Welcome to our blog. We are so thankful each of you are joining us in prayer and support as we walk through this journey. Though this is not where we would have chosen to be, we are so grateful for the support of friends from all over the world and for the way the Lord is with us with every step.
Our family loves to play & watch sports. No matter what sport it is, the huddle is the critical time when the team gathers together, should-to-shoulder to go over the gameplan. When the team breaks the huddle, everyone knows their job. We created this blog as a way to huddle everyone together as we fight this thing together. Some posts will be factual/informative. Some will be insights the Lord is teaching us or thoughts He's given us to ponder. The goal of all of them is to give you specific ways you can pray for us and journey with us through this. We need every one of you.
We thought we would start with an update of the last month so you would know where we are. It's a lot.
May 23rd: We celebrated Clay's 35th birthday and our 8th anniversary. We were eagerly awaiting the MRI his chiropractor had scheduled for May 25th so we could try to figure out what was going on with his back, as he had been having severe back pain for the past few months.
May 25th: Clay went in for the MRI at 7:00. By 10:00, his chiropractor called to tell him there was a "highly suspicious mass" on his right kidney with lesions on his spine. He informed him that it looked to be consistent with kidney cancer. He suggested that he get an appointment with an oncologist ASAP. The rest of that day was a flurry of making phone calls and complete disbelief. We ended up getting an appointment for the following Monday.
May 29th: Urological Oncologist appointment at Ochsner. He let us know that it did look to be consistent with Renal Cell Carcinoma, but we would need to get CT scans to know for certain. Clay's parents came down that night while we went to two CT scans.
May 30th: On our way to the Bone Scan, we got the results from the CT scans that confirmed the large (9 cm) mass was Renal Cell Carcinoma (RCC). As horrible and shocking as that news was, we were thankful it hadn't spread to any other organs. The bone scan that morning confirmed that the cancer had spread to his spine, ribs, shoulders, hips, and femurs. That spread means that we are looking at a stage 4 diagnosis.
Clay talked to his medical oncologist in NOLA about the results, but we couldn't get an appointment to meet with the medical oncologist until June 14th. In the meantime, we were able to get an appointment at the Cancer Treatment Center of America (CTCA) in Atlanta June 5th.
June 5-7: These 3 days were full of appointments with the CTCA staff getting "second" opinions on everything. They confirmed everything that our team at Ochsner had said and provided us with their preferred plan of attack. We were also introduced to their social worker and naturopath. Both of them provided helpful insights (in drastically different fields) that we are thankful for.
June 14: We finally got to meet with our medical oncologist in New Orleans at 8 AM. He provided us with a detailed treatment plan that he believes in strongly. He also put in referrals for their palliative care team and radiation oncology team for pain relief, as well as a referral to their integrative oncology team for a holistic approach to fighting back against this disease.
June 16: We finally had the biopsy early this day to determine the sub-type of the RCC. We are eagerly waiting to get those results back now.
There are still some other appointments to go before we can start all of the new medications (like going to the dentist to make sure I can make sure my jaw won't get messed up in this process). We know this timeline covers less than 4 weeks so you might scoff at the use of "finally" above but each day since May 25th has felt like a year. Those of you who have walked this road understand. We are grateful for our team of doctors who have gone above and beyond to get things scheduled so quickly. They have all patiently sat with us to answer questions and to go over everything as clearly as possible. They have not tried to sugar-coat anything or downplay the seriousness of the situation. That's not their job.
This information dump is only a small portion of the info we've taken in over the past 3.5 weeks. We ask that you would pray for us as we try to sift through the sheer amount of information and for wisdom as we move forward in treatment plans and the accompanying lifestyle changes. We plan to start treatment on June 29th, pending biopsy results and insurance approval. Please pray that these would come through on time.
Ready, break!
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