Finally!

(John's nephew Shawn)

We moved up John's CT Scan to tomorrow because they are going to start with the Avastin on Thursday. I wanted to see his scans before they started any drugs on him to see if his cancer is growing at all without it first. So FINALLY, Thursday is the day. I asked John if he was nervous, and he said no he just wants to get everything started. Well I am glad he is holding it together, because I am freaking out to say the least. This has been one crazy year so far. I hope John's Doctor can change that for us starting Thursday! So please wish him luck and pray your hearts out that all goes well!!!

GOOD news and BAD news bears!

I haven't posted forever because I wanted to make sure that I had all the details of what was going on. It's good and bad news.

A couple of weeks ago the lady from the Doctor's office called and said that the drug company is going to give John the medicine!!! That all I knew for about two weeks. We didn't know any other details until this week. It was driving me crazy!! So we sent off our income to Genentech, and so for John to get the medicine shouldn't be too much longer.

They said that they will be giving John Avastin for a year!!! Which is great to hear! Unfortunately they will not cover the infusion. I am not for sure how much this is going to run us, but it doesn't really matter because he will be doing it anyways. As for right now we are still continuing with the fund raising, which is going pretty good! How truly amazing and humbling that experience has been!!! We are so blessed!!!

Holy cow things have been crazy busy and we are trying to keep up with our lives, and keep them as normal as possible, but it seems like it's just stressful the worry about John's health. It makes everything a lot more difficult to deal with. My Grandpa Bowen always used to tell me "If you've got your health, you've got everything." At first I was like thinking "Okay, Grandpa" but now I know exactly what he means. The elderly know everything!!! :) I hope to learn a lot more from my grandparents. (My Grandpa Bowen, Isn't he cute??) :)

I pray that this Avastin will help John keep his health for a long, long time!!!

His little turkey's need him!!

One more shot!

Yesterday we did find out that the insurance wont cover the Avastin that I told you all about. They said it's because FDA hasn't approved it for John's cancer and they don't want to be responsible if the medicine were to hurt John more than help him. LAME!! I tell ya!
Anyways, finally the lady from the doctor's office called me and she said we have one more thing we can try.

There is a reimbursement link on the Avastin website that Dr. Gray told us about. He told us that if we apply for it they may pay for everything or give it to John for cheap. So this is what we are hoping for. Genentech is the name of the company and they require that you try your insurance first. So yesterday after we found out, John went and signed the paperwork for Genentech. They will be calling us soon to verify our income and we will see from there.This will be the last shot to get this medication, without help the proceedure and drug would cost $10,000.00 dollars every two to three weeks. So it's not cheap. It's unforunate that we have the drug in the United States and it is this hard to get it for a 25 year old who needs it! We are hoping still and I will let you know as soon as we find out!

Thank you everyone for your support and love and prayers!! We love you all!!!

Feels like forever!!!!

It seems like it's been years since we found out about John's cancer coming back. It's only been a couple of months. We are pretty stressed some days and others feel like they are kinda normal. I am kinda sick of having to rely on others, like the lady at the doctors office that told me that she would send in the authorization for the Avastin on Wednesday. I have been calling the insurance everyday since then to see if they received it. Because the lady at the doctors office wont call me back.

FINALLY today the insurance informed me that they received it and that we should know within a couple of days! You bet ya I'm going to call them everyday till we find out. :) I can't stand waiting for things in case you don't know me very well. I am very persistent and I am glad I am cause you have to be when your husband has cancer and your daughter has special needs. When we find out I will be updating on here asap!

Avastin

Avastin is the name of the drug that the doctor wants John to take. Avastin is the tumor blocking medication that I mentioned earlier. It targets the tumors and the blood flow from them so the tumors cannot grow. It has really no side effects! Dr. Gray wants him to take these because he believes that they may lengthen John's life by 20 years. If this medicine works John will have to stay on it for the rest of his life.

Avastin has been approved by the FDA for seven different types of cancers. Unfortunatly it has not been approved for ACC by the FDA, because it has not been tested on ACC. It is so rare that they don't have enough patients to really do clinical trials on. We have been told by Dr. Gray's patient advocate that Avastin will probably not be covered by insurance. They are still filling out paper work to see if they might.

We are praying and hoping that the insurance will cover some of it and that John can get the help he needs to survive this cancer. I talked with the insurance company for a while yesterday and if we have to appeal it, then it is up to us write a letter letting them know why John should be able to receive these benefits from the insurance. No pressure of anything!!

If he gets it he will have to go to the doctors office every 2 weeks and get an infusion, (like chemo) but no hair loss, and no nausea!! Why wouldn't John want to do these right?? Even if the insurance covers them we still have a spendy out of pocket copay every time. But it's worth it for John's life!(John as a young boy, with a mullet I must add)

John is 25 years old

We celebrated John's 25 Birthday with family. We went to Outer Limits in Pocatello. With John's sister Clarissa and her family, Missy and her family, his Mom, and my sister Chelsey and her boyfriend Chris. Almost everyone played laser tag and we all played lots of video games. We had a great time. John said the laser tag was fun even though he lost. :)

For weeks before his Birthday John let me know that he wanted to take one bite of cookie. He wouldn't stop talking about it. So my gift to him was this huge chocolate chip cookie cake from Mrs. Fields.

Then he wanted to eat one more bite of h is favorite Pizza Hut pizza. So we ordered a pizza just for John. He was so excited because he had not cheated at all on his diet until then. Before this diet John would go get a coke and a treat every day,so this was a big deal for him.

Almost everyone gave him money for his gifts which so nice of everyone! Thank you!
His sister Jen got him Dave Matthews Band tickets for this summer down here. It will be fun because before John and I were married we went to the same concert!
Thanks Jen and Jeff, we are so excited, can't wait!

Overall a great Birthday for John! I can't wait for more to come!