Back on this Horse

Work is crazy, life is busy, kids are wild, but God is good. :) After many months of ignoring this blog site due to what I can only attribute to the “busyness of life”, I’m going to commit to blogging at least once a week. It is incredible how quickly I forget what the Lord has brought me through. I meant for this blog to be like the stone alters in Old Testament times that would help me remember and today it has done that. Re-reading some of my early posts I’m ashamed that I am not now “totally fixed” and living that super duper spiritually victorious life. But you know, I think that is the point. If we could just get fixed like that and live perfectly then we wouldn’t really need a saviour would we? So I’m thankful that God loves me in spite of my stupidness and in spite of my tendency to go back to just living the way I want to live and doing things that I know He would rather I not do. It is a process – I am a work in progress. So praise the Lord for His faithfulness.

A Parent’s Job Never Ends

Christmas time is just crazy as I’m sure anyone who doesn’t live in a hole these days knows first hand. We have been running around like crazy trying to finish up Christmas shopping and prepare for family to visit us and also prepare for us to go out of town to visit other family. :) We love hanging out with everyone but man it can be stressful this time of year.

My wife and I were shopping earlier this week in Hallmark and I had the task of distracting my 2 year old while my wife tried to finish up. My 5 year old stayed with my wife and kept showing her these small train ornaments which he absolutely loved! She told him to put them back and then she finished up and we went home. Well, the next day we happened to find one of those tiny trains mixed in with his toys. My wife knew exactly where it was from and we had another conference with my son on stealing. I was so bummed. I thought that with big deal I made out of it the first time with the green play phone that he would know for sure that stealing was wrong and that we should never steal. But yet he had done it again. Why didn’t it stick the last time? What did I do wrong? :) And then I realized how silly it was for me to think that way. How many times do I fail the Lord every day and yet He patiently teaches me again and again. I disciplined my son and we will have another confrontation with a store manager and this time I will certainly have different expectations for the future. How silly of me to expect my son to be perfect after dealing with something only one time. I will take all of this in stride and just be patient and persistent and try to model the love and example that Christ shows to me.

5 year old love life

As I was putting my son to bed tonight we had a great conversation. I was praying that the Lord would prepare D for his future wife and also that the Lord would prepare D’s future wife to know and love the Lord and to serve her with all of her heart. When I finished, my son said “Dad, I already know I’m going to marry Sally. Because after all, she is my girlfriend.” I couldn’t help but smile and then D continued, “I mean, I know she says that Joe is her boyfriend, but she can only have one boyfriend and that is going to be me. Joe will have to find another girlfriend.” At this comment I was holding back a chuckle and then for some reason I had a flash of fear come across my heart for my son. I did not want him to experience heartache in his life. I wanted to protect him from this. So being a wise and all knowing dad, I posed a question to him: “Big D, what if the Lord doesn’t want Sally to be your wife?” At this he curled his brow and then after a couple of seconds he said, “But dad, Suzie is only 4 and Jane is too crazy and Mary just isn’t quite right. Joe can pick one of them but really dad, Sally is my girlfriend.” This realiztion at the size of my 5 year old son’s small world again comforted me and I knew the Lord had used D’s reply to comfort my heart.

As I was telling my wife of our conversation and laughing about it with her I had the craziest revelation. The pang of fear and the longing to protect my son from any harm or heartache may have been a small glimpse into what the Lord could have felt before the fall of man in the Garden of Eden. I mean, only magnified by a zillion and taken to eternity of course. But I wonder if God had that thought “I love them so much and I wish they didn’t have to go through the pain and suffering of sin.” But then if we look at the other side of this argument, if it weren’t for sin would we really have a full appreciation of his mercy and grace in our lives? I know for me that it is when I realize what the Lord has saved me from or the fact that I am so wretched and yet He loves me anyway that I really feel I have a glimpse of the greatness of God and I really feel full in spirit and love. I mean without darkness, how can we ever really appreciate light? And so it will be with my son’s love life. I know that he will experience heartache, but you know what? I’m okay with it now. Because it will be the broken heart that most appreciates true love when he finds it.

