Surviving Surgery

Well we survived the day of surgery(almost it is 11:05pm :)). We arrived at the hospital and got checked in about 11 this morning. Jeremy's surgery didn't get underway until about 2, so as you can imagine it was a long wait. They took him back about 2 and the surgery lasted about 2 hours. The surgeon said the surgery went very well. He removed the lower section of his colon(about a foot), 2 lymph nodes, and a mass of tissue that the surgeon was unsure of what is was or why it was there. He said it was around the area of where the cancer was so it could be stemmed from that or could be inflamed tissue from where the polyp was removed. We will have to wait for the pathology report to know for certain. We are praying that we will get the pathology report by Friday, but if not it will be on Monday. After surgery Jeremy was in recovery for about 2 hours before we got to see him(long 2 hours as I am sure you can imagine). The rest of the evening has been rough because of the amount of pain he has been in. They were unable to get his pain under control until about 10pm. They put him on a new pain pump and upped his other pain meds. He is now resting very well, this is the first time he has done this since surgery. He is on a restricted diet of only ice chips, but should get to start some clear liquids tomorrow. God blessed us today with a strong and sharp medical team. I praise God for the surgeon, anesthesiologist, nurses, and assistants that have been on Jeremy's care today. God put some wonderful compassionate people on our case and that is what we have prayed for. We know that tomorrow will be a tough day, but we will take it step by step and we will get through it.
Thank for your continued prayers, phone calls, texts, facebook messages, etc. We are once again so very blessed. I know I have already said that many times, but it is emotionally overwhelming to me the love and support we have received. It is hard to believe that not even a week ago we found out about the cancer and already our family, friends, and even people we have not even met are stepping up and supporting us in every possible way we can imagine.
Thank you to Melissa for all the meals you have provided while we have all our family here. Not only meals but snacks and treats for the kids. Also a big thank to you for being my communication and taking care of all the planning I know you have already done in order to make our life a little easier for us when we get home.
Thank you to Jennifer for the bag full of my favorite goodies and magazines.
Thank you to Brandy and Ali for the doorstep full of goodies on the morning of surgery.
Thank you to Melanie(Jeremy's sister), Mike(Jeremy's brother in law), Sara(Jeremy's mom), Jim(Jeremy's stepdad), my Dad, Jannie(my stepmom), Bo, Lori and the girls(my stepbrother and his family), Daniel(our pastor), Angela(super secretary :), my Papaw, Kent Dobbs, and Dave for sitting with us today throughout the surgery. It was blessing to have you all here to support us.
Thank you to Nana(my mom) for staying at home with boys, so that I can be here every minute to take care of my husband.
I cannot say thank you enough for all the blessing bestowed upon us. We know that God is our refuge and our strength and we are trusting him as we continue through this journey together.

Continue to pray for the hands and hearts of the nurses and doctors that are taking care of Jeremy every minute of the day. Continue to pray for me to have the strength to be there for my husband through each day. Pray for Jeremy's strength and will as he begins the healing process of this surgery. Please pray for our boys who are having to deal with what is a very confusing situation in their lives. They are both handling it very well, but I know that each day will get a little harder for them, so please pray for them and our family as a whole.

Psalm 18:2 — The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower.

Update on Surgery

We got a call this morning not long after 8am that the surgeon was going to work Jeremy in at 3:30(this is thanks to my stepmom who works for our family doctor, what a blessing!). Jeremy and I met with the surgeon for over an hour. He was so good about answering all our questions and fears. He said this is very uncommon for a 32 year old man and in the 25 years he has been practicing he has not seen colon cancer in a man Jeremy's age esp with no trace of it in his family.
He scheduled Jeremy's surgery for this Wednesday at 1:30. We will arrive at the hospital at 10:00am to do preop labs and xrays. The surgery itself will last at least 2 hours. They will remove one whole section of his colon and take 2 lymph nodes. This is the part of the colon the cancer had stemmed off of. He went through the process of everything that would happen and he answered all the questions we had. Jeremy's doctor called and had a consult with the gastrenologist and the pathologist while we were in the clinic. He was very thorough and it was one of our first answered prayers because God put a surgeon in our life that is not only amazing at what he does, but also very compassionate. While in the hospital Jeremy will also see an oncologist who will discuss with us if he will need further treatment after the surgery.
Many of you have asked for specific prayers that we need. Obviously our first and foremost prayer is for the pathology reports to come back cancer free, showing they got it all out. We also ask for prayer for strength, this is difficult on our entire family but obviously in different ways for each of us. We pray for guidance and wisdom for the doctors that are performing surgery and treating Jeremy while in the hospital.
We have praised God each day of this journey for the amazing friends, family, and even complete strangers that are praying for our family. The continuous emails, text messages, facebook messages, and blog comments have been such a blessing to us. We know that God is with us through this journey and we know we WILL make it with a stronger faith, family, and friendships.

