August 10

Hello again. We've survived another first day of school for the kids. We went to Universal Studios last week for a few days and made it back Sunday evening just in time for the kids to get back to school all rested and ready to go. The trip was a lot of fun. Mark fared pretty well. He was a little tired with all of the walking and heat, but loved some of the rides. He really loved the Spiderman and Simpsons rides. Mark's parents and 2 of our nephews went with us and it was a lot of fun.

Colton loved his first day of 4th grade and Calen had his first day at Jr. High today and seemed to be very happy with his schedule and all of his teachers as well. Emily also moved up to her "big girl" class in preschool. This will be the last class she'll be moved to before the transition to Kindergarten next year, so she was excited that it was her "first day" as well today.

Mark is enjoying the time off of chemo. He wanted to go for a walk tonight. He is trying to build up his endurance for the upcoming surgery. He gets some abdominal bloating and discomfort, but is doing well overall. He just really has no stamina and gets fatigued very easily.

We got our letter from Blue Cross/Blue Shield again denying Mark's surgery. What a nightmare. That is always the last thing you want to be worried about or think about when you are sick and in need of medical care. I just don't understand them, but I guess I never will.

Continue to keep Mark in your prayers as always. September 4th will be here before we know it. God bless!!!!

August 4

Hello to all. Mark is doing well. He is certainly enjoying the time off of chemo. We are both excited about upcoming surgery and nervous as well. Mark remembers well the pain that was involved. The heated chemo is very painful. They put in spinal blocks while under general anesthesia and leave them in to help control the pain because it is such severe pain. It was quite an ordeal last May and took months to recover from. I don't mean to sound so negative because we're excited that they've decided to do the surgery and to procede with the heated chemo which gives Mark another chance at beating this cancer.

Colton was released from the hospital Saturday evening and has bounced back quickly. It turned out not to be Salmonella or Shigella, but Pseudomonas. He is back to his usual self.

We are leaving tomorrow afternoon/evening for Universal Studios for a short trip before school starts on the 10th.

Continue to pray for Mark as always. God bless!!!!!

August 1

Hello again. We heard from Pittsburgh yesterday. Dr. Bartlett sees new metastatic disease around the bile duct beneath the liver again and some in the pelvis along with scattered spots in the abdomen. His feeling is to go in and try the surgery again. He is pretty aggressive and wants to to the heated chemo again as well. They have to decide whether to do the Mitomycin or to try Oxaliplatin as the heated chemo agent. Oxaliplatin is a more specific colon cancer chemo agent, but they haven't yet established a protocol for using it yet. They have used it some. They feel Mark was a "treatment failure" on Mitomycin since they used it last time and his disease returned.

They don't feel they will be able to do the ileostomy reversal surgery since there will be so much dissection in the abdomen and pelvis. They will probably leave that or consider a colostomy instead. We will see.

In the midst of getting all of this news, Colton was up screaming with belly pain all day and having vomiting and diarrhea. Not the run of the mill stuff. I thought he may have appendicitis as bad as his belly was hurting. I took him to the Pediatric Clinic and they admitted him to the hospital straight from the office. We spent the night over there last night and will be staying the day as well. They will decide tonight whether to let us go or keep us. He had blood in his stools and was severely dehydrated. He didn't start urinating until they gave him 2 liters of IV fluids. He can't eat yet and they think it may be salmonella or shigella. Not sure where he would have gotten it since no one else is sick and we've all pretty much eaten the same stuff all week. Who knows.

Oh yeah, Mark's surgery date is Sept 4th. We will leave around the 1st or 2nd to fly up there. Mark was a little disappointed that it was opening weekend of football. Our tickets may be for not. Oh well, there are worse things, huh....

Keep Mark in your prayers as always. God bless!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

July 27

Well, ordinarily today would have been Mark's chemo day, but it was held today. We met with Dr. Farmer on Friday afternoon. She had talked with Dr. Bartlett's PA, Heather, who feels that Mark's cancer is back as they see seeds through the abdomen like before. The good news is nothing is in the lungs or liver. The colonoscopy was clean as well. His CEA was higher at 32. Heather feels that Dr. Bartlett would be open to do another surgery on Mark in Pittsburgh. He is out of town now and should be back this week sometime. They probably won't use the heated chemo again, but would do more of a debulking surgery where they go in and get out everything they see and then we hit it hard with chemo again. We will have to change chemos since this one is not working well.

Mark has (or will have) been off of the oxaliplatin for more than 6 months by then and we can try this again or go to third line therapy.

We have to hold chemo 5-6 weeks before surgery since Mark has been on the Avastin again and that makes him less likely to heal. We hope to hear an answer from Pittsburgh this week when Dr. Bartlett returns. So much is up in the air right now.

