Patience

I was raised to be patient. I was taught a song as a child that my children and their cousins are all learning:

Have patience, have patience

Don't be in such a hurry.

When you get impatient,

You only start to worry.

Remember, remember

That God is patient too,

So think of all the times

when others

have to wait on you!

I was given a love of reading. My mom was an avid reader. I remember when we would camp...the success of vacation could be determined by the number of fish caught by my dad and brother, as well as the number of books I read. My father is also a reader. We pass books back and forth and have a frequent exchange that goes something like this:

Me: "Dad, can you take Mr. 1inamillion to chemo on Thursday?"

Dad: "I don't see why not. I just got a new book!"

My dad and I both can handle hours in any room by escaping it into the pages of a book. I used to knit, too. I made countless scarves in countless waiting rooms until carpal tunnel shut me down. Now I stick to the reading. Stop me at any time and there is likely at least one book or magazine in my purse. Maybe a snack or two. Possibly even a bottle of water. If I happen to be without a book, I've got a Blackberry to surf. Yep, I'm a champ at waiting. Usually.

Dane and the kids got me a gift card for a pedicure for Mother's Day. I was led back to a 'relaxation room' to wait. and wait. I sat staring out a large window overlooking a little pond with a path around it. That would be a nice little path to walk or run. People sat along the path eating ice cream from a parlor next door. I could get ice cream after I ran. I paced the room a bit looking around. Shifted amongst the comfy chairs. How long have I been here waiting? When I could be running? Or eating ice cream? 30 minutes. A half hour waiting when I don't HAVE to be here! Don't these people realize how much time I spend in waiting rooms just waiting? If they did, they didn't care. I left without the pedi and without my championship in waiting.

We have spent countless hours in waiting rooms. Most of our waiting is for the oncologist here in Wichita. He runs notoriously late. We've spent a lot of time sitting in a little room contemplating how we should fire him for his tardiness. Mr. 1inamillion and I spent one afternoon sitting in a tiny exam room counting up the time we had wasted just waiting for him alone and talking about what we could have been doing with that time instead. Not in treatment, not in CT scans or lab, not meeting with or waiting for any doctor but him. It exceeded 24 hours. An entire day! That was close to two years ago. I try not to think about the math anymore.

While I sing to those who wait on me, the words of Dr. Seuss run through my head as we arrive at doctors' offices. Of all the Places You'll Go he warned us about, the most useless place is the The Waiting Place...for people just waiting. Medical buildings are full of waiting rooms, useless places on every floor with people just waiting. For lab tests, for lab results, for doctors...Everyone is just waiting. For IV drugs to drip, for radiation to pass, for more doctors, for more tests, Everyone is just waiting.

Most of Mr. 1inmillion's energy is spent in a Waiting Place. It's just wasted there and that is so frustrating for him. Even with good books, the routine has been wearing thin on me as well. It's gotten me thinking. What if the good doctor is wrong? What if The Waiting Place doesn't have to be useless?

What if Dane's time spent waiting meant progress towards a cure for soft tissue sarcoma? What if every hour spent waiting on Dr. McTardy to find his way to the exam room or waiting for the IV bag to finally empty equaled research dollars? What if the man sitting next to Mr. 1inamillion was also raising money for his cure? And one floor down, the woman waiting for her neurologist was also making progress towards a cure for her Parkinson's? And in a waiting room across town, money was being raised to fight lupus?

We sponsor miles for runners with a cause, surely we can sponsor patients being, well, patient. Those that want and need a cure probably aren't running. They're not swimming, they're not shooting hoops, jumping rope or cycling for miles. They might like to be, but their energy is spent elsewhere. Probably in a tiny room with a bunch of others unable to do anything else but be patient, too.

We are called upon to "be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, and faithful in prayer" (Romans 12:12). To be patient does not simply mean to bear delay without complaint or anger. It also means to quietly and steadily persevere. Not just a bunch of 'suck it up and wait', but progress steadily inching forward in the Waiting-Place. That's not useless. And it makes me joyful in hope.

There's a lot to be done to build the Waiting-Place. So far I have been overwhelmed by the reaction from those with whom I've shared the idea, but there's still funding to be found and cyber bricks to be laid. Will you pray for this project? And if you happen to see me pacing, climbing the walls of a relaxation room, or hyperventilating under the new weight of this project, feel free to sing me a song. Give the lyrics up top a shot. It worked for my mom.

