Currently...

Hi everyone,

I figured this would be the best way to let everyone know how she is doing.  I will keep it updated regulary so that everyone knows what is going on.

As of today:

Her liver has been causing lots of problems.  Her doctor at Huntsman was not as helpful as we had hoped, so we are not really sure what is going on with her liver and neither is he.  It is either really damaged from chemo which may have caused permanant damage, may or may not be full of tumor on the entire left side, and might just have a problem that is so rare that they will never know what is going on with it.  Reguardless, it is not fully functioning, which is causing lots of pain, and tons of fluid build up in her abdomen.  They were going to try to treat her liver with direct radiation, but due to not knowing what is going on with it, the doctor taking too long to get things rolling, and the cancer spreading, she has been placed back on chemo.  The chemo will be the most effective treatment for now to try to treat all of the tumors.  Once the other tumors have shrunk, they will biopsy her liver to see what is going on.

As of now she has tumors in her abdomen, lungs and possibly the tissue around the lungs, likely in the liver, and tumors other places.  She has fluid in her chest and abdomen.  The fluid in her abdomen is testing positive for cancer, however the fluid in her chest is not.  She goes in weekly or as needed right now to get this fluid drained.  We went in today and they drained 1.4 liters from her abdomen.  This helps relieve the pressure, but anytime they take that much fluid out of you, your body kind of freaks out with all of the empty space, and it can cause some pretty bad pain.

She has now completed two rounds of chemo therapy.  This is a chemo that she has responded very well to in the past, so we are hoping that it can shrink the tumors and give her some pain relief.  Right now pain is the biggest issue.  She is awake most nights with extreme pain.

She is scheduled for another chemo treatment on Tuesday, however her blood count is very low, so she is receiving daily shots to try to get her strong enough to do that treatment.  Not sure what the shots are... but they usually help.  They do cause really bad bone pain, but right now she needs all of the chemo she can get.

I will keep this blog updated on a regular basis.  If you have any questions, you can call me at 801-446-2488 or on my cell 801-608-6804.  It is hard to reach her directly right now because she is sleeping a lot, but I can pass along messages and have her call people back when she is up to it.

She knows that everyone is praying for her and thinking of her, and it means a lot.