Trusting in Jesus When times are hard.

I'm home

Feeling much better =)

Thank you everyone for those really encouraging comments! I've been feeling much better. I should be going home really soon, if all keeps going well =)

 Oh, I'm on facebook now, and I post alot about myself on there. I would love to make you my friend.

  Again thank you for yor prayers and encouragement. You guys are such a blessing!

 Something spacific you could pray about, I don't know if I said anything about this before, but my hearing in my left ear has been severly damaged and the doctors don't know if it will ever be restored, another thing is my balance and voice, when I had surgery done in March they hit some nerves that effected my balance and vocal cords. I believe with all my heart that our God is a God of restoration and that he will restore everything the devil has stolen from me!

  So pray that that restoration takes place quickly and that I am restored completely. I also thank God that only those few things were effected by those massive surgeries. Love you all. God bless.

~Sarah~

 Hey everyone, I'm back in the hospital again.

  Yesturday they gave me something that made me really sick...bleh  I don't feel that great today either. But God is taking care of me and even when I don't feel well I still praise and thank him for everything he's doing in my life. Thank you all for keeping me in your prayers. =)

~Sarah~

A good report

Home early!!! =)

Round #2

  I'm here for round number two. I got here on the 9th so I'm already done getting the infusions. It didn't go quite as smoothly as last time. Last time I didn't feel sick or throw up or anything, but this time one of the meds made me feel really bad for awhile. Now I feel fine, thank goodness.

  So it's the same as last time then, I got my stemcells today, now we wait for my counts to drop then come back up, then I can go home for ten more days then do it all over again. LOL. Thank you guys so much for praying and encouraging me through this, you've really been keeping me going. Pray that the next rounds go as good as the first one did. Well this laptop is starting to get hot and burn my leg. LOL.  

 Love you all!

Home Sweet Home!!!

Update

Hey everyone, sorry it's been so long since my last post.

 Well, since things never go as planned, LOL, heres whats been going on.

 August 3rd I came in to get a central line put in. They kept me over-night and started collecting stem cells. Well, they had trouble collecting, apparently my body wasn't making them fast enough for them to collect. So I was kept here until they finally got enough cells, then once they had the cells, chemo was imediatly started.

 The 13th is when I got the first dose. It went really, really well, I was expected to get really sick right away and feel tired but all through it I did fine! Not one of the four days of chemo injections did feel sick! Praise the Lord!

 Now I'm waiting, waiting for my counts--the red blood cells, white blood cells, and things like that, to first drop then come back up.  Then I can go home!

 I've been here 17 days. But I don't think about it much, it doesn't help anything, just makes me feel depressed. there are other patients on this floor who have been here for months and months, their cases are different than mine, but it seems like there is always some one worse off than you. So I just keep my eyes focused on Jesus and trust in him when times are hard.

I hope I didn't miss anything. Thanks guys =)

The plan is...

Update on what happened surgery wise.

Change of plans

  Well okay, the plan was to come in Tuesday and get that central line put in, but I woke up that morning with vomiting, double vision, and really extremely painful headaches...Ugh...Not fun.

 Our first thoughts were, "Oh great, It's back." So we called te nurse and she said come to the Emergency Room right away where they would order a C.T. scan and try to figure out why I was getting so sick all of a sudden.  So thats what we did, last night I was admitted into the ICU.

  The results of the C.T. scan were good. The pictures showed that the cancer was not growing but only all swelled up. Which was caused by bleeding inside the tumor. The radiation I finished over a month ago killed the cancer on the inside and now there is some blood built up in there, where the blood came from they don't know, but they think it has stopped bleeding. The sugen said that the blood in there is not a bad thing but is actually helpful because if for some reason there were still microscopic cancercells that were still alive after the radiation, this bleeding inside there would have finished them off. PRAISE THE LORD!!!

  But now what do we do with this mass thats still in my brain, the doctors call it a blood clot. Well we are told there are two different things we could do: Have t surgecally removed, but that would mean the chemo would have to be delayed for at least a month. The other option is wait and let my body clean it out on it's own, which would take about seven to ten days.

