Missouri Valley Baptist Association

UPDATE ON OUR HANNAH Prayer needed. Pray for blood platelets to begin to grow. Yesterday (Tuesday) we took Hannah to the hospital for a scheduled visit. They c...hecked her blood levels to see if she could begin the next 29 day round of treatments. If her levels were good they would have started immediately, with a scheduled three day admission. Her platelets, however, were too low to begin. All other areas are growing in the right direction. Her white count, neutrophils, bands, hemoglobin are all increasing. Her ANC is double the required amount for the next round. Her platelets however, are not yet returning. We go back next Tuesday, May 18. If they have grown to the needed level, we start treatments. If they are still at their current level, she will be taken to surgery for a bone marrow biopsy to check the possibility of the return of the leukemia. They truly believe this is rare; and it’s to put our minds at ease. Please pray for platelets to return this week. There are minutes of overwhelming fear. By God’s Grace, not hours, but the minutes are intense. Please pray for Hannah to be healed. Platelets to come in this week. No infections Peace Our great medical team, nurses, all workers, patients and their families. Just yesterday I heard a mother in the next room (other side of a curtain) receive extremely difficult news. We are far from being the family hurting the most. Please pray for these sweet families. Our kids. They continue to carry the ball in the day to day for our family, ministry, and more. Joy and me. Peace, trust, and rest. Hannah is home. She looks good and is feeling good most of the time. Pray for platelets, platelets, platelets. You carry us once again. Thank you! We love you. Joy E Caldwell

Postponed! Date TBA

Pray for our mission team headed to Mexico today!

UPDATE ON OUR HANNAH Out of surgery and all is great! Her counts are building, but not yet to the level needed for the next round of treatments. The pic line i...s in and ready. The chemotherapy to the spinal fluid went smoothly. They first said we would stay tonight. Hannah, however, is doing so good, we are going to go home today! A home care nurse will come this afternoon or tomorrow. Thank you for praying. You are amazing friends. Your love for Hannah, our family, and especially the One who we turn to; is so genuine. You are refreshing. Please pray for Hannah to be healed No infections A time of rest and fun at home Her counts to increase in God’s timing. Our medical team, nurses, all workers, patients, and their families. Every area of the building we go into, holds new hurt for so many. These are precious people. Our kids Joy and me. We love you. Joy E Caldwell

UPDATE ON OUR HANNAH One of the worst views a parent can have. Hannah is in surgery. Inserting a pic line and placing chemo into her spinal fluid. Her counts ar...e good. Her team is excellent. The Ultimate Hands she is in are flawless. We still want to chase her down the hall. Please pray for Hannah to be healed Surgery to go well That she comes out of anesthesia easily and without nausea. No infections Our medical team, nurses, all workers, patients, and their families The kids Joy and me Stress and fear to lessen. Peace Hannah to stay up We had a great weekend...Great birthday party for Noah. Thankful. It’s crazy how powerful moments are. We love you. Joy E Caldwell

