Jordan Gustafson

  Jordan has been diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma Stage 4 type B. It has progressed quite quickly and is now in his lungs, ribs, spleen and stomach. Jordan started getting sick in late January, early February with a cough. He just thought it was a cold and thought nothing of it. Several weeks went by and he finally went in and nothing out of the ordinary was noted. He was given an inhaler and was told it could possibly be asthma and was fine to return home.  Weeks went by and he was still battling this cough along with other symptoms like fatigue and loss of appetite. He went in, had a chest xray and was diagnosed with pneumonia and started on antibiotic. Still weeks went by and he was not feeling any better, and feeling worse at times. Symptoms continued and more started to arise.  End of March he went in again and had another chest x-ray. He was told that  he now had pneumonia in his other lung this time and was started on a second round of antibiotics as well as a course of prednisone. After taking the prednisone he felt like a brand new person! He was FINALLY feeling better and everyone was so relieved he was back to himself....until the 10 day course of prednisone stopped. He then proceeded to not feel good once again. He went in again and a biopsy was ordered. They thought he had developed some sort of  lung disease. However, once the biopsy came back he was told that he had lymphoma and not sure what kind, what stage, or even how bad it was, but that he had lymphoma. An oncology appt was set up for the very next morning in Fargo at Roger Maris. This is when he was told that he had Hodgkins. HOWEVER, since he had that course of prednisone, it would be difficult to diagnose.  Prednisone is one of the medications used to treat this type of cancer and now the cancer has had a "taste" of the prednisone for a short period of time.  Not only does this make it hard to diagnose, but also the cancer may have gotten somewhat immune to the prednisone and could be harder to treat.  Bone marrow biopsy was the next step to try get a diagnosis. Bone marrow came back negative!! This is awesome news!!! However, still no "official" diagnosis and we are still unable to start treatment. Another biopsy scheduled and  done this past Thursday, once again came back inconclusive!! Are you kidding me?! Can this kid catch a break?! Now he has a whole weekend to wait as the  next plan of action is an appt on Monday 5.16 with a surgeon. He will look at his pet scan and hopefully be able to perform surgery and remove a lymph node and get a diagnosis this way. Prayers are needed that this time it will work!!!  So in typical Jordan fashion, he  wanted to  go home for the weekend and drive his truck around and mow his grass. How much does that sound like Jordan?! He couldn't get out of Fargo quick enough, so quick they almost forgot about picking up my mom!! The "big city life" of Fargo was just getting to be too much for him.  Anyhow, prayers are much appreciated! Thanks to everyone who has reached out to our family!   I will keep everyone up to date as best as I can and as  soon as we hear anything.