$3.29

Parenting is the hardest job in all the world.  Without much prayer and the grace of Jesus I really don’t know what I would do! We had an interesting series of events the other day at our house.

Big D who just celebrated his 5th birthday stole something from the grocery store. My wife went to the store with them which is always a difficult thing for her because they act just absolutly crazy at the grocery store. Needless to say she has her hands full with those two. (I know, I know, don’t ask – I have no clue how we’ll handle a third! :) Big D and his sister (who is 2) were running interference for each other at the checkout line and apparently D opened the package of a toy cell phone and stuck it in his pocket while no one was looking. It wasn’t until he and his sister were home and fighting over this toy that we found out. I had just walked in the door from another appointment when they were fighting over the phone.

When asked where he had gotten the phone, D said that he had “found” it at the grocery store. It was soon uncovered that he had knowingly stolen it. When we uncovered this face, he became very scared and started crying saying that he didn’t want the police to come get him.

Now as a parent, I’m feeling all kinds of emotions at this point – anger and disappointment that he would steal, a bit of humor that he thinks the police may show up at any minute, and I guess some guilt about what I may have done wrong as a parent for him to get to this point! :)

I also recognize this as an amazingly rare opportunity to teach him all kinds of moral lessons. Thus I hide my amusement at the situation and assure him that the police are not outside about to beat the door down. I take him and sit him down and I silently pray that the Lord would give me wisdom so I would know what to say. I emphasize that stealing is a sin and have him repeat that stealing is WRONG. I ask him why he stole, and really spend a good long time on the crux of the issue. Then all of a sudden, I am impressed to remind D that no matter what he does wrong, me and his mommy will always love him. I can only say that the Lord gave this to me because I don’t know where it came from. But what a neat opportunity to remind D of our love for him and to show him that we have unconditional love for him and that we don’t love him because of his actions, but because God gave him to us.

After the lecture, we get in the car and immediately drive back to the grocery store. The whole ride there is not a fun ride for either of us. I still have my stern face firmly in place. When we get to the store, I locate the store manager and tell D to explain what had happened (I’d prepped him on what he should say on the ride over). He tells her that he stole a phone, and that he is sorry, and that he has learned that stealing is wrong and he’ll never do it again, and that he would like to pay for the phone. The grocery store manager was a real trooper. At first she too had to work to hold back a smile about the situation, but she got how important this was to me.

So she rings up this plastic phone and that sucker was $3.29! I was shocked at that price because this thing was worse than a typical McDonald’s toy! I told D that this was such a waste! I said, “don’t you know what kind of cool stuff you could get for $3.29? Your daddy wants you to have good things and wants to get all kinds of good things for you – all you have to do is ask me!”

So while I definitely cringe at paying $3.29 for a cheap, plastic, lime green cell phone, when I look at the bigger picture and the opportunity I had to teach my son a moral lesson, that is money well spent and I would do it again in no time flat. One thing that I have heard recently is that as parents we should pray that we catch our children in the act. This has definitely become my prayer as I have now seen first hand the awesome opportunity that can arise from catching my children “in the act”.

Rainbow in the Storm

So I’m officially back to work now. It is going pretty well but my brain goes through times where it just won’t work. But I guess that is nothing really new. :) Our family has some additional news that we’d like to share. The day before my surgery (July 31) I was in the middle of doing a bowel prep and was very nervous preparing to go “under the knife”. I hadn’t slept much anyway and Jessica and I were up really early. She is in the bathroom and I hear her call for me so I go to see if she is okay. Then she shows me a pregnancy test that is positive! Yup – you heard me right! Our third baby is on the way. And the timing was just unbelievable. Yet again, God is so good to us. He was giving us a promise in the midst of our struggle. Number 3 was like the rainbow after the flood and man we were (and still are) overwhelmed by all the Lord continues to do for us!

Feeling Good!

