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May 7, 2007 Last night, John and I watched the Discovery Channel special, Living With Cancer. If you are interested, but missed it, the show is supposed to be repeated tonight. We had mixed feelings about watching: I wanted to; John didn’t. ;-) I think we started from the same places we usually do: I was hopeful there would be new and encouraging information. He was pretty sure we’d learn something that would qualify as “too much information.”

But he watched it with me anyway and it turned out to be a good experience. We laughed, we cried, we recognized ourselves and each other in the stories of others interviewed on the program. It was a relief, in a way, to listen to people speak to some of the things that only another cancer survivor could really appreciate. And by cancer survivor, I also mean those of us who attend every chemo or radiation treatment, doctor’s appointment, ER visit, who are there to share the late-night fears, hope for the early-morning declarations of “I feel good today!” and everything in between.

In last night's program, Leroy Sievers made a comment that really stuck with me. In answer to why he chose to speak about his experience with cancer, he said that, since it really does take over every moment of your life, he felt that those who are living with it owe it to the people who care about them to talk about it, just as we would anything else that consumed our waking and sleeping hours. Otherwise, we wouldn't be able to be ourselves with the people we love the most. Of course, all of you are cancer survivors, too, because someone you love is living with it. We know that you all wonder the same things we do: How much longer will we be able to enjoy having John in our lives? Can we do anything to make that time longer? What would life become without him at the center of our extended family of relatives and friends? As you read in his entry, he worries about us, too.

The Living With Cancer special didn't really focus on the rest of us friends, children, wives and other caregivers, but it's our life, too. John and I have found a place for our voices and, as John noted, we try to keep it focused in a positive direction most of the time. That's an honest reflection of how we both face it, too . . . most of the time. When checking in, all of our friends remember to check in on the kids and me, as well as John. We want you to know that we care about how you are doing, too. I have lost two very close friends to cancer and I know that it isn't always easy to believe your feelings count as much as those of the immediate family and the person who is fighting for their life. Sometimes it's enough to just be there offering your support to the family, but sometimes it isn't. Sometimes you wish somebody would understand how afraid you are that your friend, mentor, fishing buddy's life is in danger. I do understand. And I thank those of you who have been generous enough to express some of those feelings to me via email or in person. It makes me happy to know that the man I love and admire so much has touched your lives deeply as well. John would be uncomfortable with too much of this kind of talk, so I'll end this for today, but I'm thinking of making my own little page somewhere on this website where I can give a glimpse of the "other side," on occasion. Maybe I'll call it Maria's Musings or something "clever" like that . . . If you see this heart symbol, click on it to link to that page:

May 22, 2007  We met with Dr S., the Oncologist today and thought we would start the Chemo regimen that we talked about during the last visit. The new stuff he's going to use - something that sounds like "vanilla bean" - isn't supposed to have as many adverse side effects as some of the previous ones. Of course, it's also not the first choice. If delivered peripherally, i.e., by injection into a vein, one fairly common side effect is inflammation of the vein or phlebitis. He said it can be very painful. One way around that is to have either a PICC line put in or a Port. A PICC line goes in through your arm and and a catheter goes from the entry point up into your chest where the larger veins are located.  The problem with that was that I had one back in 1999 and developed a blood clot which was troublesome. The other choice, the Port, is a surgically implanted "port" that goes directly into the chest, under the clavicle (the picture in the link is not of me). To put it in would require that I get off the blood thinner for a short time and then have to go through the transition from Lovenox to Coumadin again. That was a pain in the ass, too. So there's no easy answer.

Then he said, one problem is that we don't have any tumors that are observable to determine the effectiveness of the Chemo. This led to a "quality of life discussion" i.e., maybe it isn't necessary to take the risk right now, particularly given the problems I've had with the chemo.  The primary tumor in my chest that was first treated appears stable, we've radiated the one on my flank and the one on my rib which should take care of them.  The nodules that showed up on the x-rays have decreased so they are likely the result of the chemo and not cancer.  Dr. S. would like me to be as healthy as possible when I start the chemo.  Additionally, he said while these tumors are "nuisances," none are "life-threatening," like one in the brain, liver, or pancreas would be.  So in the end, we decided to hold off on further treatment for a bit, schedule another PET Scan, and then see where we are.  If everything is just sitting around doing nothing, then maybe we can hold off a bit on more chemo and/or radiation.  However, it's hard for me sometimes not to feel like I'm walking around with a time bomb inside me wondering when it might go off.  But, given the fantastic spring Chinook jack counts this year, I'm up for holding off a while and maybe feeling good for next spring's season if possible.  Quien sabe?

Finally, according to the report from the CT scan, there's apparently also an issue of a "probable pathological fracture, left twelfth rib at site of lytic lesion seen on previous scan."  More to come on this since I don't really understand it, but I guess either the cancer or the radiation could have weakened and/or caused the fracture.  No one seems to be overly excited by it.  And since I'm not playing football anymore.....

May 31, 2007  While fishing below Bonneville Dam with Fred Olney and Frank Young, my left hip (artificial) dislocated. It was painful, but not as bad as I thought it might have been. It was also scary as is probably evidenced by my lack of color and the look on my face. Many thoughts were running through my mind - mostly to do with how this might complicate my already shaky health circumstances. The worst outcome would be if they couldn't get it back in place without an operation and I can't be operated on because of my blood and lung condition right now. Note the "turned in" position of my left knee and foot.  I couldn't move my leg at all and had to remain in exactly the same position as pictured. Any movement at all was extremely painful. The paramedics have me strapped to a carry board of some kind on which I remained until they put me to sleep at the hospital to relocate the hip - about 4-5 hours in all. The fellow behind me,  holding the IV, (Carl) is a medic from Cascade Locks and the other is a retired Tualatin Valley Fireman/Paramedic who happened by and offered to help out. We also had to enlist the help of Fred, Frank, and several burley fishermen to lift me gingerly out of the boat and onto the ambulance gurney - no small task. My heartfelt thanks to all who helped, whoever you are.

At the dock, Fred and two paramedics prepare me to be removed from the boat and into the ambulance	These guys fell prey (mainly to Fred) before John decided to "call it a day."