So thats where I am right now waiting for the oncologists to make the decision. I have an MRI scheduled for tomorrow, that will help them make that decition. Thank you everyone for your prayers, keep it up =) Thanks again,

Sarah

I'm still at home!

No longer an option

Please pray that we make the right decision.

I'm back from Lake Cumberland!

I'm going on vacation again =)

pictures from Hawaiiiiiiiiii =D

I'm back!!!

•                Well we went to the beach~of course
• Make-a-wish paid for a luau, oh my gosh, that was so fun!  a tour of the island, and snorkeling!!!
  
•   we hiked up this mountain called, diamond head mountain, and wow talk about a hike
•   Me and my mom did a lot of Shopping =D so we brought back tons of souvenirs
  
• And we went on a dinner cruise!
  

Brain Cancer!!! No, not me!!!

  It all started in January of 2008.
I started getting sick. I would throw up just about everyday, sometimes a couple times a day, but the flu was going around; the whole family was sick. So no one  really thought anything of it.Then about mid February I started getting headaches, really really bad ones. Pressure headaches, my head would feel like a shook up pop can ready to explode! In the middle of the night I remember waking up and just wanting to scream out loud!!!
   I'm from a big family( there are nine of us all together). We have always tried to find a natural path to take before consulting a doctor and getting a prescription drug. So I put peppermint oil on my head and forehead, because that is supposed to be really good for migraines and nausea. I took tons and tons of vitamins. My Mom said if we could get my Immune system  up it would fight off whatever was making me sick. That's how we have always done it and only on seldom occasion has any of us had anything worse than a cold or the flu. Well nothing was helping, so I was taken over to our local Hospital to get checked out. The pediatrition said, the headaches were caused by some tight muscles in the back of my neck, which  massaging them everyday would help. She didnt know why I was throwing up all the time, she thought maybe my stomache was upset from the trauma of the severe headaches. She prescribed Zantac, to help ease my stomache.
    A few days later I developed double vision, this was about the middle of March. We assumed at first that the double vision was a side effect to the Zantac, and discontinued it but the double vision did not go away, only got worse and worse.  Finally we gave in and went to see an eye doctor. He could tell by the swelling behind my eye that there could be a very seriouse problem,"A growth." So an MRI was ordered. An MRI is similar to a cat scan, a cat scan has a lot more radiation which is bad for your body and would not get as clear of a picture in my case.
  Okay, well they found tumor, about the size of an orange that took up 1/3 of my brain. It was surgically removed on March 14th of 08. Thanks to lots of prayers from friends and family, the surgery was a success. As far as the surgeon could tell he had romoved everything without damaging the tissue. I recoverd quickly and returned home within a weeks time. =)
 After the tumor was removed it was sent off to a lab to be examined. They tested it to see how cancerous/ aggressive this tumor was and how they could treat it. The results came back and it turns out this tumor is a very very aggressive brain tumor called medulloblastoma!!!
  So treatment for this thing, The doctors only recommendation  was chemotherapy, very high doses of chemotherapy and radiation. They pushed us and pushed us to do chemo, but we did not feel like God was leading us to go that route. So we looked into natural treatments and other ways to fight this thing. The first thing we tried was carrot juice, we got on a diet called the, "Hallelujah acres diet." which was a very strict vegetarian diet, with no animal products or sugar what-so-ever. It's said that sugar feeds cancer and so does some of the chemicals in meat.
  I drank 48 oz. of carrot juice everyday! And actually turned a shade of orange.  I didn't mind the orange that bad because it was summer so it just looked like a really good tan. So I drank carrot juice and took lots vitamins for about six months, all the while I was getting frequent MRI's to watch for growth in a piece of tumor they found a few months after surgery. 
  fortunately, they had seen nothing so far. We watched and prayed for God to heal me. Then in September I saw a nutritional doctor who evaluated me and said that I was not getting enough protein on the vegetarian diet, so he said to eat at least some organic meat. He also said eat less carbohydrates since they just turn to sugar in your body. I was taken off of the carrot juice also, because he said carrot juice was not needed with the supplements he had put me on. I was glad for a change! My entire family, who was doing the diet with me, was glad we could eat meat again.   
