CHAPTER 1

Now is the Time ...

to Obey

Jill Young

My journey began on July 3, 2007, when I went to the hospital for acolonoscopy. I remember being wheeled in to this small room, and itwas freezing cold! I was probably in there about two minutes before I fellasleep. I woke up while being wheeled into recovery and it seemed thatimmediately the doctor was shoving a picture in my face telling me I hadcancer saying, "This is the tumor that has spread outside your colon".Talk about bedside manners—he had none!

I was kept at the hospital all day and met with the surgeon who was sucha nice man as well as a man of faith. He was sending me home since thenext day was the Fourth of July, and he wanted me back for surgery onJuly 5th.

Everything happened so fast that I didn't really have time to think aboutwhat was happening to me. I just felt like I would go and have this tumorcut out and everything would be back to normal, right? Wrong! I did goback for my surgery on the 5th of July, and I was in surgery for about 5hours. I went to recovery and then to ICU for a few days and was thenmoved into a room.

The surgeon came in and talked to me and told me that I had stage 3cancer and that I would need to take chemotherapy. I found myself anoncologist at Bruno's Cancer Center in Birmingham, AL, and went to meetwith him. He proceeded to tell me that I had stage 4 cancer because it hadnow spread to my liver. He said that I need to attack this very aggressivelyand take chemo for six months. The process would be for me to come inevery other week, take my treatment and take a pump home with methat would pump chemo into my system over the next 24 hours, and thenI would remove the pump myself. He told me I should not lose my hair, buthe gave me a long list of other side effects that I might experience.

I sat with him dumbfounded over the sheer volume of information I wastaking in without mentioning the fact that I'm processing the knowledgethat the Cancer is now Stage 4—the final stage doctors give a patient.

I will never forget the long ride home, sitting there looking up at the skyand thinking about my boys—how was I going to tell them? I really don'tremember much about that night but my husband, Greg, told our olderson that mommy was sick and had to see the doctor. My younger sonwas too young to know what was going on—he just knew mommy hadto take a lot of medicine.

Lying in bed that same night after seeing my oncologist, I began talkingto the Lord asking a lot of questions like, "Why me?" "Am I going to beokay?" "Am I going to be able to raise my boys?" And I will never forgetthat night what the Lord told me. He said, "You are already healed,"and then He said, "Raise your hands to heaven and praise me." Oh whata powerful promise He gave me! When I raised my hands to heaven andstarted to praise Him I broke down crying and sobbing. I had a revivalin my bedroom, and it was exactly what I needed to get me throughthe next six months of chemo and all the ups and downs that go alongwith it.

The six months of treatment actually went by pretty fast, and all myscans were showing that I was cancer free! The oncologist told me thetreatments were over, but I had to continue to come back every threemonths for PET scans and blood work, so that's what I did.

Coming up on my one year anniversary of being cancer free, I went toget the results of my PET scan, and the doctor didn't have good newsfor me. He told me that the cancer was back, and it was in my liver. Myheart sank, and I'm thinking, here I go again, immediately feeling all theemotions and fear of the year before while trying to listen to what thedoctor was telling me.

He told me that he had already spoken with a surgeon about going in andseeing if he could remove the tumor from my liver, and the surgeon hadagreed to do the surgery and see what he could do.

I met surgeon that same week and he told me that he felt like he coulddo the surgery and remove the tumor. The surgery was set for the verynext week.

Surgery was set for 7:00 am, so I arrived at 6:00. My mom and dad wentwith us, and my older son came a little later with my brother. I was atpeace. I knew that my Lord was going to take care of me, and I did nothave anything to worry about. They took me back to get me ready forsurgery, but I was able to see my family before they just prior to enteringthe operation room. Greg held my hand and prayed for me and thesurgeon.

I woke up in the recovery room in so much pain. I really had difficult timebreathing because they had cut through my abdominal muscles to get tothe liver. The surgeon came to see me, and he told me that he couldn'tremove the tumors from my liver; he thought it would be best if I tookchemo to shrink them and then we would reevaluate the surgery later.

This was not what I wanted to hear, but if it is what I had to do, then Iwould do it.

When I came home from the hospital, I was filled with questions for myLord. I had to talk to Jesus. More why's—"Why am I having to go throughall this again, Lord, when you told me that I was healed, cause it reallydoesn't look like I'm healed." He spoke: "I told you that you were healed.You may not see the results of it yet, but if you faint not, you will see yourhealing, and then you will understand why our Father has allowed this tohappen." So I said, "Okay Jesus, I'm not a quitter. I will fight, and I will seemy healing, and whatever you want me to do, I will do it, and I give you allthe glory!"

I waited about a month before I could start my treatment again so thatthe incisions had time to heal. Greg and I went back to see what myoncologist was going to give me this go-round. He planned to give methe same thing that he did the first time, but with a few changes. He putme on an experimental drug, and I went every two weeks.

This time, I did lose my hair, and this was really hard on me because I hadlong, curly hair, and I lost all of it. The treatments were getting harder,and it started to take a tow on my body. I just kept...