Thompson's Welcome 2016

Hello family and friends!

Let me start out by saying Wow! What an eventful year we just had. Everything from a recurrence tumor, traveling up and down the coast in search for the right treatment plan,rigourous course loads (both of us), applying for grad schools, having a baby, and trying to stay in the best shape possible. Shandy and I are so grateful to welcome 2016 with open arms. 2015 was the year of Health for us and we did everything in our power to stay as healthy and positive as possible which I believe has gotten me(us) to were I (we) am right now in my treatment. I have had 3 negative scans in the past 6 months which means that the tumor is not growing. We have another scan at the end of January to rule me off the chemo. Tumor is still there so we will be watching its activity very closely and if there is any sign of growth we will jump back on another form of chemo. I am still taking my steroid (catabolic) for my inflammation around the brainstem. We plan to come off of that when I hopefully stop my chemo in a couple weeks. Its been a long year and 4 months and the battle is far from over but we want to continue our thanks to our community, doctors, family and friends, without you guys no telling where we would be. I want 2016 to be the year of Family. This will mean spending more time with the ones you hold dear in your life because unfortunately tommorow is never promised. Experiencing something so surreal has positively changed my life!

"Just when the caterpillar thought the world was ending, he turned into a butterfly"