Hi guys! I hope all of you are enjoying the Christmas-y festivities & are doing wonderful! It’s been a while since I have updated you guys on what’s happenin’ on our end with my hubby – Daniel & his journey through his battle with cancer & getting back to 100%. If you missed it, you can read our last update here. We were truckin’ along wonderfully as Daniel was going through his rounds of chemo. He had three rounds…which totalled to about 2 & 1/2 months of treatments. He actually went through it all with FLYING COLORS. You always hear of such scary stories about people getting so insanely sick while they go through chemo & it being a horrible time for them – but thankfully, Daniel did pretty great with it – and we thank God for that everyday. He maintained his appetite for the most part and was able to maintain his weight as well – we are so more than blessed that Daniel was able to get through the his treatments so well. As Daniel was finishing his last cycle of chemo, we were pumped! So, so so thrilled & very hopeful we could put this all behind us! We just knew that Daniel would go in for his CatScan and he would be cancer free & we could get back to our regular scheduled program! We were ready to celebrate with a big hip-hip hooray with our family & friends!
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case exactly. Daniels tumor count was nearly back to normal – so we definitely thought that the chemo had gotten rid of all of the “c” stuff near his kidneys. (If you were wondering why I say “c”? It’s because I hate saying the “c” word. It’s scary, ugly, and nothing I want to focus or dwell on for too long at a time. Yannow? Anyways…back to my story here…

After he had his PET scan about a week after his last treatment in October, that showed to not be the case. There was still “stuff” near his kidneys. The size of the masses had gone down slightly, but they were still there. What?! What in the world does that mean? We chatted with the doctor & he basically said this: there are 5 different types of testicular cancer. There is one type of that cancer doesn’t respond to chemo. That was the type that Daniel has. What.The…..????!!!! Really? You’re absolutely joking with us. It was truly the most heartbreaking & earth shattering thing to hear.
Since the cancer doesn’t respond to chemo – Daniel will have to have it surgically removed. This is a major surgery. It’s called a lymph node dissection. We immediately headed to MD Anderson in Houston. It’s one of the BEST cancer centers in the world. People visit MDA with hopes of getting the best & top of the line treatment. And we expect nothing less than that. We met with his doctor – Dr.Ward – and he went over our options with us. Daniel will be having surgery on December 23rd. Initially, the doctor said that he would not be able to do the surgery robotically & would instead have to make a cut from his chest area down to his pelvis and go in and take ALL of the cancer out. It’s a scary & major procedure, but we know that Dr.Ward is the best of the best and Daniel will be in AMAZING hands.

After our most recent trip to MDA last week – Daniel had to get another updated Cat Scan – and since then, Dr Ward believes he will be able to do the surgery robotically – BUT he won’t really know until he gets into the operating room and can see what exactly is going on. Depending if he can get all of the cancer out with the robot, will depend if he has to make the incision and go with original route. There are only a few doctors in the nation who do this procedure – so having a doctor who specializes in surgery like this & who does it on a pretty regular basis brings us a lot of peace about the situation.

They said that Daniel will have to stay in the hospital about a week after surgery – so, that means we will be spending Christmas in the hospital this year. But really – it doesn’t matter where we spend it – just as long as we are together & we will be happy! Isn’t it crazy how that works? We could literally be living under a bridge and I would be happy as long as we were together.

Since his latest CatScan – it looks like the cancer may be in his chest. He also has nodules in his lungs but that may be due to an infection or something – and we are praying to God that is the case! That the cancer is not in his lungs. Our hearts sunk to the floor and were completely stomped on when we the results from the CatScan. As for the “stuff” in his chest – we will have to address that after Daniel gets through this surgery and gets recovered. We are just wanting to get through this major surgery successfully and then we will take the next necessary steps. Dr Ward was completely honest with us – this is going to be a long process. Constantly checking up on my baby and getting him back to his healthy self – and probably surgeries down the road. Whatever it takes to get my baby out of harms way.

We’re trying to stay really positive – and we KNOW that without a doubt in our hearts & souls that God is in complete control of everything. He is using us in ways that we may just not see yet – he’s helping to mold us & our testimony to glorify Him. We are 100% okay with that. But even keeping that in mind, everyday isn’t always easy. We have the most wonderful, spectacular, life-giving & loving days together – I think we’ve loved each other more in the past 4 years & 3 months than most people do in a lifetime. I’m thankful for that & Daniel more than anything else in the world! And then sometimes, we just have those heart-wrenching, gut wrenching days & have moments where we just break down and cry while we’re at the post office, or Target or as we’re getting ready for the day. It’s tough. It is a cold, hard reality that we sometimes don’t want to face but unfortunately, we have to. I’ve actually been putting off writing this blog post for so long because it makes me nauseous to even think about, let alone – put my thoughts into words – because there really are no words that do this situation or Daniel justice.

Daniel is truly the most amazing human being I have literally ever met in my life. I still feel so beyond like the luckiest girl in the world at the fact that he chose me to spend life with. He’s my soul mate, he’s strong, he’s courageous, compassionate, loving, hilarious, life-giving, jolly and just plain perfect.

If I could just ask everyone & all of my prayer warriors to PLEASE, please, pleaseeeee pray for Daniel. Please pray that the surgery is successful & that the cancer has not spread into his lungs. Pray that Dr.Ward can perform the surgery seamlessly and we will be one step closer to Daniel becoming cancer-free!

Also, since I’m not friends with everyone on Facebook, feel free to share this post so we can get as many prayers going for Daniel & our family as possible! Also, feel free to subscribe to my blog posts so you can get an email with the latest updates about Daniel – all you have to do is enter your email address on the left hand side of this screen under “Stay-Up-To-Date” — once you do that, you have to CONFIRM it in your email inbox to get subscribed.

Again, thank you for all of the continued prayers – we will update you guys soon & let you know how everything is going! So Much Love To Everyone! xoxo, Chandy

Also, there was also a Go Fund Me account created for us to help out with Daniels rising medical expenses & etc since Daniel is not able to work during this time! Here is the link if you would like to donate – we truly appreciate and love you all – thank you!

https://www.gofundme.com/h9a28ha2ak