It's A Wonderful Life!

I just finished my yearly watching of "It's a Wonderful Life!"  (Gotta love Christmas traditions.) Every time I see that movie I can't help thinking about how much other people affect my life and how important friends and family are.  As I watched the final scene tonight, tears of gratitude spilled out as I related to George Bailey-- how his friends came to rescue and support him in his time of need. What a wonderful life we have -- not because it is easy, but because we are blessed with so many people to love, and people who love us.  As Harry toasts his brother George, he says, "To my big brother George: the richest man in town."  We are indeed rich.

Brendan's revised chart at radiation.  Last week we realized the chart was 5 days short--the 5 days where they will just radiate the lymph node in his neck that they were not able to remove during surgery. Only 7 treatments left!

Shaun took Brendan to Salt Lake today for his radiation treatment and visits with the oncology clinic, the neurosurgeon, and the radiation doctor.  Here are some of the things we learned:

*Brendan's smell and taste may or may not come back but it will take months to find out. These were knocked out by the brain surgery, but are also affected by the radiation.
*So far everything in his head looks good-- including the sutures.
*Neurosurgery wants to do scans of Brendan's head in about 4 weeks, but radiation says he'll have to wait 6 weeks for the swelling of the tissues to go down.

Landon was able to spend the day with Brendan.  He got to see the radiation machine and learn a little bit about how it works.

After radiation, Dr. Poppe checked Brendan.  He gained 1.5 pounds this week.  Yeah!
*They looked at the "sunburn" on Brendan's neck-- Pretty much expected and it looks ok.
*Scans will be taken in several months and they will be looking to see if the lymph node at the base of Brendan's skull has shrunk.  If it has, they will just monitor it.  If it hasn't shrunk or grows later, they may do another biopsy of it.
*Saliva may come back - the saliva ducts on one side of his mouth have been knocked out, but not the other side.  So they hope they will work again, but it may take months for them to start working again.
*Taste will take months to come back - if it does.

*They found fluid behind one of Brendan's ears.  That may be contributing to some of the hearing loss we've noticed.  (Last week we could talk to Brendan and sometimes he wouldn't hear us.  Brendan told me that the ringing in his ears made it hard for him to hear unless he was concentrating on what I was saying to him.)

This afternoon more blood was drawn to get a CBC (complete blood count).  Apparently his last blood draw was lost, so we don't have counts for him over the weekend.

 *Tomorrow Brendan will have to get the NG tube (nasogastric - feeding tube) replaced.  It has to be changed every month to keep it clean.  Because of his sinus surgeries, they will replace it in clinic, rather than with the home nursing service.

 Tonight Brendan was tired, nauseous, and had a bad headache.  Fortunately, Uncle Sheldon was there to rub his feet while Shaun went to buy a thermometer.  (I forgot to put the thermometer in his bag.)  We're keeping our fingers crossed this week that he stays well so he can come home Thursday afternoon and spend Christmas with the family.)  He told Santa that's all he wanted for Christmas this year.

May we all be as rich as George Bailey this year-- surrounded by wonderful family and friends!