The Village

It is that time of year that we count through our blessings and think about those things for which we are truly thankful. It's a big, big list for me but I want to focus this blog entry on those that enable me to do all the things I do and to be all the places I need to be. At the same exact time.

You've heard the expression 'it takes a village to raise a child'? It's true for us. At least until they've mastered human cloning. And time travel. We traveled last week for Mr. 1inamillion's appointments and treatment in St. Louis and I spent the few days before doing what I now refer to as 'deploying the village'.

• Arrange room & board with my aunt and uncle in Olathe. They are close enough to half way along the trip and staying the first night there allows me to miss just two days of work instead of three. It is also so wonderful to spend time with them. I miss my mom just a bit less.
• Arrange room & board with my bonus kids in St. Louis. Mr. 1inamillion of course did this task as my bonus kid is his daughter (who is beyond a bonus, I adore her). She and her husband live in a very cute brown stone apartment just ten minutes from Siteman Cancer Center.
• Speak with the half neighbors about a ride to scouts for Thing 1. (The half neighbors live next door to my dad. The kids somehow determined this made them their half neighbors and have since referred to them as such.)
• Line up lunch dates for Things 1 and 2. Wednesday was the Thanksgiving lunch at their schools and the kids could invite their parents to join them. Oh my guilt. Gabe called me from the office on the morning they were to turn in their number of guests. I was driving to an appointment in Wichita, telling him mommy and daddy will be in St. Louis that day and could hear the disappointment rising in his little body through the speakers of the car. I asked who he would like to take our place. He said Grandpa but still sounding wounded, I fast and dangerously suggested our pastor and his wife both of whom Gabe thinks are cool. He was excited with that idea. Very risky on my part since I hadn't spoken with them and if they weren't able to go it would be double disappointment. I hung up, prayed and dialed right away. Thankfully they were delighted with the invitation and able to attend. phew what a relief. I was more cautious with arranging a stand in for Thing 2's lunch and asked before I spoke. Lucy's lunch date was one of my mom's dearest friends who babysat Lucy once a week before she began kindergarten. She, too was honored by the invite and an exciting stand in that overshadowed our absence. Hallelujah!
• Speak with wonderfully kind neighbor who walks the dogs while we're gone. A fellow dog lover, she understands Brit's need for exercise and doesn't see her as dangerous and vicious at all. I am so grateful for her because my dad adamantly draws the line at walking the four legged treadmill.
• Review the week's schedule with Dad. Lucy's basketball, Gabe's scouts, Dane's appointment schedule, etc. He more than anyone makes up for the lack of cloning. He stays with the kids and animals while we are gone, maintaining for them their 'normal' as much as possible. He takes Mr. 1inamillion to his local appointments as much as we need him to, minimizing my absence from work.

Yep, I am thankful for the village. Gratitude beyond words for those with whom the Lord has blessed us.

Gabe's Book Review

Thing 1 wants a blog. He's too young for a blog. Blogger even says so. As a compromise, he will be a guest writer here offering book reviews. Is it a sneaky attempt at getting him to read more? It would be except 1. He loves to read and 2. I am not at all shy about saying 'Ha! Now you'll have to read and write a little book report!'



Captain Underpants is where two boys get a hypnotizing ring and hypnotize the principal and he turns into captain underpants. I love the series because it has flip-o-rama and it is really funny. Flip-o-rama is pages with different pictures and it makes animated actions when you flip the pages.


There are eight books in the Captain Underpants series. In the first book they beat this guy that is really small and is in a diaper but is an evil genius. Captain Underpants and the Attack of the Talking Toilets is book number two and it is my favorite. I give it 200 out of 200 stars.



Are you questioning the appropriateness of his book selection? I had a professor who told us once that he and his wife fought about their kids' reading choices. He let them read as many comic books as they wanted and she thought those were a bad choice. Their daughter became a lawyer and professor and their son a successful business owner. So...bring on the talking toilets and principals in underpants!

Plan F (I think)

We have a bumper sticker on our SUV that says "Life is all about how you handle plan B." I love it. It suits us, although our 'plans' are inching down the alphabet and I've pretty much lost track of how far. Yesterday we set sights on yet another. Plan F, maybe?


