Jonathan and Melodee Whitman

I want to preface this note by expressing my personal gratitude to you for all of the love and prayerful concern you have demonstrated toward us, particularly in the last few weeks as we have taken a step of faith by leaving the doctors here in Perugia to seek more specialized assistance in Milan.

So without further ado, here are the happenings of this morning:

I was greeted with a phone call around 7:15 from my beloved husband!  He was all prepped and ready to be taken into surgery, complete with paper gown.  If I hadn’t been impressed before by the new doctors and hospital, the paper gown did it now!  At Perugia, we’ve always worn our own clothes, but there they give you gowns!!!!  A little too much excitement, I know.  Then all of the sudden I heard, “Whitman”, and he was gone.

After a few tears and still another prayer, I started the day getting Eva fed and changed, Noah changed and breakfast for the rest of us.  Noah wanted my mom to pray.  As she prayed for Jon, I started crying again, thinking of the pain he would have to deal with in the next several days.  She finished praying, and then out it came.  Noticing that I was crying,  my precious little 3 year old boy, in a matter-of-fact, completely trusting voice responded, “The doctor will fix Daddy’s tongue.”  It wasn’t what he said that shocked me, but how he said it, so certain that Daddy would be okay.  It reminded me again that that is the kind of faith we need to have in our God.  God knows exactly what He is doing, and we need to trust him blindly, just like Noah trusts the doctor.

Intermission

Around 10 after 11 this morning, I received the phone call from Jon’s mom letting me know that he was out of surgery and in the recovery room.  The doctor had come in and explained what all he had done and what the results were.  I know what you’re thinking — “Results? Already?”  Apparently that’s another plus to going to a cancer center.  Here, we have waited at least two weeks for each biopsy; there, they run the biopsies while they have you open so they can take more out if they need to.  So, from what Rachel understood, the doctor cut much deeper into the tongue and took two specimens and then three others from the surrounding area.  All five were CLEAN!!!  The catch is that by making such a large incision, they did have to graft some skin from his shoulder onto his tongue, so the recovery will be more delicate and extensive.  The blessing of this graft, however, should mean less tightness and pain (created by the previous scar) and more mobility of the tongue.

That was the Melodee version.  Thank you for bearing with my loquacious writing tendencies!

If you have more of the “Jon” mentality of conciseness, here’s how you can praise God:

1. Despite missing the assigned train, God allowed Rachel and Jon to change tickets without any problems, resulting in minimal tardiness to the hospital.

2. The surgery went well, with the best possible results: all of the biopsies were completely clean, and the skin graft should allow more more mobility without tightness and pain!

3. Jon is in a comfortable room without other patients where he can rest and not have to talk.

Here’s how you can keep praying:

1. Pray for Jon to be able to support the pain and the feeding tube.

2. Pray for his mom and others that will be there to assist him.

3. Pray for his physical recovery and spiritual encouragement.

4. Pray that he will NOT talk under ANY circumstances, as this is very important for the grafting process.

Thank you again for all of your support and prayers,

Melodee, for Jon, Noah and Eva