New Year's MRI Results

No tears, no problems until the technician told Nathan about the poke. They were going to have to inject a dye halfway thru the MRI to get a different picture. (Had I known, I would have put numbing cream on his mediport and they could do the injection that way.) So he started crying a little. Then she said that the DVD wasn't working in this room, so he would have to lie still with nothing to look at for 45 minutes. But, thankfully, the other room became available, so he could watch a video. He did great holding still, and I did my best to give him a good foot massage. The hardest thing was that it took three pokes to find the vein, and it hurt.

The doctor showed us the before and after pictures of his brain. The pictures from Sept. before and after the surgery showed the tumor being squashed first by the egg-sized cyst pressing on it, and then by the swelling after the surgery, so we didn't have a good idea of the exact size of the tumor. The doctor called it "an unhappy brain" because everything was shifted over from the pressure. Yesterday's picture was one of a "happy brain" because everything was where it should be, except the tumor. On paper the tumor looks about the size of a grape, and we could see two clear areas in the middle about the size of a BB gun shot where the tumor has died off. So it's not exactly shrinking in diameter yet, but it's dying from the inside out. We were thankful to see some change. The doctor wants to do another MRI in 6 weeks instead of the usual three months because yesterday's picture gave us more of a true baseline to compare to.

Nathan has been bright-eyed and energetic and happy during this 2 week break from chemo. Please pray for continued healing, for the rest of his body to be protected from chemical poisoning, and for all of our spiritual growth.

Here he is today playing a horse pulling a heavy load. Happy New Year!