Sixth day post (first) chemo and I am really back to “normal”. I am amazed at how mild my symptoms have been and pray the rest of my chemotherapy is the same! God has abundantly answered prayer.

Thursday, May 15, I did have my first infusion of scary chemo drugs. Since I haven’t yet had a port-a-cath inserted, this first session was in the arm vein. God protected me from any incidents there. I was tired and took a nausea pill that evening but was not sick.

Friday was a busy day and I felt fine but did get tired by evening. Saturday I got up…and went back to bed I was so tired. I slept off and on most of the day. Saturday, Sunday and Monday I did take my nausea pill in the morning, more as a preventive measure, though I did feel a bit “iffy” in the tummy. But I have not been truly nauseated. I need to avoid being sick since that will make my MG worse and could cause serious problems, therefore the preventive measures.

Each day I felt a bit better, though I did feel the muscle weakness a couple of times. Since I am used to that as a myasthenic, it didn’t throw me for a loop. I took each day as it came, rested a lot, paid attention to things like my strength for breathing and eating and now I am much back to what is normal for me.

I am full of thankfulness to God for his care of me. As I said, if all my sessions go so well, I will be jumping for joy (though it won’t look as cute as when my 2 year old grandsons do their jumping)!

I was told I can expect to lose my hair in about a week from now (usually 2 weeks after the first chemo session). My daughter in law’s mother sent over to me 3 of those head turbans to wear. How sweet of her! Though we can’t communicate very well verbally, since she knows little English and I know little Spanish, there is the communication of love and respect which is so precious. I will write her a thank you note in English and Monica will read it to her in Spanish.

But as to losing my hair, I am looking at it as another interesting experience, although it is nice to know it will grow back! But how different it will be after growing back remains to be seen.

It will be interesting to see the children’s reactions to grandma with no hair! If it ends up coming out in clumps, I’ve decided to shave it off. No patchwork head for me! Then again, I may not lose all of it. It may just thin out. I had a friend in grade school who had, genetically, extremely thin hair, a rather bald effect. She lives with that all her life. I can live with little or no hair for a few months. There are more important issues in life!

Now having said all that, I do intend to wear head coverings. I may wear a wig. I am not quite so bold as to go bald headed, especially in public. Still a bit too vain for that.

Randy is going to the gym these days, feeling so much better. He still has physical therapy sessions to go to for a few weeks. Then he flies to West Virginia June 18 for the summer, to be involved with the home repair ministry.

If you wonder why he goes back so late in June, first is the physical therapy sessions which will run through the first week. Second, he will be here in CA with me yet to celebrate our 35^th wedding anniversary on June 16. Yes, believe it or not, those two “kids” who got married that day (if you knew us then, you’d know!) are now all grown up with sons and daughters in law, the eldest couple celebrating 10 years of wedded bliss! (We rarely get to celebrate wedding anniversaries because it always falls in our summer home repair…busy…time.)

God has been our “traveling companion” all these years. Where would we be without him? We shudder to think. So how crazy would it be to look anywhere else than to him for continuing the journey? He alone has “the words of eternal life”, as Peter so aptly put it so very long ago.

God bless you so that he will be known on earth among all nations,

Jacque

Today I begin chemotherapy. I am nervous, apprehensive, I do admit. Lord, take my fears and anxious thoughts. I need your peace now.

“I am in pain and distress, may your salvation, O God, protect me.

I will praise God’s name in song and glorify him with thanksgiving.

This will please the LORD more than an ox, more than a bull with its horns and hoofs.

The poor will see and be glad—you who seek God, may your hearts live!

The LORD hears the needy and does not despise his captive people.” Psalm 69:29-33

There is one thing I will never get over all the days of my life. Is it a slight, an offense against me? No. I can, thanks to the redemptive work of Jesus Christ, forgive a slight, an offense no matter how great or small. I say thanks to Jesus Christ, because I do not have the nature to forgive within me, but only by his grace and power do I have the power, and responsibility, to forgive.

No, what I will never be able to get over in this life is my great debt to love. I have said it to many so please forgive if you are hearing it again, all my life love has been poured out on me. I can only attribute it to the great mercy and grace of God. I view it as an expression of his love for me, that he has moved the hearts of others to love and care for me to this day. I certainly do not deserve it. But that is why it is the grace of God!

It is very humbling to know that not only family (both immediate and extended), but friends and even strangers (yet the “family” of God) care enough to pray for me and Randy. And some so earnestly and continually! It spurs me on to greater love toward others, to be more alert to the heart of God who loves so greatly that he gave that which was most precious to him, his only son. This is a powerful ministry to me!

