January 15, 2008

Hey everyone,

Joe had his first Chemo treatment yesterday and it took a little over 5 hours. The nausea medicine is working well and he has not felt sick as long as he is taking the medicine. Today he has experienced severe heartburn so the doctor called in some Nexium for him. They said the chemo would kick in around the weekend and he could experience nausea, vomiting, weakness, fatigue, low blood counts, sore mouth, hair loss, etc...

Joe asked the question, " What if I do not take any treatments, how long would I have?" The doctor said, "Your prognosis is pretty damn bleak." She went on to say, "You could possibly at the most have 6 months and in taking this treatment we will not know if it will lengthen that time until the end of April when we do another CT scan."

We know God did not cause Joe's terminal illness. There is nothing good about it but God is also not blindsided by our suffering or Joe's. I read that God causes all the circumstances to work together for good. If we make Christ more at home in our lives, the Spirit of God can be seen in our suffering. And in those circumstances, people clearly see Christ.

Just as Bill said in the service - the devil is on the prowl everyday for all of us and we need to put on our armour each day and pray for each other. It will take all of our brothers and sisters standing together in unity to defeat the evil one. Faithfulness will concur all and we will clearly see Christ in all of this!

There will be a 5k fun run for Joe at Heardmont Park on February 24th for all that want to join us. More details to come so save the date.

In Christ,
Crystal