thosewhowait

Those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint. Isaiah 40:31

Sunday, October 26, 2008

birthday boys...

tim turns 45 on monday and fred (his dad) turned 75 on saturday...so we decided to celebrate them both on SUNDAY. it was a great day...church in the morning, cookout in the afternoon and hershey bears hockey game in the evening!!!! we had 17 for lunch and it was the first time in a LONG time that we were ALL together at once. it was VERY NICE!!!! fred had all his kids and all his grandkids (5 granddaughters-one freshman in college-one high school senior-one high school junior and two high school sophomores) all together at once. for him this was the best birthday gift...tim really enjoyed his family today too. and we (the family) were thrilled to have tim around and feeling well enough to celebrate.

pretty uneventful week for tim from a medical stand point with one exception...he is having some issues with his left eye and a lot more swelling on his left side of his face. that is the bells palsy side and hopefully all is related to poor circulation or something related to the palsy. i kinda wanted to get him checked out on friday but he insisted that we ride it out the weekend and it did improve a bit as the weekend went on.

he is tired a lot of the time but i blame it on the world series games...and the college football games...and the professional football games...and ESPN...

we will update with any new info...looks like the phillies might pull off another game tonight. the hershey bears won big tonight...too bad about those steelers (sorry meg and ash)

thanks for checking in.

tim and tammy

Sunday, October 19, 2008

light blog tonight...

not too much to say tonight. i worked all weekend and tim had his good moments and his bad moments. friday was a WONDERFUL day (must be because it involved a little golf). saturday was a mediocre day and today (sunday) started out pretty rough but he did improve a bit towards evening.

hard to say exactly how he feels...except that he has some times that are pretty good and he can do whatever he wants and then there are the times that he feels so crappy that he is somewhat limited what he can do. but he is still a real trooper even when he feels bad. he doesn't ever want his illness to affect things we may have planned-especially family stuff.

megan applied to three colleges and already heard from one...she can be a west virginia university mountaineer if she so chooses. (that kinda takes the pressure off of waiting to hear from the other ones-this is a stressful time for these high school seniors and the parents who are trying to figure how to pay for it). i think she still hopes to be a lion (penn state) but who knows when it really comes down to picking which is the best fit for her...only she can do that!!! with her it might be all about the football teams...who knows!!

just keep praying. we will let you all know if anything new develops.

thanks for checking in

tim and tammy

Thursday, October 16, 2008

#484

that my friends is a lot of chatter...i have updated this blog 484 times...and you all just keep coming back for more. it must be addicting-kinda like general hospital!!!


i am sure you are all waiting for the results of the PET SCAN.


well, here is where it gets odd. the reason we did the PET was to find "hot" spots which would indicate that the new tumor was the lymphoma...the PET scan came back "cold". infact. the interpretation at the bottom of the page says: THERE IS NO EVIDENCE TO SUGGEST A METABOLICALLY ACTIVE TUMOR.


THIS IS GOOD...RIGHT? i guess we are in this wierd gray zone. part of us wants to jump up and down with joy because the tumor is NOT B-cell lymphoma (so take a moment now and celebrate)...the other part of us need to focus on what the tumor IS and why is it growing and causing him grief (party is over).


SO...where does that put us exactly? back to see a surgeon is where it puts us. more tests and more biopsies and more wondering. the oncologist said that it could be a number of different things and when we questioned "like what" his response was to list a few idea's off the top of his head:


it could be a bleed

it could be a lipoma (fatty tissue tumor)

it could be a mutant (my wording) lymph node

it could be a secondary cancer that doesn't show up on the PET...that was the one that got us.


last year they thought that his chest tumor was a lipoma and when they did the biopsy to make sure it turned out to be a relapse of his lymphoma...lets pray that we are not dealing with a second cancer and that this tumor is just a fluke.

we can't get in to see the surgeon until november 7th (happy anniversary tim and tammy) and that will just be the consult...then we will need to schedule the biopsy and then we will have to wait for the results. (my husband calls that the co-pay conspiracy) just another typical month in the life of the dewalts. lets just hope that no new tumors show up and that tims other issues stay stable. we are jumping right along toward thanksgiving pretty quickly.

