As many of you know, this beauty is my niece and Goddaughter, Megan.
Before I give you the update, I just need to share my thoughts on what these past 5 months have taught me about this amazing child of God.
I have been blessed to see faith in action watching Megan as she patiently and gracefully fought the cancer diagnosis that blindsided the family 2 days before Christmas. See that gentle smile? That is the smallest one I've seen through all these months. Usually she is grinning from ear to ear and holding out her arms for a hug.
Case in point: this is Megan just before major surgery that could have taken up to 10 hours and had a major impact on several organ systems.
Though her freshman year of college was rudely interrupted, I have never heard a complaint.
Though she has lost the muscle mass that allowed her to be a cheerleader and a runner, her inner strength is stronger than ever.
She is still the cheerleader, making sure everyone else is okay and letting us know she is fine.
She offers her sufferings and her prayers to those who are praying for her and now being her cheerleaders. (And there are a LOT of you!!!!)
She teaches joy in the face of adversity.
They celebrated Thanksgiving in the hospital,
they celebrated Christmas in the hospital,
and they celebrated Easter in the hospital. Joyfully!
And now for some good news:
Treatment Update: #1
This morning at 7 am, my doctors began surgery to try to remove the tumor. Surgery was quicker than anyone expected and went very well. They believe they were able to remove the tumor entirely. My other organs looked clean and healthy, so the procedure didn't require as much work as had been expected. They did have to remove my uterus and right ovary because they were somewhat sticking to the tumor. They also removed a few lymph nodes just to be safe.
Once again, thank you so much for all the prayers and support for my family and my self. The next step will be chemo/ radiation to make sure every last cancer cell is really gone!
Update: #2
The pathology report on my tumor came back with very good results. 80% of the tumor was dead and all 22 lymph nodes came back negative for cancer! The doctors believe they removed all of the tumor. From this point forward, we will be doing treatment for cells that could be left behind. The next step is 3-5 more cycles (3 weeks each) of the same chemo regimen before reevaluation.
Also, I'm healing extremely well after surgery. I haven't needed pain medication for over 2 weeks and the incisions are healing even better than expected. I'm not gonna lie, I have a pretty sick scar.
Thank you all for the prayers. I'll try to keep you all updated as much as possible. God bless.
Tomorrow begins the first of the new rounds of chemo. I know Megan and family would appreciate all prayers. They are getting pretty good at this and hopefully what they learned with the former rounds will help keep Megan feeling pretty good throughout these next rounds.
She will loose her soft, new hair but she was beautifully and boldly bald last time around and will do just great this time too!
Love you, sweet Megs.
Praying that the next update says: CURED!
