A Very Good Day!

 My God, my Adored One, my King, my Desire! What tongue can voice my thanks to Thee? I was heedless, Thou didst awaken me. I had turned back from Thee, Thou didst graciously aid me to turn towards Thee. I was as one dead, Thou didst quicken me with the water of life. I was withered, Thou didst revive me with the heavenly stream of Thine utterance which hath flowed forth from the Pen of the All-Merciful.

  Baha'u'llah

Monday was a Very Good Day! (Actually so was Sunday as well). I spent these two days with my sweet wife, celebrating our 18th wedding anniversary! 18 years is a long time....it feels like an entire lifetime, and it is hard to actually feel much connection back to the days before I met her! But if the past 18 years with Lauretta have done anything for me, they have helped me to look forward.....to paraphrase Buzz Lightyear, "To Eternity and Beyond!" Can't wait for all the good stuff that lies ahead for us!

On Monday I also had my monthly doctor visit, where they confirm that I am not yet dead. I had been kind of nervous about this appointment because I would be getting some important labwork back that would show how my body was continuing to respond to treatment. Each step of treatment you need to meet specific goals in order to be allowed to continue on. Every day I talk with people who are discontinued because they are not responding fast enough or their body simply cannot take the stress of the therapy. I suspect that this fear always bounces around in the back of everyone's mind who is doing treatment. I think the meds, which increase agitation, anxiety and depression, tend to magnify this lack of confidence at times.

Anyways.......I so easily go off on a tangent........

Monday at 1:30 PM my Nurse Practitioner, Melissa Loos, walked into the room, shook my hand, wished me a Happy New Year, and then smiled and said, "you are undetectable"! UNDETECTABLE!!! (Sounds like I am invisible....but it is even better!!!!!) This means that my viral load that started out over 15 million i/u per ml is now less than 43 i/u ml.....a level so low that the equipment cannot detect it! Hence the term "UNDETECTABLE." I got her to give me my own copy of the lab report so that I can say, " I am certifiably undetectable"!

I hear you saying, "so that means that your done with treatment....you have beat Hepatitis C. Right Rus?"

And I scuff the dirt with my feet and look you in the eyes and answer, "No....this virus is so insidious that even after you have cleared it from your bloodstream you need to keep taking the chemotherapy for an additional 36 weeks". I think that this is just to help us develop strength and character ;) .  Even after that I still will have to wait for several months and see if the virus tries to rear it's ugly head again (but after the way I treated it last time you would think it should not better)!

But for now... the great news is that I am officially undetectable!!!!! My body is healing and my internal organs are recovering after years of constant assault from the virus. Though I am still struggling with the side effects of treatment I feel surrounded by love and mercy.

Thank you to everyone who has been praying on behalf of myself and our family! Please continue to keep us in your prayers as we learn to work our way through the spiritual and materially challenges that this process provides to our family. Sometimes we forget that this is a blessing that can help us grow closer together, but other times I know we all feel it! Like on Monday.....which we all knew
was a Very Good Day!