Author: sortlane1

Thank you again for your continued prayers for Val and our family.  Here is some updated information to help keep you in the loop.

We met with the plastic surgeon yesterday and had a good meeting.  He is a good fit for us and the appointment went well.  We have made the decision to go ahead and have a full bi-lateral mastectomy to reduce the changes of cancer showing up again.  The down side is that recovery will be tough but on a good note, Val gets to go in for a “tune-up” as she gets older to help keep things looking good.

Surgery has been scheduled for noon on Wednesday 4/13 at Lack’s Cancer Center.  Val will need to be in the hospital overnight and should be able to come home sometime on Thursday 4/14.  From then on it will be 6 to 8 weeks of recovery from surgery.  During that time we are also going to be finalizing the treatment plan with hopefully having that complete picture together by the first part of May.  Our hope and prayer is that the only cancer treatment necessary will be an oral drug called tamoxifen.

Currently we are doing very well.  The Lord has provided us peace that is hard to describe and it is good to have the surgery scheduled and have that piece of the puzzle put into place.

Here are things to continue to pray for specifically:

1. Praise that our medical team is wonderful and we get along well with them.
2. Praise that surgery has been scheduled
3. Continue to pray that the cancer has not spread.
4. Continue to pray that the genetic testing we are conducting comes back with the good news!
5. Continue to pray for peace for our family and patience as we are still uncertain as to the long term treatment plan.

Thank you all again for walking with us along this journey.  Our trust is in the Lord and that His name be praised!

Thank you so much for your prayers since we let you know about Val‘s cancer.  We are working out a game plan to keep folks in the loop and don’t have that all figured out yet but thought a quick email would be good on what we learned today.

Today we had an extensive meeting with Val‘s surgeon, Dr. Jessica Keto.  She has come highly recommended to us and we really like her a lot!  We talked through all the decision points and what goes into making the final treatment plan.  My sister Jodi, who is a breast cancer survivor, was able to attend the appointment with us which was a great help!

Tomorrow we have a short “Team Meeting” with all the Surgeon, Oncology Dr., etc.  This will be a meet and greet so to speak and get everyone else in the loop on the plan.  Being a Project Manager type, I like this team meeting idea a lot!

Right now it is not able to be determined the full treatment plan, we just know what decisions will need to be made and the information that goes into those decisions.  For sure our next step is surgery which we are working on getting scheduled.  That will probably be 2 to 3 weeks out with about 6 to 8 weeks recovery afterward.

The bottom line is that all the news we heard today was as good as you could ask for considering the circumstances.  Our medical team is top notch and we are very peaceful about where the Lord has us right now.

If you could be praying for some specific things:

1.) That the cancer has not spread at all to the lymph nodes.  That is one of the pieces of information we will get from surgery.

2.) That the genetic testing they are going to be doing gives us good news..

3.) That our kids and us continue to rest in the Lord and for patience as we wait for these various steps to be completed.  It is hard waiting!

Thank you all for walking with us along this journey.  Our trust is in the Lord and that His name be praised!

Marc