Update.

Life has been chaos these last few days. We had the bad news late Wednesday night and Mama was admitted into the hospital. My aunts and uncle began making plans to drive up to stay the weekend with us. My sister (and I) stayed up most of Wednesday night crying so I didn't get but about an hour of sleep. Thursday afternoon, we left the hospital to get the house ready for company and let Princess out. The water had been turned off so they could work on a fire hydrant. We cleaned the best we could with no water, then went back to the hospital. Past ten o'clock that night, we came home and opened the door to the sound of running water. Apparently, we left a faucet on in the upstairs bathroom while the water was off. When the water came back on......you can guess the rest. The sink overflowed and flooded the bathroom out into the hallway upstairs and also began to pour through the ceiling. We had a waterfall in our dining room. The extra mattress we had set up in the dining room was absolutely saturated, as was the carpet in two rooms. And I mean saturated. After four jobs with a wet-vac, it's still not completely dry. The ceiling is covered in water damage and the dining room light fixture has gone dead. And the upstairs carpet is ruined, too. So, we had a mad rush to get up the water the best we could, wash all the towels, wash dishes, and make other sleeping arrangements for our visitors. At nearly midnight, my dad went upstairs to sleep, completely worn out and exhausted and I sat up with my sister waiting for my aunts to get here. We spent another sleepless night. I think I only got two hours of sleep. Then we went back to the hospital.

It's hard to remember step-by-step how everything has happened now. The first liver biopsy showed nothing abnormal, so they were going to do a mammogram and colonoscopy, but not rule out problems with her liver. They did a more detailed CT scan, which showed it was not one large mass in her liver, but a cluster of small masses and her lymph nodes between her heart and lungs are enlarged. So, we were hopeful that it wasn't as bad as it sounded at first. All our company was gone by Sunday morning and I spent the day running errands. Today, I worked 8-430. My managers are very understanding that I need to take time off, but I needed to work a few hours this week. When I went to the hospital tonight, they still had not done the mammogram and now seem more concerned about doing a colonoscopy. Mama said the cancer specialist had come around and told her he wanted another liver biopsy and that all the specialist on her case were just unsure of what the source of the problem is. But he left us with the impression that it is some sort of cancer. They just can't pinpoint where it is.

So, that's where we are tonight. I feel emotionally and physically drained. Among the minor catastrophes that also occurred this weekend, I got pulled over and given a warning ticket for forgetting to turn my headlights on and Princess stepped on Gabrielle's brand new boots with dirty feet and stained them. I know that in the light of everything else that is going on things like that are trivial, but in the moment, they are the straws that almost break me. And those are only two of the minor aggravations. We are trying in between hospital visits to get someone out here to rip up the carpet before it begins to mold from all that water, but that is easier said than done. We're dealing the best we can, hoping and praying for the best, but at the same time, I'm so exhausted I can hardly think straight. Please continue to keep us in your thoughts and prayers.