August 2014. I was living at the old home place when I first got the news. My husband of 50+ years was in a different state, planning to retire at the end of the year. The old home place originally belonged to my husband's grandmother, then his mother. We bought his sister's half out.
The house sits on about an acre of land in a small town. It was originally built around 1937 out of used lumber from an old library or a church. We aren't certain which. It was only four rooms back then. When Tom was a boy, they added two more rooms out of lumber that was a part of the old, wooden Methodist Church in town that was being rebuilt with brick and mortar.
Tom's mother had gone to be with the Lord around ten years before. Our daughter and her family were in and out through the years which helped keep it in shape. However, it had been waiting a long, lonely time for us to come. A house, especially wooden ones, seem to have a soul. If they sit too long without anyone to care, they begin to die. For the last 4 years I would spend months there cleaning and trying to get things ready for us to move back. With Tom promising to retire for sure at the end of 2014, and with a desire to have as much done as possible so he would not have to work too hard when he finally moved back home, I was there cleaning, and working hard to get things ready.
Old, nasty rugs had been removed and the floor cleaned and cleaned again. The house was painted, most of the old water pipes had been replaced. Even the broken down sewer line had been rerouted and nearly all replaced. A big oak tree that was leaning close to the house was cut down as we get high winds and tornados in the area. We did not want to have to remove the tree from the house one stormy day, so we went ahead and cut it down.
During this time, I began helping to start a Bible College at the local correctional facility. The courses came out of Huntsville, Alabama. I was the facilitator for the video courses that we used, giving and grading the tests and papers. What was really exciting about the courses is that those who completed the courses would get college credit for them.
I had been planning to visit my sister who was battling cancer and check on Tom on my way back. However, plans changed. Our son and his family had been living with Tom in our city house. He called my daughter and had her call me. Tom had a stroke and was in the hospital. The doctor had revealed more of what they found to our son as he is an RN. He shared what he knew with our daughter who broke it to me gently. My precious husband who was never sick and never went to the doctor had cancer.
The Chaplin at the correctional facility took over my duties with the course work so the students could finish and get credit for their courses. My daughter made arrangements so that she could travel with me.
It was hard on me. Though I love the Lord and expect great things from Him, this was my husband - the man who had been so much a part of my life for so many years. It was so good that our daughter could help both Tom and me as we learned the extent of his illness. It turned out that tests showed that he had experienced four mini-strokes. The blessing is that the strokes only slightly effected his eyes and hearing, He is physically fully functional. What the strokes did was get him into a hospital where they found out he had stage 4 prostate cancer that had metastasized to his bones and lymph glands.
The normal PSA for a man, I believe, is a count of 1 to 4. Tom's PSA level was 640. That kind of count is worse than bad news. We did not know it at the time. We just knew it was bad.
Tom is known for his Christian walk. All who know him, know he love the Lord and lives for Him. Our Christian friends and the students in the Bible classes began to pray. The prayers of so many have made a huge difference. Tom recovered from the strokes to a large degree, but now has to wear glasses. The doctors said that the shots they would give him would seek out that kind of cancer all over his body. His oncologist suggested giving him chemo but Tom declined. Therefore, they just gave him shots which she said would be like taking out of his body and his bones the hormone that was feeding that kind of cancer.
God listens when we pray. His answer has been to reduce the PSA in Tom's body now to 0.13. His oncologist agrees that the results are dramatic, that it has to be God!
