The Cure

Since July we have heard that the only cure to this Cancer is surgery. After many months to prepare her body, she is strong and ready for this nasty tumor to be removed from her body. Wednesday our entire family will meet in St Louis to be with mom on Thursday as she has her surgery. We have sold " Our Rhea of Hope" t-shirts to help raise money to go towards medical bills, and we couldn't be more grateful for the huge amounts of money our friends and family have donated. My hope is that everyone wear those shirts on Thursday to remind you to pray all day for my mom and her doctors.

Mom, this part is for you....you are sooooo loved and God will be with you on Thursday. He will have his hands on you and the doctors and make sure that you come out of this surgery as a SURVIVOR!Keep the faith and remember to ask for peace, leave all your worries with God. I love you more than anything and we have so many more memories to make together!

Now for the funny last part, staying true to who mom is, I have a feeling when we go pick up her van to drive to St Louis is will be packed with all her little gifts, memorablia, NUTS and croutons( that she had to go to Sam's to get that will probably tempt her on her days she can only have liquids) and it will be fully packed only leaving the kitchen sink! Hopefully she doesn't get a roomate this time, they might think she is a HOARDER! All in jokes and fun, she is wanting to fill her room with reminders of all the people who love her and is bringing photos and items that the grandchildren and friends have made. She is very thankful for it all and it will all help her keep her mind on the goal and recover faster!

You know you have been in the hospital too much when...

So  today was another “cancer” experience with mom. It started with dad taking mom to the clinic to get her port put in, the procedure went well and there were no problems. Now she is blessed to have a new accessory!!! I relieved dad so he could go back to work around lunch time, I brought mom lunch and a gift from her small group, a kindle!!! Maybe next week she can stay awake long enough to read it. She was beginning to get tired and wanted to sleep, so I left and went home. 3 hours later I got a call from dad saying she was ready to be picked up and that she is a little out of it and someone will have to stay with her until he got home. Well, when I got there, her friend Jan was with her and filled me in that she had been nauseous so they gave her some really good meds, which made her really sleepy and a little loopy. This brings me to today’s funny story. You know mom has been in too many hospital recently, because when she sat up to leave she slurs “make sure you get my clear plastic bag with my clothes” and Jan and I are like “huh”? Then mom looks down at her clothes and goes “ohh I am wearing my clothes”! Mom has been so used to wearing hospital gowns and having to change. I thought this was a funny story and I am sure there will be more to come.

We are hoping that mom will be one of those few who don’t get any side effects but I am going to bet if there is a symptom to get, mom will get it!!! But we can all pray!!! We hope that mom has a great week and she will be back again doing it next week with a new concoction of drugs! Stay strong mom, you’re are doing awesome, God, friends and family are with you at all times!

Halfway between Earth and Heaven

I just love how you truly can’t plan anything in life, it is full of surprises! I thought about this as I was flying to meet my mom and I was halfway  between Earth and Heaven. It was a beautiful sight as I looked out the plane window looking at a “thunderhead” as Brian calls it, lighting up the clouds with lightening. It was the first time ever viewing this at eye level and it was beautiful. The clouds were so light and fluffy just like cotton candy! Within 24 hours from the previous day I was taking care of my girls and going about my day, but when I got the call from mom asking if I could fly up the next day to be with her for her procedure, because dad had to go back to work. I got off the phone and quickly called the people I know I can always count on. Just like I thought they were more than happy to help me out and I had the girls taken care of for the 2 days while I would be gone. The Burbrinks gave me their free flights and within 24 hours I was landing in St. Louis.

I now sit in the waiting room saying prayers of thanks for a seemless  procedure. I hope the next 48 hours are uneventful and we fly home safe on Saturday afternoon. The procedure mom had done was to block the blood flow to the right side of her liver so that the left side regenerates. We need specific prayers that it grows at least 9% within the next 6 weeks so she can fly back and get the “ Major” surgery, in which they will take the tumor and 2/3’s of her liver out. With that procedure she will be in the hospital for at least 10 days.  We are hoping that there will be enough family to rotate days and keep her company. Sean and Oma will hopefully come for a few days and dad and I will be there.

I do just want to give a shout out to Barnes Jewish Hospital and to their fabulous doctors and nurses. I was walking down the hall this morning and I was soooo happy. I got such a great feeling that this IS THE PLACE! I know great things will come from this place. Mom did a fabulous job researching and I am so glad she went for a second opinion.

