VACATION!!

Vacation.....that is not a word that has been used often by us. But about 6 months ago, Jonathan decided that he'd like to plan a Washington DC vacation for us.

As time went on and James headed into treatment for his tumor, the vacation seemed to get scaled back more and more - to the point that we even thought we'd have to cancel it. At the last minute, we managed to pull it off - albeit less than we had originally planned.

BUT, we all agree now that it was the best vacation we've had. Instead of lots of sight seeing, we spent lots of time with old friends. THAT WAS THE BEST!!!

Although we knew we'd be going during a hot time of the year, it was definitely hotter than we expected.







We traveled there on Wednesday and by the time we arrived at our hotel, James was pretty sick. The 6 hour drive was harder on him than we anticipated, so he and I stayed at the hotel and rested while the kids went to church at Heritage.


This is James sleeping on his mattress....I can't figure out how he ended up half off before morning.

Then Josh, Johannah, and I met with Helen and Carolyn for late night bowling.









On Thursday, we had lunch with the Canavans and then attended the Marine Barracks Parade at 8th and I with the Dishongs, Cormells, Hodges, and Canavans. Hint: Someone stole all the parking garages. Everywhere that Google sent us had NO parking.










On Friday, Jon and Josh headed into DC to do some sightseeing with a friend from High School while James, Johannah, and I just rested and enjoyed the pool. Then Helen and I went out together to have our hair done (that was a blast) and go to dinner. I realized the truth of the saying that true friends can not see each other for many years and yet pick up as if there was never a gap.





We had planned to drive home on Saturday night, but the heat was still so bad and James had such a hard time with just the short drive to Lottie's house for lunch. Thankfully, Lottie so kindly offered to let us stay with her overnight. We were certainly not disappointed. We had a great time visiting and the kids absolutely loved all her animals. She has two horses, a pig, a dog, and a cat.







Then we got to attend Heritage Baptist Church in Woodbridge all day Sunday, where our pastor is from. WONDERFUL CHURCH!!! Lunch at Old Country Buffet and a naptime for James at the Cormell's house.







I prayed that God would miraculously send a "cold front" for our trip home that night. Although it was certainly no blizzard, it was clearly 20 degrees cooler by the time we hit the road and we were THANKFUL. Made it home by 2 a.m. safely and James did just fine.

Once again....we know that GOD IS GOOD!!!

God is ALWAYS good!

Thanks to Facebook, I am even more slack at updating James' website. I apologize for all those that aren't on Facebook, so don't get very frequent updates.

It took James a little extra time to recover from the shunt revision. As he gets older, the surgeries tend to get harder on him. But he is doing well now. We just saw the surgeon about two weeks ago. He removed the stitches and reviewed James' MRI. Although there is one ventricle that still looks slightly larger, he agrees that unless something is causing a problem, another surgery would not be the best idea for James. He was very happy with how well James is doing and how well the incision healed up. Now James just needs to get his hair back. :)

The last MRI showed growth in the tumor again. It is estimated that the tumor is about 30% bigger than when we started this treatment. The doctors have all agreed that they don't think we are dealing with the same tumor. It can only be assumed that when Dr. Wisoff took 70% of James' tumor out in 2008, and then it completely returned in 6 weeks, that what returned is not the same. Of course, James' symptoms and entire response to the treatment that he had already done for 4 years is also an indication that it is not the same. Anyone that knew James then knows that he did very well on the treatment with few complications and had 25% shrinkage of the tumor.....definitely not what we are dealing with now.

This has certainly caused us to step back and assess the decision that was made and ask God what He wants us to do. We can put James back on chemo and/or he can undergo radiation. I'm not saying that we won't have to pursue one or both of those options someday, but I don't yet have a peace about it. It is my hope that the tumor is growing because of the inconsistency of the treatment due to sodium issues and shunt related issues. The bottom line for me is that I need to be able to say, should James need to undergo chemo and/or radiation (which neither will be easy on him), that we have done everything we can for James first.

So the plan is to change our diet to a strictly healthy diet with juicing to stabilize the sodium, which would allow him to stay on the treatment more consistently, as well as aiding his body in fighting the tumor.

ABOVE ALL, to pray and ask God to turn this tumor around.....to do what the doctors and medicine cannot.

I do not have a date yet, but the next MRI should be at the end of August. At that point, IF the tumor continues to be out of control, we will definitely have to make a decision.

We appreciate EVERYONE's prayers for James. We certainly have not felt a crunch like this in James' care and life since he was diagnosed. I believed then that God wanted to show the world what He could do through James' life....and I believe it still today!!! It's easy to say "God is good," but it is our prayer that the truth of it will be seen in our lives.