A prompt update for a change....

If you have ever been to Cheltenham hospital, you will know that the parking situation is terrible. So we were grateful to the Lord when, just as we drove in to the carpark by the Oncology clinic, a lady was just reversing out of the space nearest the door!

After the normal wait, we were called in to see the Registrar, rather than the consultant. However, that was not a problem - he's the one Sue knows from her Gloucester Hospital days, who took her Groshong line out back in July, and he's a nice chap. It's a blessing to have someone you know, and get on well with, rather than someone you have never seen before.

As expected, it was not a particularly "medical" visit, in the sense that there was no blood test, no blood pressure or temperature test, or (of course) any new scan results. It was more "how are you feeling? how is your appetite? how is the pain?" and so on. We did discuss the pain she often gets in the evenings, and learned that we need to be more regimented in the time she takes her tablets. Strange as it may seem, a 12-hour slow release pain-relief tablet will run out after 12 hours! and if she has had her breakfast early, she will therefore either need to take her morning tablets later, or expect to take her evening ones early!

He was also pleased to note - although Sue was not! - that she has put back on some of the weight she lost earlier in the year. He thought it was a good sign, but I think Sue was disappointed.

So now we await a date for the next scan, probably in about four weeks' time; and then another meeting with the Consultant or the Registrar, in about six weeks, to see what happens next.

As always, we are so thankful that - in the grace and mercy of God, and no doubt due to the prayers of so many brothers and sisters in Christ for us - we are remarkably at peace about the present and the future. It is a joy to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that "our times are in His hands", and a privilege to rest in His love; to be able to ask that His will may be done, and His name glorified, in us and through us.