Mark got a terrible virus yesterday and his temperature went up to 104.5. He got shaking chills and felt awful. He wouldn't go get looked at, but wanted to wait it out. He was actually better this morning and the fever is gone. I guess it was a good thing they cancelled chemo because they would have had to hold it anyway.

We haven't told the kids much about any of this yet. We are waiting until we know more definite plans before we break the news to them. I know they will be devestated about all of this, so I think waiting is better for now.

Keep praying for Mark as always. God bless!!!!!!!!!!!!!

July 20

Hello to all. The beach trip was fun for all. Mark was a little wiped out, but managed okay as he always does. He couldn't go out on the beach because the neuropathy he has in his feet left over from the first chemo makes the sand painful for him. He skipped the beach and took naps in the room in the afternoon which worked out okay. Colton's team did well. They were 5 wins and 2 losses for the tournament. Their 2 losses were close and both by 1 run. The boys all played well. Most of them got buzz cuts and then shaved their numbers in the backs of their heads. It was pretty cute.

Mark got an email from Dr. Farmer today. She heard from Pittsburgh. They feel that the CT scan did show metastatic disease in the abdomen and it wasn't just inflammation and thickening. Mark's surgeon is out of town and won't be back for a little while. There is a possibility that they can go back in there and surgically remove the disease again. We will see. He has a lot of scarring from the previous surgery and heated chemo. We are praying that this is possible and very do-able. Mark is feeling pretty good right now. He still has some pain now and then, but he is getting to his feel good time in the chemo cycle. We live for those.

Mark is planning a big cajun cookout here this weekend for Colton's baseball team with all the cooking being done by Mark, including a cajun boil, jumbalaya, red beans and rice and gumbo so you see he is feeling pretty okay. He chose to do this!!!!!! Sounds just like Mark doesn't it.

Continue to keep Mark in your prayers. God bless!!!!

July 16-Flex Sig

Mark just finished his colonoscopy. He is still sitting here recovering as I am typing. He is a little goofy right now, but was glad to hear that the colon looked clean. Dr. Gilbert did his procedure and didn't find anything at all except a small residual fistula from the previous surgery. He said the colon looked good and there was nothing that appeared to be pushing in on the colon wall from the outside as before. It was quite a relief to hear.

Mark will have to sit here for a little bit and recover. When he is released, we plan to pack and head to Orange Beach to join Colton and his team for the Global World Series. They played games today already and will continue the tournament through the weekend. He got a buzz cut and his coach sent us a picture of it. Apparently a lot of the boys went and got the cuts, but Colton being blonde almost looks bald. Too cute!!

Mark is still feeling puny from chemo, so hopefully he will sleep on the drive down tonight and will have some recovery time before game time tomorrow morning.

God bless!!!!

July 14-Chemo

Hello everyone. Mark went in for his chemo as usual yesterday. There was a scheduling mix up and we ended up waiting until almost noon until his blood was even drawn and it was close to 1:00 when the chemo was started which meant getting out of there at 5:15 pm. It was a LONG day!!!! Mark did his usual course. He slept after he was given his premedications. He got to talk to Dr. Farmer about the pressure he's been feeling in the pelvic area and getting the urge to go to the bathroom in spite of the fact that he has the ileostomy. She has him set up for a flex sig on Thursday afternoon. It is a shortened form of a colonoscopy where they will just look until they get to the sigmoid colon. We will see how things look.

Mark has been sicker than usual with this chemo. He has his patch on and is using the watch, but has been vomiting quite a bit today. I gave him some pills to help and to make him sleep and he seems a lot better now. He somehow made it up this morning and taught his classes. I don't know how he does it. He is tough for sure!!!!

We didn't have a CEA drawn this time, but will get that blood test with Mark's next chemo. That will be the deciding factor as to what we do next along with the news we get from Pittsburgh (we still haven't gotten their take on the CT scan) and what the colonoscopy shows of course. Dr. Farmer is doing a few more tests with Mark's tumor pathology to see what other chemos he could be a candidate for.

Colton left today with the Plans for Orange Beach. His team is playing in the Global World Series starting Thursday and they will have an opening ceremony tomorrow. We hate that we will miss it. I'm sure the other moms will take lots of pictures. We will leave for the beach on Thursday after Mark's test as soon as he is feeling like riding in the car. (Like I said, he's tough).

Emily is taking private swimming lessons. She is such a daredevil she about gives me a heart attack at the pool. Her teacher now knows what I mean. She will just jump in over her head and tell the teacher to "let go of me, I can do this myself" even though she is about to drown. I hope she learns this swimming thing quickly or I'm in big trouble.

Calen is finished with baseball now. Last weekend was his final tournament and they will have a year end party next week. He is already full speed into football workouts for school ball. It never ends, but he loves every minute of it. He went out and helped with Colton's baseball practice the other day because he was already missing baseball.

Continue to keep Mark in your prayers as always. God bless!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!