Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom
and knowledge of God!

How unsearchable his judgments,
and his paths beyond tracing out!

"Who has known the mind of the Lord?

Or who has been his counselor?"

"Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him?"

For from him and through him and to him are all things.

To him be the glory forever! Amen.

Romans 11:33-36

We traveled to Iowa City again on the 30th.  I was scheduled for a modified barium swallow test and esophagram along with an evaluation by an Otolaryngologist (head and neck doctor).  The swallow test involved taking different consistencies of barium - a white substance which ranged from water consistency to peanut butter consistency.  They took a series of x-rays as they watched me swallow.  I somehow gulped it all down...and passed with flying colors!  They did not see anything of concern with my swallow.

I guess to back things up a bit...the reason for concern with my swallow is because of the pressure I've been experiencing in my neck.  The MRI a few weeks ago ruled out additional tumors or spreading of the tumor.  However, the brain tumor, if it would continue to grow could eventually affect my swallowing, leaving me unable to swallow (yes, that's a hard sentence to...umm "swallow").  So they just wanted to make sure the tumor wasn't bothering these particular nerves.  We were obviously excited that this wasn't the case. 

After these tests I headed to the head and neck doctor.  They decided they wanted to run another test on me...not sure what it was called, but this is what it involved...they took a small skinny cord (about the thickness of most phone chargers).  At the end of it was a tiny camera.  And they snaked it through my nose.  There was a tv screen right in front of me so I could watch.  I couldn't really watch but apparently they fished it so far up and around that they were able to see my tongue.  They had me move my tongue around...and again found nothing at all to be concerned about! 

So...the doctor said "Good news, nothing's wrong with your swallowing.  Bad news, we don't know what's causing the issues with your neck."  Ever since treatment, I've seen improvements in my facial weakness and my hearing and vision have also improved.  Nothing's back to normal...but it has gotten better.  We asked the doctor if this could all be related to the nerves trying to work again.  He said it could be the nerves trying to send messages, but just mis-firing.  Because we now know that the tumor is smaller, there are no tumors on my spinal cord, nothing's wrong with my swallow, we are just not going to worry about this.  We'll keep an eye on it if it gets worse or changes, but we're just going to hope for now that it's just the nerves trying to figure out how to work again.

Thank you so much for praying.  We are thankful for all the good news we've had recently and are ready to enjoy summer.  God bless!

"The LORD your God is with you,

he is mighty to save.

He will take great delight in you,

he will quiet you with his love,

he will rejoice over you with singing."

Zephaniah 3:17

We decided awhile back to stop writing on our blog, mainly because things had been going fine for some time and there had been nothing new to share. However, people ask from time to time how I’m doing, so we thought we’d share about my recent appointment!


Back in January, I started experiencing muscle tightness in my neck and throat. The only other time this had happened was for several weeks during and after treatment.  It’s so hard for me to explain what it is exactly…it’s just a slight tightness or perhaps twitching that occurs in my neck & throat area, usually after I’ve been talking a lot. It’s not painful, just more of an annoyance. In the last month, however, it became much more frequent. Because it was something I dealt with during treatment, it became a concern for me…of course my first thoughts were…the tumor has spread…the tumor has grown and is pressing on more nerves…We prayed this wasn’t the case!

I emailed my doctor a few days before my scheduled MRI on May 7, letting him know that this had been happening again and asked if I could have more tests done. Back when I experienced it during treatment, they couldn’t figure out what it was and they just said they’d keep an eye on it. So they scheduled me for an additional MRI of my spinal cord, along with the regular brain MRI. Usually when I go to my appointments, I have little fear…I have felt great so I have no concern about what the scan will show. So this was the first time I started to feel anxious again. I had to repeat some of the verses that helped me through treatment…Trust in the Lord (Proverbs 3:5-6)…Do not be anxious about ANYTHING (Philippians 4:4-7)…The peace that surpasses all understand will guard your hearts (Philippians 4:4-7)…To Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine (Ephesians 3:14-21)...

We were so excited to find out that day that there was nothing showing up on the spinal cord scan! The radiologist’s report wasn’t back yet, but my doctor couldn’t see anything. The report for the brain MRI was finished and the radiologist called the tumor stable again!

My doctor always shows us the scans and compares them side-by-side with my previous scan (usually from 6 months ago). He did the same this time and you could see that it was pretty close to identical. But we asked if he could compare it to two years ago (just to make sure there wasn't small growth occuring like was the case several years ago). He said sure…and I’m pretty sure there was a moment of stunned silence as Dr. Smith, Zac, and I all looked in awe at my current scan next to one from November 2009 (4 months after treatment). It was quite a bit smaller! My doctor was very pleased...as were we!. It’s apparently been getting smaller over the last two years, just at a slow enough rate that it’s harder to see in smaller periods of time!

He decided to refer me on to a head & neck doctor though to see if we can figure out my neck issues. I’ll go back to Iowa City May 30th for a swallow study and more appointments. My MRI showed that my spinal cord is as straight as can be, so that could be part of the problem, but may not be. Zac and I like to have fun and have concluded that it’s my nerves, previously damaged by the tumor, starting to work again now that they don’t have the pressure of the tumor on them. Sounds logical, don't you think?  ; ) We’ll let you know how the next appointment goes!