She's Gone

Janice went to be with her Lord this afternoon. We're just trying to absorbe the reality of it all tonight and will write some thoughts later. But for now, she would say, "If you want to honor me, honor my Lord Jesus Christ." What a time she must be having tonight. Thank you for going with us through this journey. She has reached her destination, but we've got a ways to go.
Kent

Rough Day

It has been a rough day, an amazing day, and ultimately a day full of the Lord's steadfast love and strength. My Mom had a CAT scan last night that indicated a little "something" going on with her brain. The doctors have been concerned because she had not and is not waking up after stopping her sedation medication. The ICU doctor came in to let us know that the "something" could be due to the infection that she has been battling or could be bleeding in the brain cavity. If the second were true, her battle would be over. He ordered an MRI to get a more detailed picture and the wait began. It is hard to describe the waiting except from my own perspective. I told Debra at one point the only words I could use to express God's presence for me was a wellspring. There were moments of high and low but I knew whatever hiw will, it was OK and that He is my Creator sovereign over all. The feelings/peace felt are the ones I wish I could put into the hearts and bodies of those I love that do not know Jesus. The neurological doctor finally came in and told us her brain is perfectly normal and that the little "something" was a small amount bleeding between the skull and membrane that surrounds the brain. It would heal itself.

She is not waking up because her organ function is diminished. His analogy was like a car not running when it runs out of gas. Her body needs to start working on its own and she needs to help the antibiotics defeat the infection. Her WBC counts are up today but the platelets are still low. Pray that her body can begin to take over and win the race with the infection. We each feel Jesus' presence and peace so blessed be my Lord and the prayers of his saints.

Kristi

Wednesday 7/28

First let me start by saying I am sorry to all you English teachers out there that read last night's blog. I did not proof it before it was posted and after going back and reading it, I am a bit embarrassed. So sorry! I will be more careful this time.

It was a week ago today that I received the call from Kristi that mom was being taken, by ambulance, to the ER. It's hard to believe that we have been in this battle for a week. While on one hand it seems to have been the longest week of my life, on the other it doesn't seem real that mom had been struggling for her life for a week. The amazing thing about this week is how we have seen God answer little and big prayers. It has been such a time of building my faith, along with so many in our family circle. I cannot begin to express our deep appreciation for the church family at Calvary Bible Church. I have seen you surround my dad in amazing ways, from praying with him, to providing meals for the many hungry mouths in our house. It is so nice to be a part of the body of Christ. THANK YOU!

Let me give you an update on mom:
Her blood pressure is being maintained with a lower dose of medication. This is something that shows we have a handle on the infection.
The Dr. in the ICU told us today that they do have the infection under control.
She survived another round of dialysis.
They have taken her completely off the sedation medication and want her to start waking up within the next 12 hours. This will give them a better idea of how she will do in sustaining her heart rate, blood pressure and kidney function.

Prayers:
Continue to pray for the white blood cell count to go up. We want her body to fight the infection on it's own without the help of too many antibiotics.
Please pray that when mom wakes up that she isn't frightened or agitated. That can happen coming off of sedation and we don't want to have to sedate her again. Pray the Lord gives her great peace.
Pray for her blood platelets to continue to rise. She needs those to help with clotting.
Pray that her heart rate stays stable and low and and that her blood pressure will stay good with less medication.

I am going to leave you with the verse that mom chose for this journey:
I Thessalonians 5:16-18 "Be joyful always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus"
Live this out!

