Looking to the future

I debated whether or not I should blog today since I just wrote one yesterday. I’m new to this whole thing so I’m not sure if this is too much but I feel like I have a lot to say and who knows what tomorrow holds so here goes nothing.

So I have a diagnosis and now we know what we are up against. I say we  a lot because this affects my husband just as much as it does me, if not more. I’m not going to lie, I’m thankful to be on this side of it all. If he were the one with brain cancer, I don’t know how I would keep myself together. The amount of strength he has shown over the past few weeks is nothing short of incredible. He has been a rock to me and I feel so incredibly lucky and blessed and all of those feel good words to have him as my spouse. As cheesy at it may sound, he really is my best friend. We have almost been married for five years now and I just love being around him. When I pictured what I wanted in a spouse and in a marriage, HE IS IT. I won’t get too sappy right now but I just want it to be clear how truly amazing Michael really is.

Back to the asshole that is my brain tumor. I often refer to him as my evil tenant and how our goal is to evict him. Many have asked how I’m feeling, physically and mentally. Well overall I’m OK. I’m still dealing with these insane headaches. Some days are better than others, sometimes the medicine helps, other days it doesn’t. Since I had the biopsy Monday I’ve had some issues with reading (which is partially why there are so many errors in my writing-hank God for spell check). I mix up letters and numbers and I’m having trouble deciphering  some words. I’m not sure if this is temporary or not, but the doctors assured me it’s normal and should go away. The only other symptom I have is that sometimes it feels like my brain is vibrating. It’s a very odd feeling and I feel like I’ve had a few drinks. I hated it at first but now that I realize it’s probably my new normal, I’m just trying to embrace the fact that I feel buzzed all the time. I had some spells of nausea but that has since subsided thankfully. So overall I’m not great but I am OK.

Now how we are going to do evict him exactly is still a little unclear. I shared that it is inoperable which is extremely unfortunate. That is the biggest thing I have going against me right now. But I’m young, and that is the biggest thing I have going for me, so I’m holding on to that. So what’s the plan? We are going to start with radiation and chemo in about a week. I will do this every day for 6 weeks and then we will see how effective it is. According to our radiation oncologist, there is only a 1% chance that this will cure it because of how aggressive my tenant is. When he gave me that statistic I think I may have actually smiled at him because I could hear the Lord saying VERY CLEARLY “Challenge accepted!”  But there is hope that it will shrink it or stop it from growing and if we can do that, that would be amazing as well. We are also looking into every clinical trial we can find. The most promising one (the polio vaccine at Duke) I’m not eligible for because of the location of my tenant. But we are still researching daily trying to find anything that may give me a better chance.

Most of you probably think I’m insane for thinking and feeling the way that I do. I know the odds are against me. I know that there are only 17 reported cases (at least according to google) that are the same as mine (yup, they’re all dead). Why couldn’t I have a more normal type of cancer?  I told Michael and I will tell you since you are still reading this…I believe with every ounce of my being that the Lord will heal me. I don’t know in what way yet, and maybe it will be spiritual healing in the end, but I know He will heal me. I know that He is with us and that He has this. I believe that He has the power to heal anything and I believe in miracles. Maybe it’s not realistic but I can’t allow myself to think any other way.

I want to leave you with two things today. Two “signs” if I may call them that. The first being Saint Stephanie. Obviously Stephanie is my name, but it is also my confirmation name. I didn’t know much about her as a Saint until recently but what I did discover is that she is a Saint of healing. I pulled this from Apostle.com about her: “Saint Stephanie is capable of healing herself very quickly after inflicting herself with severe penances. Able to heal others as well.” Coincidence? No way.

The second one is a text I received earlier from my sister in  law. The text itself is pretty self explanatory but in case you need some help seeing why it’s so amazing and how it just shows that God has this, 6/24 is our anniversary. And yesterday when I started this blog I titled it Faith, Hope, and Love, because those are the 3 things that are going to get us trough this.

Is that amazing or what?! Reading that this morning was just a huge reminder that GOD HAS THIS. Thank you for sticking with me so far and PLEASE keep the prayers coming. Maybe I’m getting greedy with asking for payers but they have lifted our spirits thus far and I know how big the power of prayer is.