Today was the day we have been waiting for, for a very long time. We were prayed up, and went to the doctor knowing that no matter what, God's plan would be perfect. He would be the one to walk us through whatever results we were given.
I need to be the doctor type and share some details with you before I get to the actual results of his MRI. This will hopefully clear up any confusion you may have. First, let me say that with brain cancer they never say a patient is in remission. Once you have brain cancer you always have brain cancer. So, a patient with brain cancer could have clear scans for 5 or more years but they still won't say the word remission. I am not exactly sure why. That is just how it is. I could probably google the question, but I have decided I would not be googling brain cancer questions because every patient is different, and quite frankly it just confuses things. So, with that said, you should also know that every patient responds to treatment differently and what your neighbor down the street had work for him/her may or may not work for another brain cancer patient. Brain cancer is just a completely different kind of cancer.
Waiting on the doctor.
Now to his results. Greg's doctor, Dr. Sumrall, (who we love dearly) tried her best to explain his
results as best as possible and I will try to do the same. Most doctors wait until 2 months after the last radiation treatment before they will have an MRI done. This is because the images look differently due to the brain recently being radiated. One thing we have learned is that after your last radiation treatment, the radiation continues to destroy cancer cells for up to 3 months post radiation. Dr. Sumrall doesn't like to wait, she says she gets impatient and wants to see what has happened; knowing that the MRI may be a little confusing to read. Greg's scans looked great and it appears that the radiation has done its job in killing the cancer. However, there was one part that was inconclusive and could have been a tiny bit of tumor growing back or it could have been due to it looking radiated. She felt confident it was the later and that if it was a tumor Greg would have symptoms like headaches, slurred speech and tingling again. None of which he has. Her words were, "I would be shocked if it was tumor." So, we were praising God today that everything looked great and that the radiation, chemo and prayers have done their jobs and Greg looks great and feels great and we are counting today as an answer to prayer. He will have another MRI on April 7th to confirm her thoughts about it just being an image that looks funny due to radiation and we will plow ahead. Treatment still continues and Greg will take 5 days of a chemo pill every month for the rest of this year and he will have MRIs every 2 months to monitor things. As I noted above, we would still covet your prayers as this journey of monitoring may always continue.
We are very encouraged and truly trust God with our future and know that He has amazing things for us to do. We are ready to do them! We thank you all from the bottom of our hearts for your prayers and comments and encouraging words. It has been amazing to see how God has blessed us through all of you!