Power of Prayer

I am a firm believer in the power prayer and I know when I need to ask for it. Within the last 48 hours I can honestly say our family's life has changed. Let me start at the beginning last Monday my husband Jeremy had to have a colonoscopy for some issues he had been having. He had the colonoscopy and they removed what appeared to be a fairly normal but large polyp. We left the hospital with the feeling all was ok and we could in a sense check that off our list of things we need to do. Well on Friday evening about 5:15 that all changed. The polyp that was removed from Jeremy's colon contained cancer, a cancer that is uncommonly found in anyone his age. We of course are devastated, shocked, and scared. The doctors recommend Jeremy to have a major surgery within the next week or so to remove part of his colon and 1-2 lymph nodes to be tested so that we can know if the cancer has spread to his colon. He also has to undergo a panel of genetic testing to make sure that this is not something that has been passed on to our two boys. The recommendation was to have the surgery done within the week. This surgery will mean that Jeremy will be off work for 4-6 weeks. I am asking for you to pray for my husband and his health. We are praying to God each and everyday that this cancer is gone and will not return, but as I said I am a firm believer in the power of prayer so I am reaching out to my close friends and blog readers and asking you to pray. We are supposed to hear from the surgeon tomorrow and set up our consultation and hopefully have surgery scheduled for this week or early next. Please pray for Jeremy and our family. The boys know something is going on, but it is hard for a 7 year old to wrap their head around something of this nature. However we knew it would not be right for us to not be honest with Ian because we felt that would make him more scared if he was not told the truth and heard everyone whispering. We did use easier terms and explained to him words he would be hearing, but assured him daddy was going to be okay, but the next few months were going to be tough. Let me just say I love my kids they are so wonderful. I need prayers for myself to be the wife I need to be during this time and to have the right words to say to my husband when he is worried and scared. I am having to step into a role I never dreamed I would have to and I can honestly say it is hard and is scary, but with great friends and family I know I am going to be able to do it. The next few weeks are going to be hard for us and at the same time give us a lot of answers. Once again please pray for Jeremy and please pray for our family.
In Luke 18:1 Jesus told his disciples that they "should always pray and not give up."
I firmly believe we are going to pray and we are NOT going to give up. I love my husband and he is an amazing man, husband, and father. He is a fighter and with our faith, family, and friends we will get through this.

We survived April!

Ok so I have been a terrible blogger, but partly because it was April! April is the dreaded month for us because it is so CRAZY! The month begins with both the boys birthday, yes we are now 2 and 7! Hard to believe! *Pictures of parties coming soon!* From there we have Easter, so you guessed it not only do we have lots of bday goodies but also Easter bunny goodies. So by this point my house is usually a disaster! From there begins our state testing at school. I am our schools test coordinator which means that I am in charge of making sure that we follow ALL the states wonderful rules of security and test administration. Good times! That consumes almost 3 weeks of the month because we have K-2 testing one week, 3-5 testing, and then we have make up testing. Not to mention all the coding, sorting, counting, packaging etc. The good news is I do get a little $ incentive for doing this. Granted nothing probably for the time I put in, but we usually use it for a little summer get a way to Branson. In the midst of testing is always when baseball starts, so that adds a little more to our already busy calendar! Now in the mean time Carter decided to get hit with rotovirus not fun at all and then a few weeks later Ian got hit with what we think was possibly then flu and wouldn't you know April ended with me in bed sick! So this explains why my blogging went from not so great to TERRIBLE! May is here and I am beginning to feel some better and ready for a fresh start!

Branson Fun!!!

