All Clear!
We have just gotten home from seeing the radiation oncologist and we got the news we’ve been praying to hear. All clear! No sign of the cancer in the PET scan he had on Monday or in the doctor’s exam. We are relieved, thrilled, ecstatic and we feel so blessed. There really aren’t enough words there to describe how wonderful it is to get this news but you get the idea. 
The doctor says that from now on Shannon only needs a once a year PET scan along with follow-up doctor visits in between to keep an eye on things. We will be going back to this doctor in 6 months. We already had an appointment with the surgeon for the end of June and there is an appointment with the chemo oncologist shortly before Shannon sees this doctor again.
The doctor today seemed very pleased with Shannon’s progress as far as maintaining his weight and his eating. Shannon does still have problems with a few things because the radiation has damaged his saliva glands. The biggest trouble he has is with things like bread which tends to just clump up in his mouth and form a lump he can’t swallow. Most other things he can eat fairly well. Acidic type foods such as citrus or vinegar and very spicy things are also still hard for him to eat but that has improved a lot so maybe he’ll be able to get back to his spicy Mexican food yet. The doctor says he sees a big improvement since the last visit and that the eating will continue to improve slowly over the next couple of years.
Thank you all so much for all the support you’ve given to Shannon and me through all this. All the prayers and well wishes have touched both of us so much and best of all… they worked! I will continue to update this blog whenever Shannon has a doctor visit and I hope to update a bit in between to keep you all informed of his progress. I am not the best at posting updates and I apologize for that. I can promise though that I will update whenever there is any news from a test or a doctor.