I traveled back to Springfield, MO with my family this week. I made it through the 3rd chemo in Nashville with flying colors. In fact, I am feeling better than the last 2 chemos, I just get tired in the early evenings. My Dad and I are walking 2 miles down to the farm and back everyday and I am trying to stay active. I do miss Meghan though.

I plan to stay in MO and get the rest of my chemos here as I am eating well (lots of greens and brown rice) and need to stay away from people for my immune system's sake. I will go to back to Nashville mid July to get an updated CT scan. To be honest, my May experience scared me a little but now I feel more confident that I will make it through all of this. If I can be on a ventilator for 12 days and survive, I can beat cancer. I have told many of you before, life takes on different
priorities once you realize how brief it can be... I'm still reassigning those in my mind. I will keep you updated.

Dave

Hey everyone,

Thank you for your prayers, God is good! I made it through one of the most difficult experiences of my life thanks to your prayers. I wanted to let everyone that I am at home as of Wed. I got out of the ICU and went to Stallworth rehab hospital for a week to relearn how to walk,
climb stairs, etc.

I dont remember much of the month of May, which is probably a good thing. I have a wonderful family and girlfriend that were there at every moment during my struggle. At this point I just want to move forward with treatment. Being in a hospital bed for 3 weeks can take it out of you. I am still tired but I try to walk the neighborhood everyday to regain my strength. I plan to resume chemo next Wed 6/6/07, which will be my 3rd treatment out of six. I have a feeling that all will go smoothly now that all that has happened could happen and we have the kinks worked out. I am watching what I eat, using a mask for public places and vistors and have become a hand washing freak. My last chemo is August 8th and I plan to teach in the Fall as I go through
radiation, which I hear is far less demanding than chemo. There is a chance I could get my last couple of treatments in MO in order to stay with my parents but I am still deciding what the best option is.

Please continue praying for Meghan and I and my family and PLEASE call me during the days! I am sitting at home with not much to do and get lonely so I would love to hear from everyone (615) 554-6693.

Dave

Well I have some great news to report. On Wednesday, May 23rd Dave gave his dad a great birthday present and moved out of the ICU into a rehabilitation center across the street from the Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital. He starts his first physical therapy today. He should have about 3 hours a day of PT work, on the weekends it will be a little lighter. They have promised us that Dave will be cooking, cleaning and ironing before he leaves!!! I am looking forward to having Dave iron for me! :)

We don’t know when his chemo will start back up again. The doctors are waiting to see how he does with his rehab first.

I know Dave is looking forward to reading up on his blog, he doesn’t remember a lot that went on these last 3 weeks. The doctors say it will take sometime before he remembers what happened. For now he just remembers what he was dreaming, which was a lot better then what he was going through.

I know that I have learned a lot from this time in our lives. Dave is the strongest man in the world, as far as I am concerned, and I am so proud of him. He never gave up and I am so glad to have him back. God has been so good to us. You hear of how awesome He is, but when you go through this experience you see His faithfulness and His healing power. Words can not describe how it feels to see Dave talking, laughing and walking around. Thanks to everyone again for all the thoughts, prayers, e-mails and cards that you sent. We are grateful and truly blessed to have all of you.

Hello All-

Thank you for all your prayers. These two days have been incredible for Dave and his progress. Yesterday, Dave got put on pressure support and turn down to 40 on the ventilator. He was doing so well that they said he would have gotten him off then, but it was too late in the day. So this morning they took Dave off of his sedatives and decided that they would take the breathing tube out. About 11am Dave came off the ventilator, but the breathing mask they had for was working for him and they thought they were going to have to put in back on the ventilator. However, they tried another breathing mask and with a little coaching from the team (Dave parents and me) we were able to get him to stick with the mask. It will take Dave a couple days to come off all his sedatives that he is on. He keeps going in and out with sleeping. He has tried to talk, but we are not sure what he is saying. I know that he doesn't like this mask from the time they tried it before he went on the ventilator. So we just have to keep praying and hoping that as his when his sedatibes ware off that he will be able to use his lungs better and wouldn't have to go back on the ventilator. One of his doctors did say that Dave has turn around 180 degrees from where he was in the beginning (these doctors don't give compliments out too much so that is wonderful). Again please keep us in your prayers there is a lot that has to happen before we are out of the woods, but we are taking great steps in the right directions.

Meghan

Well, it has been 9 days since Dave has been on a ventilator. We have had up days and down days. Some days he is awake enough to write things down and then there are days that he is completely sedated.

A couple of days ago Dave was put on heavier sedatives because he has high anxiety with the ventilator in his throat so they had to change him to assist mode (the highest mode) on the ventilator. They said they were going to move him back and forth from assist to pressure support, but haven’t because he has been sleeping so much. It seems that during the day he does better, but in the early morning he gets worse.

