Merry Christmas + Radiation Update!

Merry Christmas to all of you! Hope you are all enjoying the holiday season! I'm a few days late in posting this - several of us caught the nasty little flu virus that is going around, but luckily Dad and Canaan have missed it so far.

Aside from the flu, we had an absolute perfect Christmas - so blessed that Dad was feeling great and we were able to relax and enjoy the last few days. This year, as part of Mom and Dad's present, we hijacked all of our old VHS childhood tapes and videos from Mom and Dad's vacations with Friends over the years and converted them to a DVD set for them. There were a lot of tears (mainly from Mom) but we think they liked the present? :) Thank you so much to the Litteken Family for allowing us to borrow your converter/recorder!! We have a few more to convert (We needed several versions of converter tapes and we knew Dad had them, so we waited to record some until after the fact in order to not blow the surprise). We will make sure we wrap those up and return the recorder to you soon - thanks again for helping us put together such a priceless gift. After opening presents, we spent the day watching the old movies and playing games - it was the perfect Christmas. If any of you would like a laugh, stop by for a visit and watch a few - many of you are in the vacation videos and they are pretty hysterical :) I'm sure Dad would enjoy the visit (just don't bring the Flu with you!!!)

Now that Christmas is passed, we are back to business, tackling this radiation process - Dad started whole brain radiation on Tuesday. He will go 5 days a week for the next 3 weeks straight to complete the whole brain and Gamma Knife radiation process. The purpose of the whole brain radiation is to zap any little cancer cells that may still be floating throughout the brain. The Gamma Knife radiation on the other hand is a targeted "spot" radiation, where they will target the radiation to hit the two places Dad had brain tumors. As I mentioned in my earlier posts re: Dad's brain surgeries, the Neurosurgeon did believe he was able to get all visible signs of both tumors (amazing) but the radiation is a needed follow up, because there are always remaining microscopic cells still present and they want to ensure they reduce any chances of another tumor surfacing as much as they can through completing the radiation process.

To give you a little info about the actual radiation: each appointment consists approximately of about a 20 min set up period and then the radiation takes about 2 mins, so the appointments themselves are pretty quick. The side effects are supposedly not too terrible either - fatigue, minor pressure and a chance of temporary hair loss are the main effects. So far Dad had a little ear/head pain, but we are working through it and are ready to get this radiation checked off the list, none the less.

He is supposed to also have a follow up chest x-ray as a follow up from the pneumonia, but this hasn't been scheduled yet - I'm also personally hoping he will be able to have his all body scans again soon too, to make sure everything else still looks ok, but the Doctors are suggesting we finish the radiation first. More to come, but please, PLEASE keep those prayers coming that the flu stays away, the radiation goes smoothly, Dad keeps his motivation and positive attitude and that he does not have Melanoma surfacing in any other area between scans. I know we're asking for a lot of prayers for a lot of different things and I've been a little sporadic in posting lately, but Dad really enjoys reading your comments (and so do I) and we need the prayers more than ever.

Here are a few photos from Christmas at the Strieker household - Thanks again and may God Bless all of you and your families' this holiday season!