Tuesday 7/27

I have been told that this in now the place to come to get updates on mom. I will try and be diligent about getting it updated everyday so you all know how she is doing.
Today was a good day. We are still in the critical stages and we still face the very real possibility of losing my mom, but today was uneventful. I believe that uneventful is good because that means that mom is maintaining and we haven't had any crisis to work through today. Her white blood cell count is still really low. It is at 1.9 and it needs to be around 10. She is also really low on platelets and has had to receive a few pints of blood.
Her blood pressure has stabled out and the good news is, she was able to maintain, her blood pressure with the medications that raises, it turned down. It's hard to be in the room with her and not watch the monitor every minute to see what her heart rate is and how her blood pressure is. She is still on a medication to keep her heart from racing and it looks like she may be on that for awhile.
They had begun the day thinking that she was going to have another round of dialysis and by 3 pm they decided that they would hold off until tomorrow morning, giving her body a bit of a break. We saw that as a good thing, but she will have dialysis tomorrow to help clean her toxins out of her blood.
The last thing they did was taking totally taken her off the sedation medication. This means that within the next couple days she will wake up out of sedation. Please pray for that process because she still has the breathing tube in and she may fight against it when she wakes up. Our prayer is that when she wakes up there is no fear in her and she is calm with the peace of God.
Please continue to pray for her white blood cell count to come up. It is so important for that count to come up because the antibiotics that they have her on to fight the infection need her body to help. It is the infection that has caused all of this. Another prayer request would be that her blood pressure stays up and her heart rate stays normal.
We are so thankful for the staff at the hospital. They have been absolutely amazing in the care of mom. The Lord has been good to provide great people in our lives and we have seen how His people are the hands and feet of Christ here on this earth. Thank you for the prayers and the words of encouragement.

The Peaks and Valleys

Let me start this blog by saying that these have been by far the most difficult days of my life. As I write my mom is sitting in a hospital bed fighting for her life and connected to so many tubes that I wonder how the nurses keep track of them.
I am constantly battling between anger, sadness and hope. Kristi, Debra and I sat in my mom's room Saturday morning with my dad and talked to my mom about letting go if she was ready. We wanted to let her know that if she had an opportunity to meet Jesus that she could go and we would be OK. It was the hardest conversation I have ever had in my life. I kept wanting her to open her eyes, look at Dad and tell him that she wasn't ready. If you know my mom, you know she always likes to have the last word, so she quite possibly said to herself, "No way, I am fighting through this one".
This week has been one that has been filled with prayer, God's people and His continuous faithfulness. We saw a miracle on Saturday. After being called to the hospital at 4:30 in the morning, because it looked as though she was going to leave us, she battled back and made it through a round of dialysis. The nurse that worked the dialysis was walking on air when she came out. They thought that she would not be able to tolerate the dialysis. Not only did she tolerate it, but she exceeded their expectations. The nurse told us that she would have liked to creditit to her 25 years of experience, but the only one that deserved credit was GOD!
Our God is still a God of miracles. So many times I have taught through the Old Testament with my 7th grade class and wondered why doesn't God perform the miracles like that anymore. Well, He shattered through that and performed a miracle. He gave us hope in circumstances that seemed to have no hope. My mom reminded us through her prayer journal that we need give thanks of prayers in all circumstances. We redirected our prayers yesterday from "God we ask" to "God thank you for....". We continue to pray for complete healing and ask that He will sustain her, yet continue to thank Him for each small victory in this battle.
We have felt the prayer of the warriors that storm the gates on our behalf and on behalf of mom. Words cannot express the thankfulness that we have for the body of Christ and how they have provided for us in so many ways. While we walk through the peaks and valleys of this journey, we know that we have a God that is faithful and true!
If you are wondering how to pray, please pray for her white blood cell counts to go up, her platelets to to up, her blood pressure to stabilize and the infection to be gone. God is good and no matter what happens please join us in praising the Lord that Mom wins no matter what. She know Jesus and has lived a faithful life.

Mom's thoughts on prayer from her journal

Mom wrote this in her journal after reading from Oswald Chambers book on prayer. It was perfectly fitting for us and reminded us of her incredible faith during this journey. Even in her hospital bed, on life support, she was reminding us as to where our prayers should lie.