UPDATE ON OUR HANNAH We have had a great three days at home. The big family got to catch up just before the snow came. Our day to return to the hospital, for a ...one night stay, to begin the 60 day consolidation phase, was to be today. Due to the weather is has moved to tomorrow. We get a fourth day at home. We like the fourth day part, but also know it’s important to stay on task in a timely manner. The weekend was mostly peaceful. If Hannah runs a fever of 100.4 and averages that for one hour, we are to take her to the hospital immediately. The number one concern are infections. Our bodies carry little things all the time. Due to our white cell counts, however, we don’t even know. They never come to fruition. Her white cell count is building, but too low to fight. The slightest thing can become acutely, life threatening. At one point Saturday night, her fever hit 100.4 but within the hour had dropped to 100.1. We checked it often through the night and it continued to drop. Today it is 98.5. We know that you are praying and God knows how to guide you. He is amazing and so are you. Seems the more time that passes from her most recent chemo and steroid treatments, the better she feels and the stronger she gets. Stands to reason. She is walking on a walker and moving faster, smoother and with more confidence, each day. There is a part of us that dreads the chemo/etc to begin again. We know however, it is a must. For effectiveness against any new leukemia cells, this has to also bring her restored white cell count, to a zero again. Obviously, you know there are other difficult side effects as well. Things to pray for... For Hannah to be healed. For no infections. We are told it is not a matter of if, but when. Please pray. For the trip to the hospital to be doable tomorrow. For treatments to begin (If certain counts are too weak, they will not be able to start) For little to no side effects. For our medical team. For our continued relationships with new friends; and more to take place. For our family. The kids are up for sweet air, but know the next 60 days starts tomorrow. We certainly are enjoying and appreciating the moment. We are looking for many more! For Joy and me. Again, as I mentioned before, she has so much on her. There is no one that you want more, in any clutch situation, than Joy. She is brilliant and comes through with excellence in these settings. That does not lessen the physical and emotional shred. I begin to travel Thursday night, when we return from the hospital with Hannah. We know it is time. This is hard. Please pray. We are so thankful for the outcome of the first 40 days. We look to Him for the next 60 and beyond. Could not make it without you. Exact friends. Beautiful. We love you. Joy E Caldwell

Due to the sever cold weather, the 2nd Saturday Serve was moved indoors. We worked hard today to paint the ceiling in "The Dunk", the Missouri Valley Collegiate Ministry room. Thanks for all those who came to help!

UPDATE ON OUR HANNAH. We got the test results back from Seattle. Under 5% of leukemia cells found in one’s bone marrow, after treatment, is considered, in remi...ssion. The lab in Seattle can detect down to one tenth of one percent. Hannah came in as LESS than one tenth of one percent. Less than 0.1 which reports as 0% of leukemia cells left in her bone marrow. It’s the best possible report that technology can give!Experience says that if treatments stop now, the leukemia will return, so this Tuesday the Consolidation Phase begins. It’s 60 aggressive days. The circumstance, however, does not require the need to be as aggressive as her first 29 days (Induction Phase). Her first treatment of the next 60 days requires a one night hospital stay this Tuesday night. Most, after that is outpatient with some home-care and some hospital stays expected. Her day to day, moment to moment caregiver will be Joy, working with our medical team. This means Hannah has the best nurse ever! The one who has cared for her all of her life. Pray for Joy. She has so much on her. It’s an absolute labor of love that she would not do any other way, but I personally know, it is a lot of hard, physical, mental and emotional, work. It’s 24/7. I will be her assistant, but I also have to begin to travel again late next week. I cannot even explain how kind people have been to us in allowing flexibility and postponement with ministry. As a matter of fact, they have insisted I stay away or postpone, to love on my family. So so kind. As you saw in yesterday’s text, we go home tomorrow! That is one day earlier than what was originally, the earliest release date expected. Every detail in Hannah’s body is moving in the right direction. Tomorrow morning she will get one more blood transfusion to top her off before we go home. We’ve had back to back meetings, with every team here, to enable us to give proper care and know warning signs. We have been learning to check levels, giving medications and injections. I use the word we loosely. I am so thankful that Joy is brilliant. She is a quick study. She has always been that person. I am a little more like the guy with the glassy eyed look, wondering when the room will stop spinning. Joy’s receptivity is through the roof. Another, mom thing, that automatically kicks in, to protect the health of her child. I cannot even tell you how much we are going to miss the people here. They are absolutely beautiful. We, of course, will see many on our returns over this next season of life. The great news is, we already have plans outside of the hospital, with several. We know this journey is far from over. We know the road ahead can be jarring and abrupt. But God has answered your prayer. So get this. It is day 35 in the hospital...day 37 for Joy and Hannah (it was two days in before God allowed me to get in the door). Hannah is in remission. Tomorrow we are going home to reunite with our big family. It’s all God, using an amazing team of new and old friends. You carried us. You absolutely carried my family through this. You lifted us with such care. You wept with us and for us. And best of all, when we were too tired, weak and spent to pray, you took our needs before our Father. We felt it. We would not have made it without you. God answered you. We can’t fully see tomorrow, but we can clearly see His past record. It’s perfect. Things to pray for... For Hannah to be healed. For transition to home and for our reunion tomorrow. For no infections. Her white count will drop again in about 10 days due to next week’s treatments. For Joy and me. Joy as she does the majority of care for Hannah (the greatest ministry of all). Me as I assist, jump back into other ministries, and travel. For our relationships from here to continue with purpose. For the precious people here at Cardinal Glennon. I know you are praying for them. Please continue as they consistently serve hurting people. They have so much to carry. You are amazing friends. The best. You’ve done so much I feel trite attempting to express how I feel about you, with something as finite as words. We love you. Joy E Caldwell Our 35 day view...till tomorrow