I have been very slack about updating my blog recently and I apologize about that. It seems the better I feel the more things I have vying for my time. I was just talking with my uncle and he reminded me that several folks still go to this website regularly for updates so I promised him I would put a quick note up here to say how well things have been going.

I’m getting my energy back and I’m almost back to 100%. I can tell because I’m getting more and more antsy about doing several odd jobs around the house and have even tackled a couple. I start work on Monday. My pancreas drain is completely closed up and healed! Praise the Lord! The incision wound is coming along slowly but surely. I still have to put bandages and gauze on it twice a day, but it has gotten to the point where I have periods during the day that I forget about it! I may scratch my stomach or lean on something that pushes against my abdomen and then I remember that I still have a wound. So overall I’m doing really well. I can eat what I want and I no longer have to take naps during the day.

I start work on Monday so that will be the real test of how much energy I really have. Thank you all for your thoughts and your prayers. There are several other exciting things that have been going on and I can’t wait to post about them!

Picture of the Tumor

I’ve been hesitant to put a picture of my tumor up on the site because I don’t want to gross anyone out. So please be aware that this is kind of nasty to look at and only proceed if you are not the squeamish type. :)

Picture of my tumor…

No More Pancreas Drain!

So recouperation is going rather slow for me. I’m steadily getting back more and more of my energy. Been home three whole weeks now! Time really does fly by even when you’re doing nothing! :) I’ve still been very laid back with my activity. I stopped taking Vicoden (sp?) two weeks ago now (Monday, Aug 20). I’ve been to see the general surgeon twice this week. The first time was on Monday (Aug 27) and he said that since I was no longer on narcotics I could drive again. Hooray! I feel like a teenager with my first permit all over again. I used that privilege today when I drove back to CMC Surgery to have my pancreas drain removed.

I haven’t detailed too much about my pancreas drain so let me take the time to do that now. I actually haven’t felt like getting on the computer much at all the past few weeks, which is very frustrating because I have so many thoughts in my head that I want to share… But anywho, when they removed my tumor it was so large that it was pressing against my pancreas. Thus they had to pull it off which sheared the pancreas and caused it to leak some enzymes and other fun stuff. The technical term for this is a pancreatic fistula and the doctor said that it was basically like pulling a piece of tape off of a piece of paper and leaving a fuzzy place. Anyway, to ensure that the fluid didn’t build up inside me they put a plastic tube in my side that would allow the junk to flow into a bulb-like thing that looked kind of like a clear grenade. It was very annoying. I would safety pin it to my shirt and try to hide it as much as I could. Well today, it was removed! I feel like a new man with the drain out.

Also, I am back to sleeping in my bed! I was unable to lay flat in my bed comfortably for the first two weeks, but this past Tuesday or so I tried sleeping in my bed and though it was a bit rough, I’ve stuck it out and now I can sleep pretty much all night fairly comfortably. I love my LaZBoy that has been where I’ve spent like 99% of my time (including where I’ve been sleeping) but there is something about sleeping in your own bed that just feels right. :)

Spiritually I’ve been going through a bit of a valley. The Lord knows exactly what I need when I need it and family and friends have been totally encouraging, but the amazing spiritual high that I felt before the surgery was amazing and I miss that. But I know that we are to live by faith and not by sight or feelings or emotions so I view this time as more critical in some ways because now is when my discipline and consistency and faithfulness to the Lord is being tested. I still feel awed that the Lord is continuing to use me in so many ways and it is my prayer that I can continue to be faithful to all the Lord is doing.

The Fairness of It All

I was able to make it to church tonight. We showed up a few minutes late and left a few minutes early so I would not get too tired trying to talk to folks. That was very hard for me to do because I miss talking to everyone and I love my church family so much. I can’t wait until I have the energy to hug and talk with everyone. But it was awesome going to church. The Lord totally spoke to me.

