What has happened so far...

This particular journey started for us apparently a year or so ago but we didn't know about it until last week.  Based on some initial stomach pain that referred to back pain in early September, Chris went to see his chiropractor to see if his back needed an adjustment.  The chiropractor identified the source of the back pain as nerve pain from the gallbladder or liver and told Chris to see his PCP.  Chris went in for that appointment a few weeks ago.  The PCP referred Chris for an ultrasound, which seemed to indicate that there was some sludge in the gallbladder.  An MRI was ordered to know for sure.  The MRI returned results that were disturbingly referred to as 'never seen this before' and an endoscopy was scheduled. 

The endoscopy was last Tuesday, just a week ago.  During this procedure a camera was put down the esophagus to take a look at the gallbladder and surrounding lymph nodes and organs.  Biopsies were taken of the lymph nodes between the gallbladder and the pancreas as they looked irritated.  We spoke with the specialist on Wednesday evening and found out the lab results had indicated a diagnosis of gallbladder cancer.  He set up an appointment for the next day with Dr. Gold, a GI cancer oncologist at Swedish.

The nightmare began that night for us as we were in total shock at hearing 'cancer'.  What had begun as a 'normal' gallbladder issue (so many people were telling us they had had their gallbladder out after finding sludge or stones that caused the same initial systems) had all of a sudden taken an unexpected and totally alarming turn for a bad situation.  We didn't sleep much that night.

We went in Thursday for our appointment with Dr. Gold.  He made the situation more real and alarming in some ways and more hopeful in others.  Chris's diagnosis was given as stage 4 gallbladder cancer, metastasized through the lymph nodes over to the pancreas, though we don't know yet if it is in the pancreas.  There has been some progress in the research the doctor told us, and that a combination of two chemo treatments was found to be more effective and that some patients did well on this cocktail.  The appointments were scheduled for a CT scan on Tuesday (11/5/13), the portacath insertion on Thursday (11/7/13) and the first chemo infusion next Tuesday on (11/12/13). Chris will do chemo the first and eighth day of every 21 day cycle. 

We met with our ministers, Jay and Carol Kelly, and our dear friends, Scott and Lisa Lewis, last Sat to pray together.  We asked that our entire church congregation be told of the situation, that it is urgent and that we ask for their prayers daily.  We did pray with the church on Sunday, with one of our elders, Greg Brumley, laying his hands on Chris as is Biblical.  Greg also came to our house last night to anoint Chris with oil and pray over him with our family as it describes in James 5:13-16 (entire section put in for context):

The Prayer of Faith

13 Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. 14 Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. 15 And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. 16 Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.

We have a lot of hope and faith based on our personal belief in a loving God that this situation will work out well in the end whatever happens.  We ask that you pray if you are a spiritual person or send us positive thoughts as fits your beliefs that Chris can heal from this illness and live a long, happy life with his family.  Thank you so much to those that love us, have already helped us, have called, sent email, and texted, and to all those that will help us, encourage us and pray for us during this time.  We hope this blog keeps everyone up to date as we want to share the progress with everyone but can not possible keep in touch with everyone individually.  Please let Chris know you are visiting the blog by leaving comments, even just to say hi.
 
Love,
Chris, Wendy and Taigen