In the weekly home Bible study we participate in, we just concluded a study of I John. John states over and over, to love is to give of oneself, as Jesus did. Words, even nice sounding spiritual ones, are meaningless to the Lord, and others, if not infused with action (I Jn. 3: 16-19). Love truly is a verb. It always acts. I always feel inadequate and a step behind in fulfilling this truth. I keep working on it (I Jn. 3: 19-20).

I have taken quite a long time in writing this update. I have seen the oncologist (on April 24) and we have talked about my chemotherapy regimen. However, then Randy had knee replacement surgery the next week and my focus shifted to being with him. By God’s grace he is progressing, and ahead of schedule compared to others because he pushes himself. However, he has been having “associated” pain, by which I mean, not so much pain in the knee itself (although he does have that) but in his back and now his calf, and we think it is because of the way he must relearn to walk after so many years of not being able to walk properly. With having to take pain meds he is tired and needs to rest a lot, which is hard for him to accept. On top of that is the reality his body must heal, which takes a big toll on the energy side.

The day he had his staples removed (which held his wound together), he got into the car and drove to the work out gym and tried riding the bike to limber up his knee. He said he was ok “knee wise”, but he “ran out of gas”, energy-wise, on the bike. I told him, welcome to my world (as a myasthenic)! This is a reality of my life and has been since I was 13 years old, but new for him.

The fact that Randy is alive and able to praise God, I am still here, alive and relatively healthy, to praise the name of the Lord, points to the great mercy and grace of God. For it is only by his “great and precious promises” that we are able to continue in this life, and with all the resources we need to live pleasing to the Lord (II Peter 1). We are determined to strive to do just that, offering to God the sacrifice of praise continually and to share with others from the bounty which God has provided us (Hebrews 13: 15-16).

So now to the word from the oncologist. I should be starting chemotherapy May 15, unless there is a delay related to the move into new facilities the Cancer Center made three weeks ago. If you’ve ever moved you know things can get backed up, because of all the extra work and changes that take place. I found out this past week this is the case for the Cancer Center, which may affect me related to starting chemotherapy. Pray my insurance company authorizes my treatment. The doctor’s office was still trying to confirm that.

I was initially told I’d need a portacath surgically inserted, through which the drugs would be administered intravenously, but today I found out they will not have to do that but will give the chemo drugs through my arm. This eliminates the need for another surgical anesthesia and the danger of infection at the portacath site. This is an answer to prayer.

In my first course of chemotherapy I will have 2 drugs given over the next 3 months (A and C for those in the know). One of which is actually used as a treatment for myasthenia so I am hoping for a double beneficial effect from it. Following that I will start my second course of intravenous drug, given over the next 3 months, then radiation. At the same time as the second course is given, I will start an intravenous drug which will be given for 12 months. This is where I get bumfuddled. I do not want to “switch horses in mid-stream”, so to speak, and have a doctor in West Virginia take over my care. I want to maintain the continuity of care I have started here at Loma Linda, which has been excellent. To do this means I will be here for over another year! It is not that I do not want to be here; I love being with my family, we know this is where I need to be now for cancer treatment. It is just that to be here means I can’t be “there”, in West Virginia!

Your prayers are needed as we look at Randy going back this summer for the home repair ministry which starts in June and ends in mid-August. We must determine the best time for him to return, based on his healing process. But after the summer we must figure out the schedule for him being there in WV while I remain here.

This will be hard on us, to be separated for long periods of time, but we are looking to the Lord for guidance and wisdom. We have been praying about these issues, and related ones (see the prayer page of the Seeds of Hope newsletter), for some time. I am not so much taken by surprise as finally faced with “reality”. We are committed to serving the Lord however and wherever He calls and directs. We will need his grace for the months ahead as much as we have needed, and experienced, his grace for the months we’ve just been through.

Is God able to meet our needs and are we up for this next “trial” of faith? He is and by His grace we are. The peace God has given is real. Of course I can’t explain it. It is beyond understanding. But not beyond reach (Philippians 4:6,7).

As we have trusted him to give direction in the past, so we trust him for direction for the future, for protection and strength during chemotherapy and radiation, for healing of our bodies, for continued peace and grace. He is our light in the dark.

Thank you for continuing to pray for us. We owe you a great debt. I trust we will faithfully love and serve our Lord, strengthened by your love.

May God be gracious to you and bless you and make his face shine upon you, so that his ways may be known on earth, his salvation among all nations. (Psalm 67: 1,2)

Jacque