Sister Jill and I celebrating her birthday on February 1

Hello friends.....it's hard to believe it's been a week since my last post - I'd like to say that it's because the week has been uneventful, but I'm not sure that will fly.  I'll take things a step at a time, and you can be the judge.  As you can see above, Jill and I made the drive out to Galveston on her birthday, Wednesday of last week.  We had a very "gulf coast" type dinner and it was excellent.  One of Jill's student's family gave her a gift card, a 'love offering', for her trip to visit me and we used it to pay for our dinner - more love from the body of Christ.  Jill headed back to Illinois on Sunday - we had a great time together for the week - what a blessing Jill was to us!  She cooked and cleaned and took care of me with that great servant's heart, and enabled Renee to get that well-deserved week off.  That's giving of oneself.  I am generally avoiding crowds, so it was a quiet week - we did a lot of reading, watched a little TV, and had many long discussions about family and faith.    I have two truly wonderful sisters!

I got the results of the bone marrow biopsy, and they were in line with expectations - 5% lymphocytes remaining.  As I forecasted last week, this is the typical result (minimal disease) at this stage.  The idea now is that my new immune system cleans up the remaining leukemia - The next biopsy will be at about 100 days, or April 1.  Dr. Hosing said this was a good result, but I'll be honest - I don't ever like to hear that there's still some cancer!  Still, I trust Dr. Hosing and we are praising God for the fact that it's almost gone.  Technically I am not in remission until there's zero cancer, which we will hopefully verify at my day 100 re-staging.

I have felt very well in the last few days, thought I've felt a little nauseous in the last 12 hours.  That's been brief and easily controlled with an anti-nausea pill.  I just mention it to demonstrate again how quickly things can change - I haven't felt any nausea for weeks until today.  GVHD can present with upper GI symptoms, so it needs to be watched.  Dr. Hosing is planning to discharge me next Thursday(!), but I have to caution myself and everyone that there are still a lot of things that can happen - another example is that I have some virus that has been activated - again, it's common to transplant patients - and I'm getting another medication for that - Dr. Hosing said that the medication can disrupt bone marrow function which can affect blood counts.  So, I'm not counting on anything until we are in the car and approaching Baton Rouge :-)

First Presbyterian Church of Houston this past Sunday

An update on the young man that Anne Marie wanted me to visit - A-M asked me to visit him Tuesday evening - the first good day for me to do so was Friday - I called the hospital and asked for his room - they said there was no one admitted by that name - when I checked back with Anne Marie, she shared with me that Scott had had a miraculous recovery from surgery starting on Wednesday, which resulted in him being discharged that very day (Friday) and allowed him to head back to California with his parents.  So, I did not get to meet him this time, but praise God for His work in Scott's life!

It's great to have my main squeeze (Renee of course!) back in Houston.  We're starting to plan our exodus, though we know the plans can change any time.  Another good time to put my faith in the Lord and trust Him, getting my mind ready for whatever His plans turn out to be.  I want to share a video with you....it's very moving to me, and it's the closest thing I've seen on this earth to what I think worship in Heaven will be like.  The passion of the worshipers and the musicians/choir is remarkable and challenges me and my relatively sober worship style.  The second half of the video is the most inspiring.  I hope you enjoy it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVeZRCIQzcI

Thanks and glory be to the Lord who has delivered me through the valley!  There may be more valleys ahead but I know He will see me through anything, and I also know that whatever comes my way, He has a divine and eternal purpose for it, which will be revealed to me in glory.  I know that my redeemer lives!  God bless you - I am eternally grateful for your prayers and support!  Dan and Renee