Family Update

Love you guys and thanks for all your prayers. Mark is doing great and got a good report from the doctors and they believe they got all his cancer - so he is cancer free and gaining his strength back everyday. I'm so proud of how awesome he did...I would marry him over and over 1000's times!!! Above is a picture of Mark, me, Ladonna and LW. LaDonna is my best friend from high school and we had a great time while they were here visiting. Mark and Kevin got to play the TPC course at Sawgrass...they loved it, but the course was hard!! They didn't care at all...just enjoyed the whole day.

My dad (Cathy's dad) is doing about the same, but he is not going into the nursing facility yet….right now we are on hold. My dad and mom are dealing with things great….they have a nurse that comes now 6 hours a day and someone comes for one hour each night and helps my mom get dad in bed. This is working well….but probably by the end of the year, my dad will be in Texas Veteran’s Home in Amarillo. It is a very nice place and we were glad to find something where my dad can be happy…he’d love to stay home, but that is just not going to be possible. Through it all, he has been the BEST!!!

Neal got the assignment in Washington DC and will be moving there in later September. Pray they let Amy go with him. They are both very excited about this exceptional opportunity - he worked hard to earn it. Hopefully, we’ll be seeing them soon for Neal’s birthday.

We just got home from fishing….so I’ve got to go help Mark clean the fish. This is not my first fish to catch just my first Red. We miss you all and would love to hear from you too. I have posted more pictures on my Facebook if you want to browse them.

Talk with you soon,

Cathy

PS:

Megan was sitting at her desk when she had a very sharp shot of abdominal pain, within 5 seconds she passed out. That is when her body went down, hitting her chin on her desk and then falling the rest of the way to the floor, hitting a file cabinet on the way. Her co-worker saw it happen so was able to explain to the doctors quickly, thank goodness she was at a hospital!After many tests over the last couple of days, they have determined she has a very bad fracture in her left vertebra, C2, I believe they call it. This particular type of injury is often referred to as the Hangman Fracture as it is the same type of result that used to happen when people were hanged. The doctors are amazed at #1 what a short distance she fell and sustained this severe of an injury and #2 that she is not in a worst position considering the fracture. For the next 8 weeks she will be in a neck brace. Here is an update she just sent out regarding her progress:

To all my amazing family and friends: Just wanted to send out a quick update on my status. A brief paragraph of what happened to me last week is below in red for those that haven't heard yet. I just cut and pasted from an email Angi Rigot sent out last week since she put it so well. Thanks Ang:)Anyways, I am one week out and had a follow up today with my neurologist - no I don't have brain damage - although Ryan may beg to differ due to my moments of altered mental status (likely 2' to narcotics:). I just see a neurologist because the injury is so close to the brain and spine. He had me get another xray this week and is so far very pleased that no further damage has been done and it looks like I am doing well.

The fear is if I don't heal up as I should I may have to get a Halo brace - google that and you will really feel bad for me:) It looks like I won't need that though. Because I am young and otherwise healthy, he has every reason to believe I will heal just fine in my current "collar." Yes, that sounds like something for the four legged variety, but it really is called a collar. Below is a picture of my "Miami J Collar," so you can get your laugh on before you see me and may be tempted to laugh. I won't be offended. I would laugh too. That is not me in the picture by the way. I feel pretty good as long as I take my pain meds - thank God for narcotics! The pains should lessen in the next few weeks and I will then ween myself off of the meds.

We have a wonderful nanny, Jessica, that is here during the day to take care of the kids since I am unable to lift, turn or do much of anything besides rest and type an occasional email. The plan for now is to focus on healing. I plan to take off work likely for 8 weeks, and my internship will be on hold for that time as well. Hopefully after 8 weeks I will be ready to hit the ground running and get back to normalcy. More than anything, I feel blessed. A little uncomfortable and inconvenienced, sure, but have nothing to complain about.

God is good and has provided for us more than we could have even imagined. We absolutely without a doubt have the best family and friends ever. I am thankful for each and every one of you and how caring and giving you all are. Thank you for feeding us, organizing meals, home made ice cream, taking me to doctors appointments, for encouraging cards, emails, phone messages, for offering to help clean, mow our yard and so many other thoughtful things. I can't tell you how much we appreciate that. We will probably take our first outing this weekend, hopefully to church and Sam's club. I will be using a motorized cart as I get woozy if I walk too much. Ryan will probably be embarrassed by me, and I may just accidentally run over his toes. Just kidding. But I will use the cart.Thank again for your thoughts and prayers! Hopefully I will see you soon. ~Megan

Again...thanks so much for loving and praying for our family. Write us when you can!