Sunday, December 5, 2010

December 5, 2010

For those of you who have at one time or another planted a vegetable garden, you know what it is like to wait for the seeds to sprout, stems to grow and the leaves to unfold with the hope of blossoms forming, being pollinated and growing into something to harvest weeks later. Sometimes seeds are planted too deep and take longer to poke through the surface, sometimes the seeds sprout but have a deficiency or disease, some grow into plants with blossoms and no fruit and others produce a harvest that is tenfold.

What does a vegetable garden have to do with an update on Bonnie? As one day becomes night and another day rolls around, the sitting, waiting and wondering about positive results are like watching the surface of the soil waiting for a seedling to poke through wondering if it will be one that grows or withers. Thus far the past two weeks have produced few results.

From a positive perspective, the fevers are under control with the last one being over 48 hours ago. Whatever her body was trying to fight has been neutralized by 5 different heavy duty antibiotics. Another positive is Bonnie’s will to fight. She has forced herself to get out of bed to walk ten laps around the floor yesterday and eleven today. The energy may be due in part to the temporary steroid she received four doses of Friday and Saturday.

The four doses of steroids were given to Bonnie with the hope that it would be like a bomb to attack the Graft Versus Host Disease ravaging through her mouth. Unfortunately the steroids did not prove to be an effective treatment, as there has not been any improvement or relief in the slightest.

Her blood counts remain low and the collective wisdom is that until her white blood cell count increases the sores will persist. So while we wait to see if and when the counts come up, Bonnie is left with various concoctions of ointments and rinses to find temporary relief combined with the stronger IV pain meds that have been causing nausea. We thought we found an anti-nausea solution yesterday without the drugged up effect, but later found that many times a bad headache accompanies its use. So it is a vicious circle with no immediate light at the end of the tunnel.

We wait and try to focus on God’s faithfulness. The verse that we are claiming and is written on the grease board in our room is Isaiah 40:31:

“Yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength, they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary.”

Please pray Isaiah 40:31 for us. We are so grateful for your prayers not only for Bonnie and me, but also for our kids. In addition to how you’ve been praying we do have a special prayer request for Cassandra who is away at college and to a certain extent feeling all alone. She has finals coming up over the next couple of weeks which will require her undivided attention to accomplish the goals she has set for herself to maintain her academic scholarship. She has the ability to compartmentalize a little, but with what is going on in our family’s life, it’s a challenge for her to forge ahead with the focus she needs to succeed. Pray that she will be able to focus clearly on her studies and that she would not feel any guilt about being away actively involved with school.

Thank you!

Steve & Bonnie

5 comments:

  1. Glad to hear that Bonnie is out doing her laps again despite all the pain etc. She is amazing, as always.
    We will keep on praying, and we will be praying for Cassandra.

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  2. Will pray for Cassandra! She is such a loyal kid you both are blessed. Also, will continue to pray for Bonnie that the meds will comfort her in her pain and not cause nausea. For you, Steve, to have strength and wisdom for all the decisions you have to make. May God hold you firmly in His loving hands. Sandy

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  3. We're reading these. I do pray that Isaiah 40 will be very, very real to you. And, it will. It was 700 years from the Assyrian crisis of Isaiah 40 until the birth of Christ - - but, soon enough, "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given (Isaiah 9:6 ff).

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  4. I was just talking about how this would affect Cassandra with my wife today, Steve. We will keep her in our prayers.

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  5. We are with you in spirit--praying that God would renew your strength, give you and your family peace and comfort and be with you in a very real way as you walk through this.
    The Edwards

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