We traveled this week to St. Louis for Mr. 1inamillion's CT scan and appointment. I don't spend time wondering about what the results will be, I simply pray, hope and focus on the road ahead. Dane spends a lot of time wondering, and he usually knows what the results will be. Just as he suspected, yesterday wasn't good news. There was a bit of growth and a new lesion on his right lung. It all is still very small and still in the same region. So it's not good news but it's not horrific, either. It just boils down to a new plan.


We spent close to three hours in a tiny patient exam room hashing out the next course of treatment. There was a clinical trial that the doctor attempted to get him in, but it required him to be 'unblinded' from the previous study in which he participated. The last clinical trial was a double-blind study and we believe he was in the placebo group, but can't confirm it. Much of our time was spent waiting while the doctor fought it out with the drug company. He lost and without that confirmation, Dane's ineligible to participate. We determined he would go on a established chemo drug, dacarbazine. An oldie but a goodie for sarcoma patients. Good being defined by a 40% response rate. Not quite a coin toss but far better than my odds at the slots.


Mr. 1inamillion will be part of a study at Siteman that focuses on PET scan monitoring in conjunction with dacarbazine. (PET scans look at how the tumors process glucose, monitoring the behavior of the lesions while a CT scan really just measures size and shape.) Participation in the study means driving the eight hours to St. Louis every three weeks for the chemo treatment and getting the scan on every third cycle. It could be done in Wichita because it is a standard regimen but participating in the study requires treatment be done there. It's a long drive, and I imagine it will be much longer for him post treatment.


You might wonder, why bother? It's in the name. He's a rare breed. If he's not willing to offer himself to teach them, when will they learn? When will there be progress and when will they find his cure? He's one in a million. He has to be the one to say, 'Yes! I'll do whatever it takes to help you find my cure.' All I have to do is coordinate the plan, pray, hope and drive.

Our Awesome Thing 1

Thing 1 is a pretty awesome kid. He is curious, has a remarkable memory and just soaks in so much.

Last year he watched an Arthur show in which they did a bicycle race to help their lunch lady who had cancer. It inspired him to do something for his dad. We talked about how cool it would be to help a lot of people with cancer in addition to daddy. Thing 1 went to his principal and asked to do a bear drive for Victory in the Valley. They went all out. Every class made posters to put up throughout the school and town. 267 Victory bears were collected to be given to cancer patients in Wichita on their first day of treatment. That was a whole lot of bears for our little town and it was amazing to watch him learn how easily he can make a difference and realize the satisfaction of it.

I worried about leaving that support and encouragement of their school in Douglass. But Gabe really is pretty awesome and has already started collecting bears with his new school.

Over the last few months Thing 1 has determined that he really likes to attend our contemporary church service in lieu of the Sunday school class with his age group. He's too cool to sit with me and prefers to sit with the teenagers in the praise band. He actually pays pretty close attention to the sermon and will talk about it with us throughout the week, so I let him (sorry, teenagers). He asked to be baptized and join the church. Note that he not only asked me, but he went right up to the pastor last week and asked him. He's eight years old. He is eight years old and already making this decision for himself.

This morning, he went up on stage and stated the church vision statement: Inviting all to experience the life transforming love of Jesus Christ. It's been the focus of sermons in recent weeks and we've been challenged to memorize it. (He had to tell it to me twice as I typed it just now, and was a bit annoyed that I needed the second reiteration.) He walked up on stage with his messy hair, recited it perfectly into our pastor's microphone and I thought, Dear Lord. Please don't let me ruin him.

Later in the service, there was the opportunity to go forward for prayer at the alter. He did it. I risked his cool reputation and sat beside him afterwards. I put my arm around him, put my head to his and prayed. and cried. Lord, Thank you for trusting me with this awesome kid. Help me to raise him to be the man you want him to be. Please don't let us screw this up.

As I wrap this up, Thing 1 and Thing 2 are in trouble with Mr. 1inamillion for playing with the garage opener. Now they are fighting and blaming one another for ruining Halloween. At least this time no one was riding the garage door. That's improvement. He is just eight years old. Providing his younger sister doesn't kill him today, he's got a lot of years ahead to learn from his choices and still be awesome. (As long as we don't ruin him.)