The Mt. Pleasant women’s monthly meeting has been changed to February 20th at 11 am. Hopefully the weather will be warmer then.

UPDATE ON OUR HANNAH. HANNAH IS IN REMISSION!!! The doctor just came by after looking at her slides. This is the preliminary, but he is confident. We will get ...some final results later today and even more detail on Monday; but Hannah is in remission!! This is day 30 and the Induction Period is officially over. Now we step into the 60 day Consolidation Period. After a 7 day break we begin...mostly outpatient with a few hospital stays. We are told the consolidation period can, without doubt, be bumpy, but nothing is typically as difficult as the 30 day induction period. The medicine that was the hardest on her body with the most side effects, was the steroids. She took them in liquid form, by mouth, twice a day, for 29 days. We administered it with a large plastic syringe. After her last dose, last night, while only Joy was with me, I stomped that last syringe into tiny pieces. I know...a bit juvenile, but that’s nothing new. Plus, Joy, being married to me for 27 years, was not at all surprised. Albeit juvenile, it was very therapeutic. Grateful for the medicine, but anything that hurts your daughter, eventually you have to stomp. The road ahead is long but get this...Hannah is in remission! Only God. Things to pray for Pray for rest today for all of our family. Especially Joy and Hannah. Joy is beyond amazing. No words to how she served our princess. Hannah is absolutely spent in every way, yet up. We had a CT Scan of her brain at 4:00 this morning as a follow up to yesterday’s surgery. Pray today is a boring day. We are praying for rest in your life as well. You have prayed selflessly and relentlessly. Thank you. Pray for recuperation and strength to gain over the next seven days before consolidation begins. Pray we get to take Hannah home this coming week. Continue to pray for all the people in this hospital. Our medical team, nurses, workers, patients and parents, are something special. Pray for relationships to continue to form and bond for His purpose. We already have plans to hang out with several new friends from here, in the coming weeks. Pray for our big family to all be back together, face to face, soon. We love you all. Hoping to give you a bit of radio silence for a few days while recuperation is taking place. We have leaned on you so much. We could not have done this without you. You are such an amazing community. You are family. We love you. Joy E Caldwell

UPDATE ON OUR HANNAH Hannah came through the surgery and did great. With the surgery and bone marrow biopsy taking place this late on a Friday, we were just tol...d we will not get the preliminary test results till tomorrow. The final results on Monday. In these days the preliminaries are informative. Please pray for... Hannah to be healed. A restful and peaceful night for Hannah. For us to find out tomorrow, early, that Hannah is in remission. Rest for our medical team. They are amazing and seem tired tonight. Our family. Joy and me. Thank you for praying. Long day. Pray for a quick night. We need to hear that she is in remission. We love you. Joy E Caldwell

December Bridge

Praise and Worship Night this coming Friday! At Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church! We would love to have YOU! Please free to invite a friend. We will have praise and ...worship, a short devotional and fellowship afterwards. Bring a snack to share during fellowship. Let me know if you have any questions! See more

The Winter car check was hosted by First Baptist Church Marshall today. Thanks for all those who volunteered!

November Bridge!