Well our spring break getaway to Branson was wonderful! We have been super busy since we have been back, so that is why I haven't even posted pictures yet. We got the boys some summer clothes and shoes. Jeremy and I also got a few things ourselves. Actually I got much more than Jeremy, but he would rather you just show up at home with him some clothes rather than have to shop for them himself! My sweet hubby did treat me to a new purse that I LOVE! My dad and stepmom got us a room at the Hilton down on the Landing that overlooks the Landing and the water show. It was a great spring break gift and we enjoyed every minute of it! Thanks again!!! We ate at Joe's Crab Shack, Texas Land and Cattle, and Macaroni Grill. Not to mention the ice cream, fudge, and goodies we snuck in between meals!!! The boys were both very good shoppers, I was very impressed! Of course the famous question each day we were there was when are we going swimming! We saved swimming til last each day because it wore them out really good and then when we got back to the room they were ready to crash! So basically a good time was had by all! When we came home we were greeted by Nana(my mom) and a super clean house with all the laundry done. It was a very nice treat! God has blessed us with amazing and giving parents! So wanted to share a few pics of our getaway!

Our room was the one right above the funnel cake stand with the big balcony!

So excited to be in Branson! First one to wake up the morning we left!

Bass Pro fish tank

Joe's Crab Shack

Playing in the fountain

Water and fire show. We got to watch it right from our balcony in our pajamas!

Orange sorbet, so yummy!

This is all he was waiting for! Forget all the new clothes and shoes!

Carter was a daredevil in the water.





Waiting for the last water show and playing possum!

Branson Bound!

So it has been a long past 6 months. God has blessed up each and everyday and each and everyday we have also learned many valuable lessons for life. Learning to BUDGET in a serious way with this crazy economy. Making things stretch when normally we would have thrown them out. At first it was really hard for me, I mean to not stop and get Starbucks if I really wanted it. There are so many things in life I guess I take for granted and then we had to scale back a bit. After few weeks of feeling sorry for myself :) it became like a game. How much could I save at the store using coupons, what kind of deals could I get at Walgreens, etc. Well as luck would have it business has picked up a bit and we have nested some money away to take a much needed getaway! Nothing too fancy or exciting just a road trip to Branson and we are all thrilled! Just a few days away. No cooking, cleaning, wood from the storm to cut and clean up. Just some good ol family time! We plan to do some summer shopping for the boys, new clothes, shoes, etc. and of course a few new things for Momma and Daddy as well! As long as there is some indoor pool time penciled in that is all they care about. So the top three pics were as follows:
Ian and Carter-SWIMMING!
Momma-shopping
Daddy-a BIG breakfast buffet
Doesn't take much to please us does it??? So we are headed out tomorrow afternoon and won't be back until Thursday night. I can't wait and I know we are going to have a GREAT much needed time!

Ladyback Fun!

So last Sunday they had a big elementary school day at the Ladyback game. All of our 3rd-5th grade students got family tickets and 2 tickets for free popcorn and drinks. So lucky for us the teachers got them too! So we loaded up the boys and went to watch the game. There we met up with lots of my teacher friends that also have little ones, so we had a great time and so did the boys! Ian got his picture made with Pork Chop so he was happy!



Carter on the other hand met Pork Chop and gave him 5, but that was about as far as he would go! So needless to say we had soda, popcorn, and thanks to Clarisa cotton candy! Now you know in our house it is ALL boys, so when Carter had Clarisa's two little girls sitting right in front of him with pig tails in, he just couldn't resist! He was mesmerized by their ponies!!! He kept touching them and spinning them around his finger! It was too cute! Not cute enough to give him a little sister of his own....but it was cute!




Then some really good friends of ours adopted a baby this past year and they were sitting right by us and Carter decided he needed to feed Brady his afternoon snack, so you will see Brady chowing down with Carter assisting!!!





Ian ate the entire bag of cotton candy! As you can see from the pics it was really yummy! The only reason I know is because he gave me one bite!


Then as we are headed to the car, Carter decided to play a little hard to get! It was a battle of the wills and he was gonna run! So basically it ended in a standoff!

Here is the stand off!!!



Daddy won, but Carter was giggling the whole time!

The Ladybacks did win and a good time was had by all!