It was a great Sunday this past week. The picture is from a previous baptism time, but this week there were 18 baptisms!
Pam couldn’t miss it. And so she didn’t.
First time to church in about 8 months. It was a great Sunday.
Meals for September
If you would like to provide a meal in September, slots are now available for you to sign up.
You have all been such faithful help over the last few months. Thanks so much.
RSS Syndication.
Craig Nodine pointed out that when we switched to a new website hosting service, the connection to RSS syndication disappeared. RSS is a way to have the site automatically notify you when there has been an update to the site. It’s an older approach than Twitter and Facebook, but still works well.
If you’d like to subscribe to the RSS feed from the new site, go to the About page. You’ll see a link on the right hand side of the page. Click on that and you can add this site to your RSS reader. And if you don’t have an RSS reader, you can set one up right then.
Diagnostics.
Now that a few days have elapsed since Pam’s return from the hospital, it would probably be a good idea to update everyone on her status. Pam is now in a time of diagnostics to help determine the next course of action. We anticipate that this means surgery, and the diagnostics will help determine how much surgery, and when.
Today, Pam completed an MRI. Needless to day, this is probably Pam’s least favorite thing to do. Afterwards she commented, “Never again.” I think she means it.
Pam will undergo three diagnostics next week — mammogram, ultrasound, and echo cardiogram. And then, the following Monday, we’ll meet with the surgeon to discuss what they’ve discovered. As of today, we’re hopeful that it will be a minimal surgery. We’ll know for certain in just over a week.
Meanwhile, Pam continues to very slowly recover. The process is not consistent, and one day she feels a little better, and then for two days, is pretty much a slug — not able to move well, and very tired. There are still symptoms left over from the chemo, including one nasty bout with nausea, but we’re hopeful her body will start to mend.
In general we’re praying for good rest each night, some improvement during the day, and expanded time in “the real world”. We appreciate your prayers, too.
Changes. It’s good.
Pam has been home for a little over a week after her week-long stay in the hospital. The doctor said that she should expect recovery time to be twice as long as her time in the hospital. And so each day has seen small but noticeable improvements in energy and outlook.
If I hadn’t said it before, this last experience of zero white blood cells has convinced the doctors that chemo is over. They have cancelled the last two infusion sessions. Hooray!
What will now happen is that Pam will continue to build her strength back, several diagnostics will happen, and then surgery. The extent of the surgery will depend on the results of the diagnostics.
But for now, rest, recuperation, and recovery are the orders of the day.
We’re grateful for your continued prayer support and good wishes and send our blessings your way.
Site changes.
We’re in the process of moving Pam’s old website to a new location. I’m not sure how much content we’ll bring over, but this is now the new location for information about Pam and Facing It.
It’ll be bare bones for a while, but thanks for stopping by.
Home.
In an amazing (miraculous?) turn of events, Pam’s white blood cell count skyrocketed yesterday, and she was able to come home last night. Hooray! This was totally unexpected, and she was prepared to stay yet one more day, but a late check on her blood showed she was OK to come home.
So she is … home. Very tired, very weak, but home.