News from UVA

We drove to UVA this morning, while Kelli's parents watched the boys. We met with Doctor Theodorescu and found him authoritative, personable, and patient. We spoke with him at length as he carefully read through Ray's files, CT results, and pathology reports. He spent considerable time reading and speaking as he read. Once he was finished, he explained that he would want to look in Ray himself to be certain of anything, but that this is what he surmised:

Basically, Ray did not have any additional tumors as we had thought from the CT scan; it was an error. The tumor that Ray does have is minimally invading the bladder wall. It's still remains a highly aggressive form, but hasn't moved as far as we had thought. He informed us that the stage of the cancer was a T2A, which is far less than we had believed. In addition, the doctor was thrilled with Ray's age and physical condition, believing that this opened Ray up to choice procedures that others might be unable to choose from.

We were told that we could try radiation as a first method of attempting to deal with the cancer. We were also told, however, that if Ray were to have surgery, removing his bladder, prostate, and lymph nodes, then he would have a 90% chance of being cured.

*Hearing anything close to "cure" brought us hopes and reassurance

that we had not felt all this time*

We were also shown the three basic choices for bladder repair work (for lack of better vocabulary). He could have a bag attached to his hip, or a port that he would catheterize with a straw, or create a bladder from intestine and attach it to the urethra for an essentially normal (and I use that word broadly) means of peeing.

So, ideally, Ray will have the surgery, have a new bladder created that works similar to the old one and hopefully be cured -- with the only need of regular CT scans just to make sure. WOW. God is so good to us; is he not?!?

As for functional information, Ray would be in the hospital for 10 days, and then be unable to work for two months. The doctor did look inside Ray at the hospital today and confirmed all of his understanding from the paperwork. We are going to call Monday to set up the appointment for surgery.

We are so grateful for all your prayers and have been reading God's word and praying so much ourselves. We really feel like the news today is an answer to all of this. We read just this morning Jeremiah 29:11, when God declares so clearly that his plan is not for harm for us, but prosperity, to give us hope and a future. Ray's goal is just to finish the work he began in our two boys, who still very much need a daddy (as I need my darling husband).

Thank you again. We'll post with all the news we get, as we get it. Thanks for caring so much for our family.