No kidney stone left unturned

We’re thankful Susan's procedure to treat her kidney stones this week went smoothly. She had a ureteroscopy at UCLA that inserts a tube with a camera and a laser through the bladder and ureter into the kidney to break up the stones. With one measuring about ¾ of an inch, her stones were too big to pass and were at risk of causing a serious blockage. It was time to get after them. She handled the surgery and general anesthesia well and had no complications. Blasting away at the stones reduces visibility in there after a while, so she’ll need at least one more treatment. Meanwhile, Susan has a stent implanted temporarily so the bits can pass through. Who knew we’d get to learn so much about kidneys?

Pondering in pre-op. Plus a lovely fashion statement.

This was Susan's fourth procedure at the outpatient surgery center in Westwood, including a port catheter placement and a couple of bladder pacemaker surgeries. I think that makes us frequent flyers. At any rate, we know the pre-op and post-op routine, recognize the nurses now, and are glad to have such a great facility and staff to help us. We trust getting rid of the bacteria-laden stones will remove the source of her frequent infections and improve her health overall.

Meanwhile, Susan has been dealing with mysterious headache for most of the past four weeks and is growing weary of it. We’ve had her blood tested a couple of times in different ways and have ruled out infections like UTI or the signs of meningitis. We’ve had her endocrinologist chime in, who doesn't think it's a problem with her steroid taper. While it’s good to rule things out, we still don’t know why she’s having persistent pain and will need to wait until next week’s MRI and oncology visit. We’ll know soon (but not soon enough) whether she’s got brain swelling or more tumor growth, or perhaps another issue in play. 

As we navigate our brain tumor journey, we still pray all the time, hope for the best, and are ready for anything. We continue to find ourselves in the mystery of God's will. We’ve been working through the hardest thing we could imagine, yet we see God in it and trust his plans for us.

We always hope and are open to God’s healing however he may bring it, through his gift of medical science or by his hand alone. He’s done both for us already. Yet what of prayer? On one hand, we pray with authority and faith and expect his power to meet our need. On the other hand, we know we are sinful beings in a fallen world who practice our faith imperfectly. We know that suffering sometimes attends our lives for reasons we don't understand. We pray always, but sometimes I wonder how we should pray. I wonder why God sometimes heals and why he doesn't. Maybe we’ll understand more in the future. It doesn’t matter. We pray.

Susan and I are keen to know what God may be doing in and through us during this season. What purpose will he accomplish? We’re confident he has one and that it’s marvelous. How might he want us to grow? How might we know him and ourselves better? We’re still a work in progress. We thank God Susan's tumor has not shown any growth in two years, even though she has not been completely healed or restored. She was near death, but is still with us. God has brought her a long way and clearly has shown himself faithful to us in all things. As we learn to trust him more, I keep thinking perhaps he wants us to experience something with him on our journey that may even be more important than its outcome.