January 5, 2002

Update # 22 

Happy New Year! 

We hope all of you had a joyous time.  Ours was fairly quiet.  Ken and I went to a 4:30 movie then returned home to watch the changing of the year on TV. Jeff was out with kids but made it home before Midnight to watch with us.  

Jeff had a great "18" - especially spending the money.  He still has some to spend and he plans to do that later today when I pick him up.  We took him to Springfield for an overnight Synod Youth Board meeting.  They'll be finished around Noon.  He commented he won't get to "freak out" some of the girls again since he now has eyelashes!!!  All hair, in fact, seems to be returning nicely all over his body. 

Jeff had radiation on Mon., Wed., Thurs., and Fri.  That made the total of 14 doses so we finished Round 1 yesterday.  When Dr. Roy saw Jeff on Wednesday, he still was pleased that Jeff has no side effects.  Jeff's mouth gets dry sometimes and I noticed this week his lips are starting to chap but that's nothing.  Side effects can still show up later but it seems great that nothing has begun.  We now have three weeks off!!!  We figured there have been two weeks since July we haven't had to go to CG or SLUH.  One was the first full week of August and the other was Thanksgiving week.  The cars probably won't know what to do!   

We return to SLUH on Monday, January 28.  They will do the simulation and a CT Scan to mark Jeff for the second round of radiation.  We have to keep three of these current marks on Jeff during the weeks off.  Dr. Roy thinks he will keep the dose at 2100 cGy and the length at 14 doses.  We guess by the time they calculate the numbers and make the blocks, radiation might start that first week of February.  

We returned to school on Thursday so Jeff missed the first 2 hours of Thursday and Friday.  Semester ends the 17th so he needs to get all things caught up and ready for finals.  He should have no problem since he will have more class time spent at school.  

I think that covers our latest news.  Then end appears to be in sight!!!  I'll still send weekly updates and hopefully Jeff won't do any surprise stuff.  Maybe the update can be one of two sentences of quiet, peaceful existence.  We continually thank you for your prayers.  

Love,

Marcia