The picture above is of two of the most amazing men that I know. My dad (on the bed) and my uncle Jim (next to him). My uncle has cancer and has beaten it before...he is a fighter! My mom and dad flew back from the Philippines to be with him and to undergo a stem cell transplant (I think that is what it is haha). This summer all of the brothers and sisters on the Schaefer tested to see who has the closest DNA to uncle Jim and the winner gets to help him out! It was pretty neat and a huge blessing that almost our entire family was together this summer in South Dakota. 75% of cancer patients do not have a donor match in their family that is close enough to them and have to get added to a national registry an wait...we got lucky! My uncle has been going through chemo treatments and this transplant is what our family hopes will be able to save him. For a week the poked by dad with different needles and going through a ton of different tests to make sure he is 100% healthy. Today he will spend 6 hours in that bed getting stem cells drawn. The hope is that these stem cells replace all of my uncles bad stem cells when they get put into him. At then end of the procedure my uncle will have my dads DNA - crazy! I know I am bad at explaining all of these scientific things but I really just hope it works out.
Being away from my family in their time of need is one of the most painful things ever but I know that I can pray for them both and pray that this works! Please join me in that :)
No comments:
Post a Comment