Letter from Richard

Dear Friends,
First, I would like to say thank you for all the support you have given my family during this time. It has been overwhelming to me to realize the number of people who have touched our lives.
To each of you, I give my heartfelt thanks, admiration, and love. You are very special to us. Your support, especially to Heather, Anna, and Paul, has left a lasting impression on all of us. As many know, today, I went into the hospital with hopes of having my stomach and surrounding tissue removed expunging the tumor. The procedure was to take 6 or more hours.
The first part of the procedure was another exploratory laparoscopy to review the area around the stomach, liver, pancreas, intestines, and esophagus for additional tumors and margin to remove the infected stomach.
There was no sign of additional spread to organs which is extremely positive. Unfortunately, there was not enough margin between potentially active
tumor cells and the esophagus. What this means, is the surgery was aborted and returned to oncology for additional eradication and treatment prior to attempting removal.
The current recommendation is 3 more rounds of chemotherapy predicated on agreement by my oncologist. Biopsies were performed as well and the results will be available in a few days. My response to the previous rounds of chemotherapy has been successful. At this point, I am back in a holding pattern but the next rounds of chemotherapy will be even stronger than the previous and will likely have more impact on my day to day activity level.
Clearly, the results today were not what any of us had hoped but we knew that it was a possibility. I remain realistically hopeful given the severity of the situation.
I appreciate your continued support for my family as they are the reason I do everything, everyday.

Thanks,
Richard Mackey

Todays the day

Richard was wheeled back to the OR at 7:15 this morning.... now comes the waiting part....

The importance of Cheesecake and movie popcorn

As we are counting down to Thursday morning, I wanted to give a quick update... We are heading up to Mayo bright and early for more consults and scopes tomorrow. We enjoyed a movie yesterday with the kids and a big bag of popcorn since we don't know how long it will be (if ever) before Richard can enjoy that greasey, fake yellow colored treat! Tonight we enjoyed a little date night at the cheesecake factory. The hard part now is just waiting for more information which can only come post surgery. Once I know anything, I will post it here and on Facebook. On a lighter note, here are some highlights from our trip, including Richard's debut as a cast member :)

Richard is scheduled for surgery, so we are going to Disneyland!

We have continued on our roller coaster and it has led us to a new surgeon and facility. The surgery is scheduled for bright and early on the 22nd, and a this time it does appear to be a total removal of the stomach. Given that the recovery will be quite hard with the addition of radiation on top of chemo, we opted to go to So Cal for one last family adventure to Legoland and Disneyland (we decided this Monday night and are leaving Thursday morning!)
Richard has been feel really good and has continued to gain weight. We know that it is still an uphill battle with this, but we are up for the challenge.

We were able to continue our Easter tradition of a large Easter Egg Hunt/ Potluck. There were 12 dozen confetti eggs that were the highlight of the party.
Thank you for the continued prayers, encouragement and support.