Entry by Debbie

Cryoablation Update!

Once again God was kind and answered all our prayers to allow Bryan's procedure to go well yesterday! Thank you so much for petitioning the Lord on his behalf.  😊

Dr. Burns was able to freeze and completely kill the second tumor located on the top of Bryan's liver - Praise God! Bryan only received a "twilight" sedation so he was able to come to much easier which was a blessing. The only difficulty was that due to Bryan being so thin, the doctor had to inject quite a bit of fluid into his abdomen during the procedure (which they normally don't have to do at all) in order to move his colon out of the way of the cryo. Unfortunately this caused Bryan a lot of discomfort and pain post-procedure but that was better than the alternative of having his colon frozen to his liver!  It was a long ride home for him and difficult to get comfortable in bed last evening but by God's grace he did get a good night's sleep and felt quite a bit better this morning. The doctor said the fluid would be absorbed by his body within a day. Please continue to pray that the pain and tenderness he is having would completely diminish over the next week and that he would regain his strength and appetite.

On another note, we found out that the CT scan they did after Bryan's histotripsy procedure showed that there are 2 lymph nodes in his abdomen that are enlarged and suspicious for malignancy. 😞  Dr. Burns said that due to the location of these nodes, neither histotripsy nor cryo are options but he feels that he could treat them with yet another form of abalation called PEF (Pulsed Electric Frequency) which is a fairly new ablation technique and it is what the doctor in Mexico used on Bryan.  So......the next step is for Bryan to have an MRI in 2 weeks to see how things look and then scheduled the PEF procedure. In the meantime we meet with Dr Gama at the Cancer Center next week to start a new treatment protocol to target the cancer stem cells that are still in Bryan's body.  We would appreciate your prayers for great wisdom for us and our doctors and effectiveness of the treatments.

No one likes to get "bad news" but we choose to celebrate and praise Jesus for the WINS - Bryan has no more liver tumors!! 🙌  🎉  We know that God is still in control and He is sovereign over every cell in Bryan's body so we don't fret when we are delivered unexpected news like this. We trust Him and we know He will continue to guide and direct our steps as He has since the beginning. And speaking of the beginning, can you believe that May 25 will mark 2 years since Bryan's diagnosis? It's been a lot of ups and downs for us but the one constant throughout this whole time has been God's amazing care and faithfulness to us. Soli Deo Gloria!

Psalm 112:6-8a   -   For the righteous will never be moved; he will be remembered forever.
He is not afraid of bad news; his heart is firm, trusting in the Lord.
His heart is steady, he will not be afraid