  Shortly after that, the MRI's started showing growth in the piece of tumor that was leftover. We could not go back to carrot juice and the diet, and the supplements I was on were not enough. We looked up on the internet "Alternative cancer treatments" but most of the clinics that it referred us to were outside of the US. We did find one clinic called, "The Burzinskie Clinic." that was in Houston, Texas. They treat their patients with what is called "antineoplastons." It's to complex for me to explain how they work though. It sounded very promising, and a lot of peoples lives had been saved by this clinic and the theropies they used. So the whole family all nine of us left Indiana and drove 20 hours to Houston, where we didn't even have a place to stay. We had left immediatly, and had had no time to make reservations anywhere.
  We needed a place to stay for at least four weeks. It was hard to find a place even for one night because, a hurricane had just recently passed through an area nearby and all the cheaper, more affordable hotels were filled up. With our family we always need at least two rooms and we like them to be connecting. So we looked and looked and finally found "Drury Inn" it was a really nice hotel, that gave us a discount. We stayed there While we searched for apartments that would allow you to stay for only a few weeks. After four days of making phone calls and such, we found some cute little apartments that fit our budget, we rented an already furnished apartment that had three bedrooms, one with a queen size bed and two with two twin size beds. My twin brothers who are 7yrs old slept on air matresses on the floor. It had a nice little kitchen and living room, everything worked out well. God was watching over us the entire time, providing for all of our needs.
  We stayed there for four weeks, during that time I was given a couple different meds by the Burzinskie clinic, as well as put on there antineoplastons. We returned home a couple weeks before Christmas, which I was very glad we did not miss Christmas. I continued Burzinskies treatment at home, we all continued to pray for my healing, our entire church as well as family continued to pray for me. Everything seemed to be going well until Easter, the scans started showing growth again. slowly but surly I started getting sick again. I was taken over to our local hospital and then transferred over to Childrens Hospital, where they did a whole bunch of scans and decided that surgery would have to be repeated!  So there I was again, it happened to be on exactly the same day as my first surgery had been, this time the tumor was in a spot that was harder for the surgeon to get to. It was located closer to the brainstem.
  The surgery went smoothly except for a few bumped nerves that will heal in time, it wasn't a complete success, he saw tumor still in there that he was not able to get to without permanantly damaging all the nerves in that area.We decided to go ahead and give radiation a try and according to the oncologist radiation works a lot better if followed by chemotherapy. So, I began radiation as soon as I got out of the hospital which was about eight days after the surgery.
   I completed radiation about  three weeks ago!!! It took a total of six weeks altogether, everyday for six weeks one of my parents drove me up to cinncinatti for treatment. Through out the treatment I did very well, minimum side effects. I got a little nausea but took a perscription drug which made it go away, my skin got really dry and my hair fell out, but those were the only things! Most people lose a lot of weight, they lose they're appatite, and are just really sick through the whole thing. My Radiaologist said, I was the only person she ever saw gain wieght while going through radiation treatment!
   And thats where we are now. At the end of june I get another scan to see the results of the radiation. The doctors really want us to do chemo next, but it's a 10 month deal so we're praying God takes care of everything and he will. There has been blessings coming out of this deal. I qualify for Make-a-Wish Foundation, which is for children who are under the age of eighteen who have been diognosed with life threatening diseases and illnesses, Make-a-Wish grants their one wish. A lot of kids choose to go to Disney World, I decided to go to Hawaii. So for six days Make-a-wish is sending my family, the whole family, to Hawaii!!!    If you have any questions for me feel free to ask, make comments I like feedback. =D 
   These are a few pictures of me with my family.