I guess there has been quite a bit going on since the last post. First, Jay and Lonita got married a couple of days ago. A huge congratulations to those kids...and I hope you guys are relaxing and enjoying your honeymoon. In the midst of the fun of a wedding we've also been talking to doctors.

Trying to summarize:
At the time of the last post Dr. Wong had essentially no hope of any good news for Ramona. A day or two later I had the reports of the scans sent to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, hoping that they might find some glimmer of hope. The email I got back from Mayo is likely the most discouraging five sentences ever written. There was no way to glean any hope from that email. Palliative chemo, is what he was talking about. Meanwhile, we have been talking to Oasis to see if they really knew what they are talking about. I seriously questioned them and the group of doctors saw her case again last Thursday. They called me on Thursday and stuck to their guns that Ramona is in good shape. And this has been our struggle, how can doctors look at the same scans and have such different interpretations.
Anyway, today we had a Telehealth appointment with Dr. Waddell (lung surgeon) in Toronto. To our surprise, he said that to him, all the tumors in the chest looked operable. Lung surgery is not exactly an appealing thought, but it was refreshing to talk to someone outside of Oasis who atleast had a small glimmer of hope too. He would need chemo to be done first. We asked him when he thought chemo would start. He figured chemo would need to start in 3-6 months. So this is where we are at, in the time before the doctors here think chemo would need to start, we hope it will become even more apparent that the Oasis treatment is working. We will do everything possible to boost Ramona's health during this time. We have asked Dr. Wong to have a scan done at the end of August to evaluate where everything is at.
One good thing that has happened is that medical uncertainty is a huge wake up call for us. The God who we often think doesn't care, is actually the same God who loves us enough to have sent Jesus to die for us. God does miracles, not doctors.
-Earl