The other night I came back to the hospital to visit and he had a heart rate of 200. They gave his some medicine to stop his heart for a few seconds and see if it would lower his heart rate. It didn’t work as well as they would have liked. We mainly think it is because Dave doesn’t like all the doctors and commotion they make when they come in, so we have his visitation with the doctors and residents as low impact as possible. The doctors have also agreed to let us spend some more time with him. Someone has spent the night with him for the last couple of nights.
The pulmonary doctors are going to check in with infectious disease to see if Dave has fungus inside him. I think the pulmonary doctors want them to be more aggressive and look into that more. Also they are talking about putting in a trec on Friday or Monday if there are no big improvements with Dave. His lungs are getting slightly better and they think he is taking steps to improvement. We did find out today that Dave has an infection in his blood and they are moving his IV line to his neck. Just another one of those infections people get from being in the hospital and the toll it takes on your body. I will keep you update as we progress.

As always keep us in your prayers and thank you so much for all the ones you have said. I know God has blessed us with some very thoughtful and caring friends and family. I know that He will see Dave through this struggle. We just have to keep fighting along with Dave and keep the faith that God will bring his healing hands on him.

Hey everyone-I wanted to get with you on what has happened over the weekend. Dave was having difficulty breathing and coughing a lot Sunday morning (about 3am) so he and the doctors decided that he would need to be put on the ventilator.

Dave is pretty sedated now, but has been able to communicate with us by writing things down. His condition right now is that he doesn't have a fever, his vitals are looking good and that his lungs are resting. We are hoping and praying that he will only need a few days on the ventilator so that he his lungs can heal. They haven't really given us a time when they will take the breathing tube out of him it could be a couple of days or a couple of months it just depends on the how he is doing. However we want the breathing tube out as soon as possible because with a foreign object in your body there are infections you can get from them too. The doctors did do a procedure on him Sunday that got a specimen from his lungs, they are going to run tests and see if that they can figure out what is on his lungs.

Right now the ICU specialist and Internal Disease specialist are on his case. They are all working, trying to figure out exactly what bacteria is in Dave and how they can fix him. Since he doesn't have a fever they think that the bacteria may be gone and now we have to wait on the body to heal.

Dave is on a low setting of 50 on his ventilator which is good we want it to go down to 30 so that they can see if he can breath on his own. I know this is a little confusing to be quite honest I still haven't grasped everything going on. His parents mostly talk with the doctors and I think I like it that way. Doctors seem to give you the goods and the bads and I am just trying to keep positive. His parents and I believe that Dave has to get better and we are looking forward to the celebrating that time with him.

Thank you so much for your thoughts, e-mails and prayers. They help me and his family so much. Dave is truely a "tough" guy. I will continue to keep you update on his condition.

Hello to all of Dave's dearest friends and family:

Unfortunately, Dave is unable to update his own blog so he asked if I would update all of you on what is going on with him. It is easier to break it up by day so I will start from the beginning of the week. I know that I am probably messing up some of the details, but once Dave feels better then he can correct me. :)

Monday, April 30th - Dave wasn't feeling very well and hadn't been all weekend. His dad came to cheer him up and be with him over the weekend and for the beginning of the week. Around 9ish that night Dave was running a light fever and ran one through out the rest of the night with some difficult breathing.

Tuesday, May 1st and Wednesday, May 2nd - Went by Dr Morgan's office (his oncologist) to get checked out. His doctor decided to check him into the hospital that afternoon. Dave had pneumonia. He wasn't getting better over the days and actually feeling a lot worse. Temperature was staying in high 102 to 103 and hi cough was getting a lot worse.

Thursday, May 3rd - Not getting any better, actually getting quite worse. Temperature spiked to 104.4 and was placed in the "ice chamber" (this is where they have him under an ice blanket; it measures in temperature between 55-66 degrees and they placed ice on his neck and armpits to cool off the body). Dave's dad had to help him through the day and night to keep temperature from getting higher.

Friday, May 4th - Checked into the intensive care unit (ICU) so he could get more one on one care. Was given a mask to help with his breathing and was feeling a lot better!!!! I spent the night with him and we got his temperature down to normal for several hours, as well as some of his other vitals. So he was looking good all night long, he was actually getting his sense of humor back and we were making jokes during the early morning hours.

Saturday, May 5th - He took a turn for the worse this morning. Fever went up and vitals were not what the doctors thought they should be. They were going to put him on a venerator to help control his breathing. Basically, Dave has pneumonia on his left lung thus having his right lung do all the work for him. The doctors are trying to give him as much antibiotics as possible to help him kill the bacteria in him that his causing the spread of pneumonia, however they are having trouble finding out exactly what the bacteria is because of blood culture results. I left this afternoon with Dave getting sedated so he could rest, which by the way he was very happy to get. This is what he has been dealing with for the last week. I know I have left some parts out, but in a nutshell Dave is really sick and in the ICU. He goes through ups and downs….it is like a roller coaster…and the doctor said that this is to be expected when a patient in the ICU.

On a personal note this has been one of the hardest things I have ever done. Dave is absolutely miserable and it is so painful to see someone you love so dearly so sick and you are so helpless to do anything for him. Please please keep him in your prayers and I will continue to keep the blogs updated. If you have any questions or just want to send Dave an encouraging note you can e-mail me at meghanahall@hotmail.com or send him mail him at 5801 Tee Pee Trace Antioch, TN 37013. Thank you for all the support.

Love, Meghan