Tomorrow's the day! Asa=Healer Josiah=Yahweh heals - June 15, 2014

Tomorrow's the day.  We head out first thing in morn to Texas Children's.  Asa should be overjoyed as he can't eat after 7, so we go to preop and distract him from his hunger until they take him back.  Asa felt fine today.  Ate and played and never spiked a fever again.  Had a great Father's Day with Daddy, cried through dinner because he couldn't figure out spaghetti and fell asleep before he could get strawberry pie. 🍰😴

Please pray for all of us tomorrow as we anticipate a long day.  Surgery slated for 11am at 3rd floor surgery area. We have been told to expect 4-6 hours.  We will try to update when we know something, but that may depend upon how much attention Asa requires. This is a team of at least two liver surgeons and a specialized radiologist.  They plan to remove the tumor and a large section of the left lobe of the liver.  They should be able to avoid most vasculature and there is real possibility that there is far less tumor than even shown in the last MRI.  Asa will have his gall bladder removed as part of the process as it is anatomically unavoidable.  Recovery is expected on 11th floor with about 3 days of epidural for pain control.  Hospital stay of a week expected.

Please pray for all the doc teams.  Pray that God's handiwork continue to be evident to them as it has already with the effective tumor reduction.  We have been praying that they find next to nothing and it would be an easy recovery.  Pray for Dr. V and Dr. G and team.  Please pray for us, that we would be calm advocates for Asa, our least favorite job.  It may be hard to understand, but just going to TCH causes anxiety, almost like post traumatic stress or something.  Sounds silly, but common with parents of cancer patients.  It's not fear, just anticipated stress. Pray that I handle Asa's nursing well.  He is expected to be at least 24 hours on nursing strike due to surgery.  Also pray that the nurses have mercy on us.  Hospital policy does not normally allow nursing moms a food tray at Asa's age.  It's silly, but the tray is a huge help and allows us to care for Asa and not spend so much time scrounging for food at inopportune times.  Pray that we would have good attending floor docs and nurses and that we would be full of grace with them. We will not be on the oncology unit this time with our oncology family of staff, so we are dealing with strangers and Asa will be dealing with strange faces.  Yay!  We are no longer on hospital lock-down because there is no more trace of adenovirus in Asa's system.  Do pray that he stays well this week and there are no germies and no complications or bleeding issues.  He will have a nice lifetime battle scar from this.  Please pray for troops at home, that they be cooperative and not too bored.  Pray that we sleep at the hospital.  At least some.

Thanks today for my great hubby who works so hard being a provider and a daddy to so many.  Grateful for the other daddies in our lives and those great ones gone before.  Thankful that God is our ever loving and ever present Father in all this mess.  Thankful for strawberry pie and lots of cooks in the kitchen.  Very grateful that Asa was well today.