Tomorrow is my surgery. Thank you to everyone who was praying that my skin would heal in time, it’s looking almost completely normal and the surgeon is ready to proceed. I had my pre-operative meeting with him on Monday and the surgery is scheduled for tomorrow from roughly 8am-2pm central.

The doctor said that the latest MRI is a clearer view of the mass and he thinks it’s actually within the brachialis muscle rather than the bicep. It seems weird to suddenly discover this right before the surgery, but I’m starting to learn that imaging, while impressive, is not an exact science. Either way, the doctor will have a full understanding once he gets inside the arm tomorrow. The doctor plans to take the majority of whichever muscle has the tumor in it, and a portion of the other muscle. I’m not a doctor, but my understanding is that if I lose the majority of my brachialis, I’ll lose a significant amount of elbow bending strength but will maintain the majority of forearm rotation ability. If I lose the majority of my bicep, it would be the opposite.

This past week that I was able to spend back home was amazing and felt like a true vacation since I didn’t have to do any treatments. I spent lots of time outside and got to hang out with a few different friends and my family. I was also able to get the rest of my stuff and bring it to San Antonio. While it’s not much, it makes my barracks room feel more like my own.

Getting cancer and having to put so many professional and personal aspects of my life on hold has been a very humbling experience. While I was back home though I was humbled even more when I rear-ended someone. No-one was injured and my truck took essentially zero damage (I love my Tacoma), but the other car needs a new bumper which my insurance is taking care of. As far as car accidents go, it was about as minor as it could have been, but it felt like just another thing on top of everything else. I’ve always thought of myself as a great driver so it was yet another way that I’ve been humbled recently.

As you can imagine, I’ve been thinking a lot recently of how the Lord’s infinite power fits with suffering. My first response is to think “suffering is the result of sin and while God can remove our suffering, he sometimes chooses not to in order to grow our faith” While this is true, it overemphasizes the righteous judge aspect of God’s nature and doesn’t account for the sorrow He feels over sin. I had a realization last week that the Lord must have felt an incredible amount of sorrow when Adam and Eve sinned and brokenness was brought into the world. When Adam and Eve sinned, God didn’t just see their sin and therefore the suffering they would endure, but also saw the suffering every person for all of eternity would endure. Back in the garden when Adam and Eve sinned, God saw the cancer that I would have thousands of years later. While He knew it was coming, I can’t imagine the amount of sorrow He must have felt in that moment of the original sin. When I think of that, I’m reminded that God never intended for us to suffer and He isn’t an emotionless God, but feels my pain as well.

The last few weeks have been busy as I’ve been wrapping up radiation, going to MD Anderson, going to Florida, and getting prepped for my surgery. While I’m ready to get this mass out of my arm, I feel a strange sense of grief as I think about losing either my bicep or brachialis. While not to the same extreme, it feels almost like losing a friend. I’d say that after 24-years, my arm muscles and I have a pretty good relationship, but in less than 24-hours, my muscle will be biological waste. It’s a strange emotion I feel as I wonder how it will affect my life in the future.

Since the surgeon is working with such tight margins and trying to save muscle while also making sure the mass is completely removed, he can’t say what the outcome will be until post-surgery. I’m going to have to wait until I wake up from surgery and then ask how much of my arm muscle he was able to save. That’s such a strange and uncomfortable feeling. I’ve met with this surgeon several times over the past few months and I really respect him and trust him. Please pray that he would perform the surgery as well as possible and that nothing would come up.

I also have one night left before my muscle is removed. I know that the Lord can at any time supernaturally remove this mass from my arm despite what medicine says. Please continue to pray that the Lord would remove it even as I’m preparing for surgery.