Since talking to my doctors about not jumping straight into the chemo chair, we’ve at least agreed to monitor my condition with imaging and blood tests on a regular basis. My most recent scan previous to this one, many lung nodules appeared with the biggest at 2.3 centimeters. So now, one month later, it’s time for a new scan, and so I requested it to be done exactly the same as the previous scan, so we’re comparing ‘apples to apples’ and not different types of scans getting different levels of results. The doctor agreed and scheduled me to come in for another CT scan with contrast.

I was at the park with my son Carver, playing in the sand box with his plastic truck, climbing up the giant ladder and flying down the slide, running around in the grass kicking his soccer ball, there were no worries in the world in that moment, it was absolutely perfect. That’s when I got the call.

I didn’t recognize the number, but I knew that “the call” was coming. I remember the moment like it was yesterday, my heart dropped into my stomach and that weightless feeling I had with Carver suddenly became heavy and increasingly deep. It was my oncologist, and he called to give me my test results. He said that the lung nodules in my chest have grown a full centimeter since the last month and that there were twice as many of them. He says that they’re growing rapidly and are acting extremely aggressive, the largest is now close to 4 centimeters. He strongly recommended that I don’t wait any longer and admit myself to the hospital for 5 days to get me started on my first cycle of chemo and then I’d need to complete four cycles of BEP which would last three to four months of me being deathly sick.

The park with my son now had a completely different feel, all the wind in my sails was suddenly depleted and I just wanted to go home. Looking back, It was so unfair to him that he has to suffer through this just as much as I do, but I guess that’s what family is all about… now I have some serious decisions to make. Being the sole provider in my house, taking that much time off of work would devastate my family, but getting healthy is number one because me not being around would devastate my family even more. I prayed about this tirelessly and I know my family and friends were praying for me as well. This was by far the hardest decision that I’ve ever had to face.

After a few days of deep thought and some serious prayer, I finally came to a decision. I was going to give myself a deadline to see better results. I was going to hit all of the natural treatments as hard as I can and in one month’s time, if things continually get worse then I’ll give in to chemotherapy, otherwise I’ll hold my course.