currently: @841 (11:11am) on friday 11.21.08 | 85 hours since last post
I can't remember if I'm the good twin or the evil one.
OK, so we met with Dr. Winter this morning, and while almost all the news was good, I still had my hopes up too high and have spent some disappointed hours since the appointment. Hope is a good thing but dammit, dashed hopes suck.
The details: the tumor has shrunk still more, perhaps 20 percent, and associated structures are shrinking as well. An area that appeared on the first PET scan, but wasn't clear enough to call a "tumor" or "mass" has disappeared entirely. One of the lymph nodes in the center of my chest is still showing activity, but that has also reduced since the first scan. So, all good news.
Treatment wise, they are indeed going to start radiation treatments, which will be weekdays, daily, for about 6 weeks (weekends off). Dr. Winter said there'll probably be some associated fatigue, as well as some soreness in my throat and chest, but nothing like the effects of the chemo. However... they're going to continue giving me chemo at the same time, starting in about two weeks. It'll be reduced doses given weekly. I hope they're really reduced doses.
It didn't sound like he thought surgery was an option at this point - they really need to have a specific spot to go cut something out, and it's still spread out enough between the main tumor and the lymph node that he didn't think any surgeons would recommend doing that.
I'm sort of excited and scared at the same time by all of this. I hope I tolerate the radiation+chemo thing better than I've tolerated the chemo. I don't know why I would, but perhaps the dosage will be reduced enough since they're doing it weekly that it'll be easier.
We also complained about the ongoing battles with my cough, and they're sort of bringing out the big guns now: a prescription for a morphine pill that's shown some success in cough suppression, and a nebulizer (imagine a hookah pipe for liquid drugs) along with lidocaine and albuterol and a sulfate form of morphine to put into it. As I told Jeff earlier today - if they can suppress the cough, the fatigue is much easier to deal with... I mean, it's not hard to just lay on the couch. It's the cough that makes my life really uncomfortable. Best case, the morphine pill will take care of it enough to be tolerable, and I won't have to hassle with the nebulizer; they had me use one of those during my hospital stay back in March, and it sucks because you're breathing this really heavy nebulized air into your lungs. It feels like smoke except it's not; it doesn't smell or taste smoky, and isn't warm or hot. Hard to describe, but unpleasant to breathe for any extended period.
So that's the new plan. We meet with Dr. Tran in the Harrison radiation office on Thursday, then back to see Dr. Winter the following Friday. Presumably I'll start chemo at that point.
I love you all, so much. Thank you for being my friends and family and acquaintances and strangers that I meet. I wish I could hug you all, a giant group hug, for everything you've given me over the last few months.
It's never wrong to hope. No matter what I say about disappointment, remember that.
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