Clinical Trial

I am beginning my first clinical trial since I have been on this cancer journey.  A year ago we talked about one and then I started on Elahare which worked well for about 9 months.  The numbers have been going up for the last three months and it is time for something new.

I had a CT scan a couple of weeks ago and it revealed cancer in my lungs which has made me eligible for a clinical trial - because the doctor's need to SEE the cancer somewhere in my body in order to measure the efficacy of the treatments.  So, after some testing - testing tissue, an ecocardiogram an eye test - I have been accepted.

Tomorrow morning I receive my first infusion.  Afterwards I have to wait around for three hours to then take another blood test.  I will do this every three or four weeks depending upon my schedule.  It all makes me nervous.  I look at the side effects and I wonder what mine will be.  I have been very lucky so far, and this is a new procedure.  I say that I live in the land of "I don't know" and the last few weeks have been very challenging with the waiting and not knowing.

At the same time spring - and the hopes and visions of new life - are all around me.  This year John did not put his white electric Christmas tree down off the porch.  I mother cardinal decided it was the perfect place to build a nest and we wake up frequently to the vision of her sitting on the nest.  Several times I have seen the baby bird with his mouth open waiting for Mom to feed him.  And sometimes the Dad cardinal makes an appearance.  It is an unlikely place to have a nest and it is a perfect symbol for me of 

" God will make a way where there seems to be no way. He works in ways we cannot see, He will make a way for me.""

or this quote from Isaiah:   Isaiah 43:19 (NIV): "See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.

So God is always doing a new thing - a new drug, a new trial, a new hope.  

Let it be so.