Rough day for the entire family...

Nick had his PET scan Wednesday afternoon and was thoroughly exhausted and in pain by the time we came home 5 hours later. We were able to get him a fentanyl patch and his pain seemed to ease by evening, though he slept little.

I was able to get a copy of the results faxed to me by noon yesterday. It was frightening, to say the least, but placed a call to Dr. Gouw before giving in to panic. Katie called later in the afternoon and confirmed the concern Dr. Gouw has after reading the scan results. It appears Nick has two new cancerous areas in his lungs, his entire abdomen is blanketed with a layer of cancer over an inch thick and a lone gland that has metabolic activity (still have to Google that one...). Dr. Gouw debated putting Nick back on chemo, but decided to go with the clinical trial, which starts on Monday. We all have a tremendous amount of hope riding on it now. At least we now know why Nick is in so much pain, and we are taking extra measures to keep it manageable.

Carly lost her job as a supervisor at a call center yesterday. Obviously not her dream job, but did have her summer plans and college based around this job. She drove home to be with us to help her sooth her wounded pride as we watched Kelsey play in her high school softball game. Another daughter, Natalie, is also facing a very difficult journey in her life starting today, with little for us to do but pray for her emotional strength and express our unconditional love. Fast forward to the junior varsity game - Kelsey was pitching and took a line drive to her right ankle, laying her out flat. School trainer told us to go get it xrayed. As I'm packing up my chair and Kelsey's ball bag, I'm thinking, "wow, we are really having a bad day..."

With all of that being said, Nick is going to be a groomsman for the bride - Makelle - in her wedding tomorrow. He will be looking mighty handsome in a tuxedo and will be able to hide his portable iv and drain tube. Carly brought up the first season of "Modern Family" so we can all get the laughter rolling. Kelsey's ankle is just badly bruised and it got her out of doing any more pitching. Lee is in town for awhile, increasing my strength tenfold while Todd, with all of us, stay close to Nick, Carly & Kelsey.

I will be posting more later about some amazing news with CureSeach, First Descents and all of our upcoming WACKY events. There doesn't seem to be anything better when facing fear than to be proactive in fighting this despicable disease.

Please pray for Nick's immediate and successful response to the clinical trial.

With love,

Lori