Good Morning Team Zachary,

This is not a medical update. It's more of an Ann update so if you only want medical updates, push the delete button now.

These last three weeks have been the most intense, unbelievable, surreal, painful, hope-filled, nerve wracking, loving weeks of my life. Three weeks ago we were in Bloomington at our community hospital with Zachary's fever at 105.9, his cancer raging, his blood counts too low for the IU Med Center surgery he needed to get a new biopsy and diagnosis, his physical state was clearly deteriorating daily and options were disappearing fast. One jet ride later in an air ambulance and we are in a hospital that deals with cancer all the time. Michael and I just cried the first day we were here. We could not stop crying. The sense of relief that we felt was simply overwhelming. If Zachary has a chance to beat this, Omaha is the place it's gonna get done--there is no question in our minds of that.

You have to remember that we thought that we knew something about cancer from the last 8 months of treatment and chemo's effects and how things worked. We were profoundly wrong. To us, chemo had always been what you do for a couple of hours and then go home with some side effects but nothing SO horrible. Well, we have a new cancer and it's been growing during his previous chemo treatments. So what he is getting now is some serious stuff. I will spare you the details but every possible thing you ever heard about that can happen with chemo has come true and then some. Because of the severity of his reaction to the initial chemo we will be coming back to the Nebraska Med Center for next round as well.

Michael and I are often asked 'how are you doing?' It is not possible to answer. On one hand my heart just gets ripped out looking at Zachary in the hospital bed while they prod and poke and do it again. As he gets so sick my own stomach turns for his. There has not been a day that has gone by when my eyes have not filled with tears--either of joy at the progress or of the terror of becoming stuck at one of these stages. And then there is the reality that I can't hear what the medical staff tells me and I can't be a good advocate for Zachary if my heart is so involved. My heart blinds me absolutely rendering me no help to my task of care. On the other hand I love him so much.

It is impossible for me to hear the statistics and see the process of 'healing cancer' and not wonder what is the difference between Faith and stupidity. Here's my best guess at this point. I think stupidity is when you put a blindfold over your eyes, you put your hands on your ears so you can't hear and go blah, blah, blah at the top of your lungs so nothing gets in. You choose not to see the train coming full steam down the track. Splat...

Faith is the moment you see reality clearly and your heart chooses to override that and believe what has not yet unfolded.

In the last three days I have seen Zachary go from having so many toxins in him that he couldn't see or think straight to coming up with his own versions of hymns and singing them. You cannot stand in the room and listen without wanting to join in.

No letter would be complete without going on and on about his wife Dara. I don't even know what to say. She is so beyond awesome, wonderful, faithful, loving, protecting, sweet, kind and all while being in a hospital room in the presence her in laws and on a marathon with no markers to indicate where you are or when you'll be done! I am sure it is her love that makes the treatment for Zachary worth it.

I will leave you with a Zachary moment:

During one of his 'gosh this is hard moments' for him:

He is gagging all the time because the lining of his throat has been destroyed by chemo. He feels like he has strep throat and because of this has been gagging a lot. He has a blue wand (like a dentist would use to help you spit) that he uses to help him get the phlegm out of his throat so he won't choke and I hear him say TO THE WAND 'thank you wand for helping me. I know your job sucks (and he starts laughing at his own play on words) and I want to thank you so much for helping me.'

What more can I say?

Love,

Ann