot. I have been posting something about the cancer journey, Bob has been on, for these many years. I think people may get tired of hearing about our journey and our prayer requests. Perhaps fatigue over the same old thing or perhaps just the fact that so many of us are on our own personal journey with many different tough situations. However when you think of us please do offer a prayer for Bob for lack of pain, quality of life in keeping with his health. Pray that I will not allow myself to slip into morose. Pray that I will continue gracefully loving and caring for my Bob.
For Bob December began and continued on from November. The pain in behind his ear radiates to his shoulder and now down the jaw. The jaw also has tingling and numbness. Our family doc gave Bob a viral cream to put in the ear. The ear is pretty much clear. The green gucky stuff is gone. Bob went back to the family doc who looked back at the Aug. PET scan and thought that the lesions (tumors) on C3 and T1 may be causing the problem by pushing on something. We got in to see our oncologist yesterday, like a Christmas miracle, on one day notice.
An aside here: Last week at the end of the week Bob received a call from Alberta Lab services that they wanted to redo the lab results that they had done 2 weeks ago. Bob went in this past Monday with the 24 hr urine and the blood work was also redone. That happened before our appointment with the family doc or the appointment with the oncologist. God always has our back!!!!!!!! We told the oncology nurse that this had been done and she was amazed that she had not been informed. This requisition had come from the lab.
As we met with our oncologist the results that he was looking at were only days old and Bob is only in the middle of his cycle. Once again the cancer markers are down and this in 2 weeks. For my medical people: Kappa Free down to 33.39 from34.2 which is going in the right direction Lambda Free1.83 from .28 also going in the right direction which put the ratio at 18.25 from 122.14 which is also the right direction. Urine protein .12 well in the normal range. Praise God kidneys are fine. Neutrophils 2.3 in the normal range---just but there!!!!! Once again Dr. B so "over the moon" with these numbers as Bob is part of his research. He assured us that he did not believe this pain was from the multiple myeloma lesions. He believes there may be an infection in the mucus??!!!!! behind the ear. He gave a name to this which I did not write down and which I couldn't find thru doc google since the name had kind of escaped me. sighhhhhh. He gave Bob a prescription for a different antibiotic this is a sulfa antibiotic. However he is ordering a MRI for the base of the skull to cover all the bases. Should Bob get better with the antibiotic then we are to cancel the MRI.
That is the medical journey thus far this month. :-} .
Since this is also partly our Christmas letter I will let you know that our families are both in a relatively stable condition. All are working or studying, or still attending school. They are all healthy. They, well at least the little ones are growing like weeds. The older ones don't want to grow in either direction. Our youngest grandchild is closing in on 5 and our oldest well on his way to 21.
We get to spend time with them regularly as both Mike and Barbie and their families live close. This has been a huge blessing for Bob and I.
Each family member is on a unique journey of their own. Learning new skills, packing away knowledge, learning about people and situations that have to be dealt with. We are proud of each and every one of them.
The most important Christmas journey was the one that Mary and Joseph made to Bethlehem over two thousand years ago. This journey had been foretold in scripture through the prophets centuries earlier. Bethlehem was to be the place where the Savior of the world was to be born. Sadly Jesus was not who most of the world wanted as a Savior. He did not have an army to over throw the Romans. Even though Jesus healed many people physically He did not heal everyone. Jesus did not make 'life on earth" perfect for anyone. The journey of Jesus to earth and then his death on the cross and His Resurrection do give us an amazing way to live on earth. He promises to never leave or forsake us. He dwells within us. He gives us His strength, His wisdom, His peace, His love, His joy.
Once we accept Jesus as King of our lives and confess with our mouths that Jesus is our Savior and we want Him to journey with us through this life. We will live eternally in heaven and continue to praise and worship our Lord Jesus Christ forever.
Now that is a journey worth being on.
