.98

After several months of chemotherapy treatment, my dad’s doctor has finally found a cocktail that is proving to be successful!  One of the major numbers we’re following is the M-spike.  When he was first diagnosed with multiple myeloma, his M-spike was around 1.5.  The number should be 0.  That result, in conjunction with the bone damage he’d sustained, placed him in stage II.  Today, he texted me to inform me that the M-spike is at .98!

This is the first time his numbers have gone below 1.  What does this mean?  It’s not curing him per se.  What it means is that the cancer density is coming down and healthy cells have a significantly better opportunity to repair the damaged bones.  He’s looking at several weeks of “healing” before he’s going to be in substantially less pain.  He said that he’s feeling overall less pain, but he is still living with a lot of broken bones.  In the coming weeks, he should feel a lot better!

He is still working at his job to the best of his physical ability.  Aside from the bones being painful, he’s experienced one of the biggest side effects of chemotherapy.  Fatigue.  The doctor has given him extra boosts of steroids to help combat that.  It has helped a lot.  It gives him the energy he needs to assist in sustaining a higher quality of life while living with cancer.  Medicine is incredible!

With this newfound promise in his current treatment, he could be at a point of maintaining the cancer for a long time.  I believe the plan at this point is to continue treating him twice a week with the chemotherapy until his M-spike reaches 0.  At that point they’ll wean him off his medications and let his body rebuild.  The doctor will monitor his blood work to make sure he’s able to stay ahead of the cancer when it comes back.  I would assume it’d be monthly and then less frequent as dad shows signs of being cancer-free!  

This is such great news and I’m so excited to be on the winning side of this fight!  Thank you so much to those who have kept my dad and our family in your thoughts and prayers!  Those well wishes and prayers in combination with modern medicine have clearly been heard!  I will keep updating my blog as this chapter continues to play out.  Again, thank you so much for all of your support!

Five

If you had asked me five years ago where I would be five years later, I would have stared at you with a blank face.  The next days were a fuzzy horizon shaded in morbid hues of red.  Like a sunset used as a backdrop in a Robert Rodriguez film.  Ominous and foreboding.  Somewhere in the distance was a glimmer of hope that things would be alright and the moment I was shaking in, would become a sliver of a memory that would occasionally cause me to pause for a moment and then continue on.

Five years ago today, I held my lifeless son in my arms and wept uncontrollably.  After an eleven-day fight for his life, we’d allowed him the grace of escape.  That was the most intensely bittersweet moment of my life.  I left the hospital feeling like I had absolutely nowhere to go.  I didn’t feel like I belonged anywhere.  Inside the building was my son who wouldn’t be coming home with us.  I went home with my hands in my lap, my heart empty, and tears persistently running down my cheeks.

The HD imagery I have of those initial moments is a blessing and a curse.  I am glad I am able to easily recollect those minutes.  Seeing things in my mind in slow motion gives me the ability to see things intricately and revel in each breathing second.  As painful as it is to permit such a film to play out, it’s the best I have to feel as close to my little Connor as I physically can.

Today I wonder what life would be like if I had brought him home.  Where would my marriage be?  What kind of mother would I be?  How different would my coping have been when my mother died?  Would I have Alex?  Just how different would things be right now? 

Of course there’s no way to answer those ponderings.  I live in this life and with that history.  Though, in honor of my precious little guy, I think about him running through the house with Alex and the two of them raising absolute hell.  I imagine the two of them in overalls and bare feet.  I hear hysterical laughter as they flood the bathroom floor with water from the sink filled with mud.  I watch Isabelle dote on her two little brothers with adoration.  It brings a teary smile to my face.

Life is so full of things we have absolutely no control over.  Typically that is said during times of trial.  But, we rarely address the things that land in our laps.  Opportunity versus struggle.  It’s so wildly difficult to find the silver lining in things.  Yet, if given the proper amount of time and energy, there is almost always something good that comes out of despair and difficulty.

So, here are my five bands of silver lining the wings of my angel, Connor.

1.  I have an incredible person waiting for me when my time comes.  He knows me and yearns to wrap his arms around my neck.  I know him and feel him before I see him.

2.  I have the sweetest little boy doing everything right to fill the hole in my heart Connor left.  His name is Alex.

3.  I have the sweetest daughter that makes me laugh and wince in the most beautiful way.  She is such a tender soul who loves with her whole body.  Despite her teenage tendencies, she is an incredible young woman that wells me up with nothing but pride.

4.  I know, because of Connor, that I can make it through anything.  It took me a while to figure out just how strong I really am.  I couldn’t have without losing him.

5.  I know the deepest love I could ever feel.  I have loved so powerfully and didn’t get what I wanted out of it…but I learned how that kind of love completely remodels your entire perspective on life.