i think that if i were in charge...i could wrap this whole thing up in a couple of days instead of a couple of weeks or more. it is just me or has this been going on for a LONG TIME??

that will wrap it up for tonight...we will stay on schedule with our monday morning updates and if anything changes or develops we will certainly pass it along.

thanks for checking in

tim and tammy

Sunday, October 12, 2008

another beautiful day...

i love the fall...a little warmer than i prefer but i am willing to compromise a bit.

another monday has come and you are all here for an update on the man of the house. i wish i could say that i had something to say...i do know that today was a MUCH better day than yesterday!!! we took the family to the big national apple festival in biglersville, pa. what an event that is...a lot bigger than we expected. it was nice but tim didn't feel very well while we were there so we didn't stay too long. i never knew that you could make so many food items from an apple-amazing.

the last update mentioned that tim was getting his PET scan this week...turns out the radiology guy needed the scan moved up a week and got the insurance company to agree so he actually had his PET scan last thursday. unfortunately we still don't know anymore today than we did last week.

we still haven't started the radiation therapy and we still don't have the results of the PET scan and the funny part is...we really don't care. we used to fret and worry about the scans and the results and lost sleep waiting...not anymore!!! we just get up each day and enjoy the day and go to bed each night knowing that we did what we could to make the day the best we could.

i will post a new update when we do hear anything...i know that we see the main oncology guy on wednesday afternoon so that would be the latest we would hear anything. if we hear anything before i will pass it on.

thanks for checking in

enjoy your day today.

tim and tammy

Monday, October 06, 2008

nothing too exciting...

on friday tim and i had a CONSULT with a radiation oncologist. we talked for a bit and they sent tim off for a CT SCAN and we decided that it would "probably" make sense to soon start to radiate his (new) tumor that they think is causing him grief in his left arm. he had all his "markings" done and they will call us later this week to discuss "the plan". they are planning to put him on a plan that will hopefully shrink the tumor to the point where it stop causing the arm issues (numbness, achey, loss of strength, ect...)

turned out from the CT scan that the 2-3 inch tumor we thought we had was a bit bigger than anyone expected. we will know more specifics after the PET SCAN on the 15th. hopefully the radiation will be able to slow it down and shrink it a bit.

on saturday tim and i took off for a 36 hour get-a-way (without the kids). it was nice...tim got to golf in the morning and then we headed to harveys lake for grotto's pizza and then back to berwick to visit with some family. we really had a great time and it was nice to get a way for a day.

we will keep you all posted on tims radiation final decision and any other issues that may arise.

thanks for checking in

tim and tammy

(i am loving this fall weather)

Friday, October 03, 2008

say a prayer today...

tim has some "weirdness" going on...keep him in your prayers today.



his newly found tumor behind his left arm is giving him some major grief and we are heading to the hospital this morning for a radiology oncology consult to see if they think some radiation therapy could shrink the tumor and give him some relief. there is a good possiblity that today he will have his radiation "markings" and begin treatments. (very UNEXPECTED).



if they do start the radiation it will only be for pain control purposes...we have been told (which we already knew) that this would in no way be "CURATIVE". the goal of the day is to give him some relief...and for those of you who were with him yesterday...he was not keeping anything from you...THIS IS ALL RELATIVELY NEW-SINCE 3PM THURSDAY. we knew about the tumor BUT his arm started with the spasms yesterday afternoon and has been getting worse every couple of hours.



it is alittle after 3AM and he is up popping his morphine...pray that this treatment will give him some pain control.



we will be in touch when we know anything. we do have a PET SCAN scheduled for october 15th. the day that megan turns 18 we will find out how much her dad "glows"...goody! (some days are just a bit rougher than others-i hate to see him in pain-keep praying)



thanks for all the "essay" comments. (she wasn't too upset when she found out-thanks craig II)



thanks for checking in



tim and tammy