I have not been great at sending updates, so I thought now would be a good time, as a lot has happened over the last couple of months (especially the last couple of weeks). 

In January when she was diagnosed, the doctors noticed a spot on her ovaries that we somewhat "put on the back burner" until we addressed the tumors in her lungs and brain. After she returned from Houston, we decided to finally address the spot on her ovaries with a hysterectomy in early July. Surgery went well, and the doctor confirmed it was the small cell lung cancer that had spread. Thankfully, it was all removed in surgery. 

In mid-July, she had an MRI that revealed the tumor in her brain appeared to be getting bigger. Doctors were not sure if it was due to cancer progression or if it was a side effect of radiation causing the tumor to swell (called radiation necrosis). They prescribed her steroids and was told to get another scan in 6 weeks to see if the steroids were helping reduce swelling, which would indicate it was radiation necrosis, not cancer progression. 

Since then, she really has felt great and has been able to resume a normal life at home, gettting plasmapheresis every 3 weeks to treat the neuropathy and maintain her function in her hands and legs. 

On Thursday, August 20 she called me and said she had fallen out of bed and thought she broke her leg. I called Nancye to go check on her, and she called 911. Unfortunately she does not remember much of anything from the day before, so we aren't sure when or how she fell. She had a broken her hip, and had to get emergency surgery that Thursday afternoon. The doctors did a CT of her brain to see if she had a stroke, and that showed that the brain tumor had grown even more and was putting pressure on her brain stem and causing fluid to back up, causing the neurological issues she was experiencing (lack of memory, slurred speech, confusion). After many talks with the doctors and neurosurgeons, we decided the best option was for her to have a craniotomy to remove and biopsy the tumor. She had the surgery this past Thursday, August 27 (which happened to be the same day Hurricane Laura hit - thankfully that did not disrupt anything with her surgery), and confirmed it was "active" cancer. But the surgery went very well! Her neurosurgeon, Dr. Wilden, was very aggressive and feels confident that she got the entire tumor, which was about the size of a mandarin orange. To make sure all the residual cancer cells in her brain are taken care of, she will get another treatment of radiosurgery on her brain in the next couple of weeks.   

For now, she is recovering from both surgeries very well! She really is the toughest woman alive. She's still in the hospital, but should be discharged to a rehab facility tomorrow to rehab her hip. Doctors are very impressed with her progress, and they think she will only need 1-2 weeks in rehab before she is mobile enough to go home again. 

Other than that, the cancer appears to be controlled everywhere else, so no other cancer treatment is needed at this time! Tyler will continue to monitor everything every few months, so we pray that the next couple of months are calmer than the last. 

Please continue to pray for her as she recovers from these surgeries!