Still Waiting...

Good grief, it's been a long week!

Lots of emotional ups and downs around here. Thanks so much for all the prayers for my dad and for my family. I am very thankful.

I know I was vague about what was going on in my last post. That's because I had very little information at the time. Honestly, I still don't know a lot more than I did last week, but here's what I do know.

Last weekend, my dad was admitted to the hospital because he was extremely jaundiced. The ER doc did some tests and (carelessly, in my opinion) threw out the words "pancreatic cancer". That remains an unconfirmed diagnosis, but just hearing those words threw me into an emotional tailspin. This past Tuesday, the doctor did an outpatient procedure on my dad and put a stent in his bile duct. Something was causing it to constrict, therefore it wasn't able to drain, and that was causing his jaundice. While in there, the doctor was able to rule out some minor issues and to biopsy the inside of his bile duct.

The biopsy of his duct came back benign, but his C/T scan showed some suspicious growth on part of his pancreas, and that is likely what is growing and putting pressure on his bile duct and causing the constriction. Because they didn't biopsy his pancreas, we don't know for sure if that "spot" is malignant or not. That's where the "still waiting" part comes in.

He's scheduled for an endoscopic ultrasound in a few weeks. Not days...weeks. Until they go in there and take a look around and biopsy the pancreas, we don't really have a diagnosis. It may be contained in his pancreas, it may have spread to other places, it may be operable, it may not be. There are still SO many unanswered questions, and waiting is not an easy thing for me. Waiting from 1000+ miles away is even harder.

All of this is so frustrating, and needless to say, I've been in a bit of a funk this week. Knowing that people were praying was a relief and comfort, so again, thank you. I'm trying to remain hopeful.