So let’s get our cheerleaders going to keep mom lifted up and continue to stay positive. She has been soooo brave!! I just know her liver is going to grow fast and healthy!!!!

Second Opinion

Just a real quick update: Mom and Dad are both going to a hospital in St. Louis to get a second opinion today, she will meet with the chemo doctor at 1:00 and the surgeon at 2:30. Please say some prayers at these times. She hopes that she will have the feeling on which hospital to choose for her surgery and chemo by the end of the day. Everyone have a blessed day and I will hopefully have another update by the end of the day!!!

Update

Sorry it has been a few weeks, I went on vacation and have been extremely busy catching up!! I will try to do my best at explaining the updates to the best of my ability. SO while I was away mom had another stent put in her liver and they went ahead and put one in her pancreas so she wouldn't get pancreatitis. She also saw a geneticist and found out she has Lynch Syndrome which pretty much means she has a much greater risk of getting colon cancer and a few other cancers. So she went and had a colonoscopy yesterday and will find out results in 5-10 days. Since mom has Lynch Syndrome this means us kids have to have colonoscopies done every year as well and we have a greater risk of getting one of those cancers!!! Oh Joy!!!

This week mom has set up a visit to the Jewish Hospital in St. Louis for a second opinion next Tuesday and a third opinion on Wednesday to visit the Cancer of America I think in Oklahoma??? Hopefully Wednesday she can make a decision and hopefully get back and start chemo Thursday or Friday and then do her surgery at one of the 3 hospitals!!!

Once again it has been a very tough, trying and emotional week for mom. Constant phone calls to doctors and hospitals and then waiting on phone calls back along with mixed messages!!

Specific Prayers: Please pray that her cancer still is contained in a small area, that God gives her the right doctor and hospital choice, patience and healing.

To lighten the mood, my story for today is just a thankfulness of the most amazing mom anyone could only WISH for! As a little girl, only my mom could tuck me in, she would lay down with me in bed and read me a bedtime story. I can still hear her yawning in my ear. Before I knew it she was fast asleep!! I am not sure when she would sneak away but I would always find her by morning because I would sneak into her bed and put my cold piggies on her legs and sleep with her until morning!!  I love you mom! Stay strong, God will send some great answers to us next week. Keep your head up high!!

Naturally straight hair might grow faster than we thought!!!

Well, the team of doctors finally reached an agreement on the plan of action for moms case. She will go through about 6 weeks of chemo first to try to shrink the tumor. The chemo will be done locally, in Covington. This is all pretty good news, mom was nervous about the surgery anyway and she might get the added bonus of loosing her hair and having it grow back in straight, like she has always dreamed about!! This was actually the first thing she said to me last week when we knew at some point she would go through chemo. The doctors also plan on putting an external drain from her liver, sometime next week. So please do some serious prayers that that procedure goes smoothly and secondly that the chemo doesn't make her sick! For those of you who want to help please go to http://takethemameal.com/ , type in  Rhea  and password is Heidi and sign up to make and take her meals.

Speaking of hair...did anyone of you know that mom is not a stranger to wigs? She actually hated her hair so much she used to wear a wig when she dated my dad and even bought a long curly wig when I was a teen.We love you mom no matter what your hair looks like!!!

Hurry up...and wait!

Hurry up...and wait has been the common saying for the last week. Once again we went back Monday, they took her blood to check her levels and we were told that a "tumor" team- a group of specialists and doctors were meeting yesterday afternoon to review her files and they would then determine her next step. Dr Conway will call today (Tuesday) to let us know what they decided.

Story for today... this kinda goes along with the hurry up and wait theme. Dad, mom, Brian and I traveled to Europe several years ago. We were trying to get to our next destination. Dad was driving, Brian in the passenger seat and mom and I in the back. We had been traveling all day and started getting closer to our destination. Mom pulled out the directions and they read something like this " go over the hill, pass the tree then follow along the road and go over the bridge"...so I am exaggerating a bit but you can guess how at midnight and listening to these directions how unhappy dad was.Unfortunately in Europe everything is closed and there is no 24 hour gas stations to even ask for directions. So what do mom and I do in this situation.....get the giggles!!! Dad and Brian were not amused! We got off at an exit, pulled over and out of nowhere a car pulled up, mom went and spoke with them. They told us to follow them and they took us right to the house!!!! Mom swears they were angels sent from God!!!