My wife and I were discussing our current situation earlier this week and she asked me what my take was on the fairness of what we’re going through. I hadn’t really processed this whole ordeal from that perspective but I had a chance to kind of work through my thoughts with her. I feel that first off, the Lord is in total control. Did He cause me to have this cancer? I don’t think that the Lord actually formed it, but He certainly allowed it to happen. I liken this to the story of Job. The Lord allowed terrible things to happen to Job so that He could prove Job was faithful and so that God would be glorified. Thus I believe that the Lord allowed this to happen to me first and foremost so that He could receive honor and glory and praise. I thank the Lord every day for the football size tumor that was on my kidney. It has allowed my relationship with Jesus to grow and it has given me such an amazing perspective and empathy for others and it has allowed me to know how to love people in a new way. I feel that this is just the beginning of a long process that God has in place to get me where He wants me to be. So now I feel a responsibility to seek the Lord earnestly for how He wants me to use this situation for His glory. So is it fair that we are having to go through this situation? No, but then again was it fair that Jesus had to die on the cross for my sin? Is it fair that even though I am sinful and selfish in so many ways I still get to experience the amazing mercy of the Lord? If I take a completely honest look at what I deserve and what is really fair, I am amazed that the Lord allows me to come into His presence and talk to Him through prayer and eventually spend eternity with Him at all. So no, this is not fair – I praise him that life is not fair and that He gives way more than I deserve. Praise the Lord that He is not fair, but rather that He has mercy on us and gives us way more than we could ever imagine!

A Wretch Like Me

I continue to be amazed by the love and support that we’ve been getting from everyone. The Lord definitely knows how to use others to encourage me at just the time when I need it and in just the way that I need. I shouldn’t be amazed, but I am. The Lord is so good.

We came home from the hospital on Friday. They removed my staples in the hospital and since then my scar has opened a bit. That made me really nervous and resulted in a rush visit back to the doctor on Monday, but come to find out it is perfectly normal and Dr. D actually opened the wound a bit more on purpose and said that we want it to heal from the “inside out”. The most annoying part is that now I have to change the gauze on my wound 3 times a day, but having the peace of mind that this is okay and that I’m healing is worth the annoyance.

It has been a slow few days since coming home. I feel like I am a useless wretch because I just sit in my chair and only get up to eat or use the bathroom or bathe. I get winded just walking to the kitchen and back. I know this is part of the healing process, but man it is no fun. I wish they could just knock me out and then I could wake up in about 2 weeks mostly recovered and ready to go. :) But the Lord is teaching me patience and I’m trying my best to learn…

I just managed to pick my laptop back up yesterday. I haven’t really felt like typing on reading or anything until yesterday, but now I am feeling well enough to do things at least for a short bit. I want to post more often, but I will take it day by day and do things as I can.

We had an oncologist appointment this morning. Our wonderful friends (I’ll call them “the B’s”) helped us tremendously by taking the kids while we went to the appointment. What a blessing they are. Yet another example of how the body of Christ is coming together to help in so many small yet significant ways! So we dropped the kids off and went to meet with Cheri who is running the clinical trial that I may be a candidate for. She gave us a 22 page document to review with all kinds of FAQs about the clinical trial and she talked with us for over an hour. It was very encouraging. I had pretty much reached the conclusion that I was going to do the clinical trial. I figured, “Why not”? I mean the side effects are minimal compared to the increased care and monitoring as well as the 66% chance that I would get one of the new drugs and that they are effective in really preventing a recurrence in me! I mean, it sounds like a win-win situation no matter the spin. But of course, once I had some discussions with Cheri I started to feel a bit more apprehensive about the possible side effects. They even say in the document that there is a possibility for death. I know they have to put in all kinds of disclaimers so that they cover themselves from law suits and what not, but seeing it in black and white really sent a chill. But even though it made me more apprehensive, I still feel it is the best decision for me to participate. Some of the biggest benefits in my mind are that I will get a CT scan to check for recurrence every 4 months instead of every 12 months. And they will be monitoring my blood pressure and heart rates and other levels in my bloodwork very closely. So even if I’m just on a placebo instead of one of the new drugs I’ll be under the care of very watchful physicians.