Warrant Officer 1 (WO1) William "Billy" McCotter Needs Large Amounts of Spiritual Warfare Folks

I received a call from Fort Rucker today with some news that kicked me in the gut.  I don't know WO1 McCotter but the Soldier who called me does.  Billy is a stand up guy and REALLY needs our prayers right now.  Turn it on and turn it up folks!

From his sister's blog Flying High and Fighting Hard

Billy is my brother. He's 25. A newly-awarded black hawk pilot in the army. He just finished flight school in Alabama, and is on leave until mid-October, when he is supposed to report to Hawaii. He's been visiting friends, and had plans to stop and see several of you. As we all know, sometimes life doesn't go according to plans.

There are many details in this story. I will give the basics now, and share more in future posts.

Billy (or Cooter, as many of you know him), just spent the past weekend in the Florida Keys with friends. He was losing his appetite, and his stomach was hurting more and more.

Tyler and Melissa Haines went with him to the ER on Monday. They found lots of fluid in his abdomen, some sort of mass, and a bunch of "nodules." He had a CAT scan on Monday. They drained 2 liters of fluid from his abdomen on Tuesday, and did another CAT scan. They say a bunch of masses in the CAT scan, but weren't sure what all that meant because of the fluid. On Wednesday, they did an endoscopy. During all this time, he was on pain meds, and the frequency started increasing. But the pain meds are harsh, and they made him throw up. He's been throwing up since Monday night.

Billy was diagnosed with poorly differentiated gastric adenocarcinoma on Thursday morning. In basic terms, that means stomach cancer. It's in stage IV (highly advanced). The doctors say it's incurable and inoperable. It's too big and too far spread to get it out.

There are also two facebook pages set up to encourage and support Billy and his family. 

Praying for Billy

Will's Hope 2010

And, again, his sister's blog.