Think of the last thing you prayed about - were you devoted to your desire or God? The point of asking is that you may get to know God better. "Delight thyself also in the Lord and He will give you the desires of thine heart" Keep praying in order to get a perfect understanding of God Himself.
The main reason many of us leave off praying and become hard towards God is because we have only a sentimental interest in prayer. Too often instead of worshiping God, we construct a statement on how prayer works. We hurl our own petitions at God's throne and dictate to Him as to what we wish Him to do. We do not worship God, nor do we seek to form the mind of Christ.
The plaintive, self-centered, morbid kind of prayer is dead-set on the fact that I want to be right, is never found in the New Testament. The real business of your life has a saved soul is intercessory prayer, whatever circumstances God puts you in, pray immediately, pray for your friends right now; pray for those with whom you come in contact now. Pray on the realization that you are only perfect in Christ Jesus, not on this plea, "O Lord, I have done my best, please hear me." Prayer is not only asking, but an attitude of mind which produces the atmosphere in which asking is perfectly natural.
Is the Son of God praying in me or am I dictating to Him? God always hears the prayers of His Son, and if the Son of God is formed in me the Father will always hear my prayers.
The great battle in private prayer is the over-coming of mental wool-gathering. We have to discipline and concentrate on willful prayer. First thing to do when you wake in the morning is to swing the door wide open and pray to your Father in secret, and every public thing will be stamped with the presence of God.
Prayer is the way the life of God in us is nourished. We often pray as a means of getting things for ourselves; the Bible's idea of prayer is that we may get to know God Himself. God has bigger issues at stake than the particular things I ask.
In prayer - Have no other motive than to know your Father in heaven. It is impossible to conduct your life as a disciple without definite times of secret prayer. Prayer is getting into perfect communication with God. Remember that we have to ask God things that are in keeping with the God whom Jesus Christ revealed.
God's silences are His answers. If God has given you a silence, praise Him, He is bringing you into a great run of His Purpose. If Jesus is bringing you into the understanding that prayer is for the glorifying of His Father, he will give you the first sign of His intimacy - silence.
Prayer does not fit us for the greater works; prayer is the greater work.
In intercession you bring the person, or the circumstances that impinges on you before God until you are moved by His attitude toward it.

Hospital

This morning I was awakened by a phone call from Jerrel. He called to let me know that Kristi had called him and they were taking mom, by ambulance, to the hospital. She has become so weak that they couldn't get her out to the car. Along with that, she had further complications of not being able to catch her breath. It has been such a long journey for her and in my limited understanding of what God was doing in this I kept asking Him, "Why Lord, can't you just give her a break?". I have questioned why the Lord would allow a chemo plan that was suppose to be an easier chemo than most to knock my mom on her butt. It seems that every time we get one side effect in a place that is bearable, she finds another to plague her. So many times I have pleaded with the Lord to give her strength, to stop the side effects, to allow her to walk through this with no problems. Yet,for some reason, the Lord has chosen to allow her to struggle. While in my head I understand that God allows difficulty to happen in our lives to draw us closer to Him and to increase our dependence on Him, I still have had a hard time getting my heart to follow. I think that it's like that for most of us. We question God and ask Him questions that we expect answers to.
I was angry with Him this morning. I questioned why a God that is good would allow this to happen. I questioned why a God that is good would not answer my prayers in a way that I wanted them answered. So I did the only thing I knew to do, I read through the Psalms in the Bible. Oh my, God had a few things to say to me! I was searching for answers in people, in doctors and in my own understanding, all the while the answers were in scripture. I read through Psalm 33 and was comforted that I have a God that created the heavens and earth. I have a God that is right and true. I have a God that is faithful in all he does. Did you hear that?..."faithful in all he does!" That means the Lord is faithful in this. He will protect and love my mom through this when we can't. Who am I to question a God that has created the heavens and the earth? Who am I to question a God that knows the beginning from the end? All I see is the here and now. The part of Psalm 33 that stuck out to me the most is verses 20-22 "We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. May your unfailing love rest upon us, O Lord, even as we put our hope in you."
I will put my hope in the Lord even if I don't completely understand this. I serve a mighty God, a God of miracles. Does that stop me from praying for my moms complete healing? Absolutely not! However, those prayers will be filled with the thankfulness of a mighty God along with the pleading for my moms health. He is worthy of my praise even in the difficulty. He has given me eternal life in His presence and that is more than enough to praise him for. God is good, even when life is difficult.

