Second Chemo

Four Down and Twenty to Go!

The first four months are behind us with discovery, surgery, chemo and hair loss; only twenty more months to go! This morning I was thinking about the “Valley of Baca” and thought that we have found our experience to be similar to Israelites. As they travel through a barren land that claimed many victims we, like they, have found “pools of living water” that have allowed us to move “from strength to strength!” (As they go through the Valley of Baca they make it a place of springs; the early rain also covers it with pools. They go from strength to strength; each one appears before God in Zion. Ps 84:6-7, ESV)

Toni managed her second chemo even better than the first. It is still a mental and physical adjustment from her previously fast paced preference. Before we discovered “it” Toni had started memorizing Colossians, a book I am preaching through. Chemo has slowed that down significantly, it just is not sticking. I quizzed her on the first word today to get her jump started. Actually I joked with Toni that with her lacking sleep, having a foggy brain and needing to be careful about what she eats … if she starts telling really sick jokes she will know exactly how I live my life! We are up to 6-8 “center laps” at the mall nearly every day.

The hair thing has been interesting. She went to the door without realizing her head was uncovered and took two well dressed young men in dark suits with white shirts and a handful of literature quite by surprise. Toni has even taken her temperature with and without a hair piece because of how cold she can quickly get with out that silver-blonde adorning that was hers previously. It has been fun to watch Toni introduce kids to her new do! Toni did a hat and wig show for our grandkids and also for some of our other little friends. Today our youngest grandson told Nana to put her hat back on, several times!

We heard this week how one of our special little friends put two and two together and got five! When she was told she was going with her mom to visit Toni she was pleasantly surprised. She had been a companion of a woman who would visit her aging mother until she “went away” and of course our young friend did not see her any more. Because she had also been praying at the same time for Toni who was sick and because she had not seen Toni for a while, she concluded that Toni had also "gone away." But being a good four year old theologian, and when told they were going to see Toni, she asked, "Has Toni come back to life?" Mom explained that Toni had been sick and needs to take medicine but that she had not "gone away." She then exclaimed, "Oh, good I enjoy her so much!"