Old--- David Part 1 (3.12.2008)

Dear Family and Friends,
Well the news is good. David has stage 1A Hodgkin’s Disease/Lymphoma. The 1 refers to that the cancer is only located in the right side of his neck. The A refers to symptoms associated with Hodgkin’s that David does not have. (If he was having night sweats, fevers, chills, etc then he would have B.) So now we're going forward. David has an appointment this afternoon to get some specifics about the chemo he will be getting, what to expect, foods he may prefer, etc. Tomorrow he is having an out-patient procedure to put a mediport in. The mediport will be used for the chemo treatments as well as taking blood. This will make it so they are not sticking him with needles in the arms and hands all the time.
If our insurance company is prompt with their approval for the chemo treatments to begin, David will have his first treatment on Tuesday, March 18. He will have treatments every other week for 4 months. At the end of this they will do some radiation on his neck. Regarding side effects of the chemo, nausea should be less with the course they are doing for him but they all but guarentee he will lose his hair. As for long-term, they say that this course of chemo should not effect his future fertility, so we're good.
David is taking everything very well. He is ready to get it over with and get on with his/our life. I think the procedure tomorrow for the port will go a long way for making it real that this is all happening. David will be able to work as much as he feels up to it throughout this. Our employer, since we both work for White Electric, and all our co-workers have been very understanding and supportive.
Thanks for your thoughts and prayers! We really appreciate them and with good news like this they certainly are working. Feel free to call or email anytime if you’d like to know more. We’re just going to beat this. It’s that simple