Half Way

This week we finished treatment # 6; six more to go. I have mentioned before that I had never realized how totally life consuming chemo-therapy is. Each day we pray that God gives us strength for that day, We will deal with tomorrow as it comes (Matt 6:34). It would be a misstatement to say that Janice is doing well, but it is accurate to say we are learning to accept what we have been given and to look forward to the time that it will pass. It still hurts to see her in this condition. When I think she cannot get weaker and survive, she gets weaker and survives. Some things have improved; the nausea, the acidic stomach pain, mouth soars; others have not; the extreme fatigue, itching rash; weakness in her knees that make it hard to walk, metallic taste of food and drinks, and a few others we’ll leave unmentioned. She has lost forty pounds and a great deal of her hair; but not all of it.

That’s all the bad news. The good news is that we’re half way through and the light at the end draws closer. She still has not had to delay another treatment and has had no infections or set backs. Though she is very weak and spends almost all her time resting or going to treatment, her worst days are not as bad as they were a few weeks ago. We are very blessed there is light at the end of our tunnel.
“Weeping may endure for a night,
But joy comes in the morning.” Ps 30:5b

Today I received a note from my friend Judy that an old high school friend of ours, Tommy Blanton, had passed from cancer. I have great memories of Tommy, a short guy who could mow down people twice his size on a football field, and always lost his shoes in the middle of the field. My prayers are for his wife. I know how difficult that must be. I thought I knew that before, but now I understand better. God is teaching me everyday.
“I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go:
I will guide you with My eye.” Ps 32:8
When you go through what Mrs. Blanton has just experienced, you understand there is no sufficient strength other than the One who created us. Without Him, it’s all guess work. As all of you continue to pray for Janice and me (and thank you for that) perhaps you can remember to mention Mrs. Tommy Blanton for awhile.

Our cancer center (CBCC) is full of people with stories. Some are full of hope; some, not much; but all full of courage. I’ve told you a bit about our little friend, Shauna, who is doing somewhat better, and I have mentioned a few others. Perhaps, I’ll use an upcoming blog to tell you a few of those stories. It will certainly make you realize that every day of good health is a gift of God’s grace. But each story makes you realize He never abandons us. Thanks for hanging in there with us.
Kent

The Coast

07/03/2010
I am sitting here waiting for Kent. We are going to try and spend a few days at the coast. I have none of my usual side affects except I have developed Thrush in my mouth so I can’t eat. The doc gave me some meds so it should help soon.

As I haven’t written in a few weeks, let me share with what is going on in my little chemo brain. I have also prided myself on being a strong person; there was no challenge, problem, event that I could not handle. After all I come from strong stock and I have raised my girls to be strong. But my Lord has a way of letting me know when I am way off track. I have studied and read my Bible for well over 40 years and I believe every word it says. I believe that the world was created by God in seven days, I believe a flood covered this earth, I believe in the word of the prophets, I believe God chose to come to this earth as a man, to take on the sins of all of us, that He will return to redeem those who accept that. What I wasn’t seeing is the truth that my strength does not come from my self but from my God. He has given me well over 20 verses in the last month to teach me that fact. Cancer has shown me that only in His strength can any of us really function. We may think it is by our own, but trust me on this one, it is only through Him that any of us even makes it through the day. Trust in His strength and His alone because one of these days it may be all you have. God bless and remember “The joy of the Lord is my strength." Janice

07/06/2010 -- Update
We did spend a few days in Cayucos on the coast over the 4th and Janice did just fine. She is still fighting the Thrush, but it’s much better. She’s lost about 35 lbs now and is pretty weak, but we’re coming up on the half way point next week. With God’s help and all your prayers, we’re going to make it. Kent