Friday........

        You always hear that families in crisis need to return to a normal lifestyle as quickly as possible. The reasons for this are endless, so we have tried to piece together some manner of normalcy. We quickly found a house in Tennessee that has come to feel like home again; I have found a job, not a particularly well paying one, but a job none-the-less; and we were on the cusp of starting to receive better job opportunities to stabilize our income crisis. We've plugged back in with our fellowship and even hosted a weekend get-together at our home. St. Jude's three month check-up came and went as a roller coaster starts and finishes, and aside from the occasional headache Tzadok seemed to be doing as well as is to be expected. However, over the last couple weeks Tzadok has been complaining of his head hurting again. So we have watched him closely, but to be proactive we decided to contact St. Jude yesterday to set up another scan and draining of the cyst if need be. This situation is so delicate because Tzadok is young and his head hurting may not be as bad as those looking at him interpret. St. Jude was thrown into a frenzy by the information that Tzadok was complaining of headaches and they tried to make us go immediately to an emergency room, which we refused because he is not vomiting, suffering from vision loss, or extreme nausea, which are the signs of Hydrocephalus. Through multiple phone calls we finally agreed on getting to St. Jude on Monday, scan on Tuesday, and drain the cyst that evening or the next morning. This course of action was okay with our Oncologist and we felt much better about having our team see Tzadok instead of some random emergency room crew.

Fast forward three hours:
        Rachel received a phone call from our old neurosurgeon that Tzadok has brain surgery scheduled for Tuesday if the scans are not favorable on Monday. Additionally, we were to be admitted into La Bonheure hospital on Sunday for the scan on Monday. This was an absolute shock for us considering that we had already finalized everything with our St. Jude visit several hours earlier. Obviously, we declined this because of numerous concerns and we immediately contacted our clinic at St. Jude with questions and a little shock that they may be overreacting. After several phone calls, we quieted the hysteria and our visit to St. Jude is going to be the same as it was before this troubling phone call except that the possibility of a brain surgery is a very real possibility if the scans are not "FAVORABLE." To balance the conversation, we respect our neurosurgeon and he did a fantastic job with Tzadok's first surgery and there are legitimate concerns such as the possibility Tzadok may have multiple cysts in the same location and they are all not being drained or that the walls of the cyst itself are growing, but we want to make absolutely sure that surgery is the only option before we move forward, which is wise. The shock of Friday is reverberating in our minds. It was supposed to be Ebenezer's birthday party and it ended as a medical fiasco. We are in a great need for prayer on all levels, but Tzadok is our foremost concern. Please pray for great scans on Tues., please pray that if surgery can be avoided let it be so, and please pray for wisdom on us and Tzadok's care team that we don't act on fear but on fact that is based in truth and not supposition. I have often pondered over the moment Adam and Eve decided to enter into a contract with death, destruction, and despair. I wonder if they ever gave a thought to the generations that would come after them and would have to face a myriad of terrors that are all to real for all.