****Long overdue update****

Friends and family, sorry we haven't been on the ball with updating this blog, but here is a long overdue update of how Mary's treatments are going. After having three rounds of chemo and seven weeks of radiation, Mary has enjoyed several weeks of freedom from the treatments. She has spent a lot of time with family and has been riding her horse at every opportunity. On one of her horse rides, she rode through a patch of June Bugs, which spooked the horse and Mary was bucked off. She landed on some rocks scraping her face and embedding debris. In addition to a black eye, a subsequent infection in her wounds caused a swollen face resulted in a "hellacious" week in and out of the hospital receiving IV antibiotics for the infection. On June 8th Dr.'s did a test on Mary's kidneys, liver and brain to make sure the cancer had not spread to any of those vital organs. The news was good and NO cancer was found. The once softball sized tumor in Mary's lung has now shrunk and split into 2 one-inch sized tumors (the Dr.'s aren't even sure if they are real tumors, or if what is showing up on her scans are actually just scar tissue.) Today Mary began her last round of chemo treatment which will go through the next 5 days. It will be nice for her to have the chemo phase in the past. She will also have one more battle with radiation treatment. Although she has NO cancer in her brain, Dr.'s have explained that lung cancer can often spread to the brain, and as a preventative measure she will receive 15 days of a low dose radiation to her brain. Radiation treatments will begin July 18th. Once the radiation treatments are complete, a PET scan will be done in August. The PET scan will reveal if there are any existing cancer cells in her body. We continue to exercise our faith and prayers in Mary's behalf, and invite you to do the same as she continues to fight this battle.