11 Years 364 Days

Each week I enjoy uploading pictures of our family activities, and at the end of each year I print the entries into a book.  This is my only form of journaling.  It's fun to see the pictures of our children grow and remember the many fun things we try and do with them.  It's not the kind of journal where I pour my soul into words or share my inner most feelings.

This entry has no pictures.

Jill has breast cancer.

Cancer is such a hard word to say let alone understand.  I have known people who have had cancer before and in fact my grandfather died of cancer many years ago.  What is cancer anyway?  I have heard once before that "cancer doesn't discriminate".  I call bull.  Somehow cancer knows who the greatest people are, and rear's it's ugly head in their lives.  When was the last time a serial killer had cancer?  What about child abusers, dictators, or politicians? It seems to always infect the best people.

Our neighborhood lost a great woman Jenny Wiscomb earlier this year to cancer.  Another neighbor was just told they have terminal cancer. Cancer cancer cancer.

A month ago Jill felt a lump in her breast.  She told me about it and because of all of the attention to breast cancer in the month of October (Delta Airlines and Football players all wear pink and raise money for breast cancer awareness). After our trip to Boston Jill went to have a mammogram.  The lump was out of the ordinary so the doctors wanted to biopsy the lump.  Tuesday Jill went to the hospital to have the lump biopsied.  It was a painful process that involved a lot of poking and prodding. Today we went to see the doctor for the results. The results were not good.

Jill has DCIS breast cancer (they think) which is one of the better cancers to have.  If it's only DCIS cancer, that is good.  Tomorrow we go and meet with a surgeon to talk about removing the lump sometime next week.  This process is happening so fast.

It's a fast growing lump a little over an inch long.  It just does't make sense because "Jill is so young"  (they said that a number of times during our visit).  When they remove the lump, we think the doctors will also remove a lymph node, to see if the cancer has spread throughout the body.  This would be really really bad. With successful surgery, after a few weeks of healing, Jill will begin a 6 week course of daily radiation.  We hear radiation isn't bad, but it's a lot worse than taking Landon to kindergarten.  After radiation, follow up tests will be performed to find out if the cancer is gone.

We went to the doctor today a little worried, but we thought "it can't be cancer."  It was.

Jill's nurse-navigator was very nice and created a binder which included sections like "questions to ask your doctor", "how to tell children","facts", etc.

It was a long drive home from the hospital.  It's all so overwhelming really.  We have a wonderful support system with loving family and terrific neighbors.  This along with faith, prayer, and the priesthood we should be cancer free at the end of the treatment right? I hope my faith is strong enough.

Tomorrow Jill and I celebrate 12 years of marriage.  What an anniversary gift huh?

I know there are only about 9 of you who actually read this secured blog, most of which are family.  We want to share this with you so you can exercise your faith and add prayers on Jill's behalf.

When we got home from the hospital we told our children that "mommy is sick".  Logan gave Jill a hug, but less than 1 second later he asked to play the Wii.  Our young kinds just wouldn't understand exactly what Jill is going through.  We want them to know, but they are at an age where they just don't comprehend.  Logan's 8th birthday is Sunday and he is pretty focused on that big event. I'm glad he is.

Tonight my best friend, running companion, and bishop came to our home.  He and his wife are our best friends in the neighborhood and we shared with them the bad news and he helped me give Jill a blessing.  I believe in prayer, I believe in priesthood blessings .... Please God help my unbelief.

As we learn more I will keep this post updated.  It's therapeutic to write things down, and we can look back on this time to see how our faith increased and we relied on God to get through it all.