Tuesday, July 15, 2008

No Cancer!

This morning I got the phone call I've been praying for for the past two months...no cancer!!!
It was the best news I've had in a long time.  Really, there aren't words to describe how I'm feeling today - all the challenges of the past few months are out of the way, and now there is nothing standing in my way in getting to Africa!  

I am still having a little trouble getting my meds regulated, but it's slowly getting close to where I need to be.  For the past couple of days, I haven't been able to feel a couple of my toes which has been strange, so this morning I went back to the lab to have more blood taken to see what's going on with my calcium level.  Dr. R told me today that one of my parathyroids accidentally got taken out during surgery which might be causing some of my current problems. I guess my thyroid had grown so big and out of control, it had engulfed one of the four parathyroids, so when the thyroid came out, so did one parathyroid.  The good news is that you only need one parathyroid to survive, so I still have two on reserve.  The whole thing made me laugh and made me think of bad classic movie titles, "Night of the Living Thyroid"  "The Thyroid that Ate New York"  "Thyroidzilla"  etc.  

So now I'm getting ready for Africa, most likely leaving August 16 and will be based either in Kenya or Uganda.  Tomorrow, I'm going to Cache Creek Casino with some family members and am feeling lucky so watch out penny slot machines!  

-Kristen

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

WOOOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
Thank you LORD! wow that is great news!!!!
I am so excited for you!!!
happy packing for Africa and we will get together when I get back from Cuba! we arrive home on August 2nd.
Good news!
hugs!!
colleen

Chef Mayhem said...

Whew! What happy news! See ya soon!

Rika Diephouse said...

Come visit the Diephouse's in Grand Rapids! So glad to hear you can go to Africa!