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1/25/10

Well, the new chemo was a bust, and quickly. I took it for 8 days and had
just gotten to full dose when I ended up in the hospital for a week
from the side effects. The doctor was successful in getting my blood
pressure and pain under control. They took scans ( not that I
remembered :Z) and fortunately they did not show any bleeding or
other problems in the brain.

The radiation we had hoped I could get turns out not to be available to me. When I
was able to go to the radiologist we learned the Spokane doctor felt
it wasn't safe. Seems it is very new, still experimental and may be 5
years or more down the road to approval for conditions like mine. So I am starting another
round of radiation on Wednesday ( 1/24). It is a procedure whereby they use a
cone to target the large tumor and radiate (hopefully) just the
tumor. The hope is to slow or shrink the tumor to give them more time
to try to find a chemo that would work. I've taken all the renal cell
chemo's available and they are hoping for a new one to come out of
trials. We've also discussed mixing a couple of the one's I've taken
in the past. And the fight goes on.

12/24/09

A lot has been happening here the last couple weeks. My family came 
for the first time in 25+ years, so that was awesome. 

I had labs, ct's, mri's, and EKG's last week plus I saw the oncologist.
The largest tumor in the lung had continued to grow while I was on 
the last chemo. It was a particularly harsh chemo and it became 
dangerous to my (mind) & body so he took me off of it for about 6 weeks. 
It's taken that long for my body to heal enough to consider my next 
adventure. 

My severe depression, induced by the chemo, started to lift 3 weeks
after I stopped taking the drug. I knew I was in trouble while taking
it but I never expected the chemo to cause such as horrible depression.
I now understand those warnings you see on t.v. "if you have thoughts
of suicide while taking 'Weasel Dung CG' call your doctor 
immediately". Sadly no one else had figured it out either. So from 
May to almost Christmas I've been in the deepest, darkest, loneliest
place in of my life. So if any of you are on chemo or similar drugs 
be aware for your own sake.

Saturday I started a new drug, just out 5 weeks ago. The side effects
are the usual but they add the increase of liver damage, heart 
attacks and strokes to this one. My heart wouldn't dare attack me! 

We are also trying to determine how I can get to Spokane daily for 
several weeks for a specialized radiation treatment that will target
the largest tumor in the lung. They have the machine capability here
but there is no one trained who can use it for my needs. So it will 
be April or May before I can get the treatment here. Dr. Tezcan 
(oncologist) doesn't seem to want us to wait if there is a way. Plus
that's about the time I can start working dogs. :) 

As usual they found the brain in the mri. The amazing thing is they 
couldn't find but a minute trace of the two small tumors. When the doctor 
showed me the larger one I was stunned. There are two small shadows 
of the large tumor. Great progress. Whew. Still some pain from the 
radiation damage but nothing to complain about. Some memory loss and
some word slurring still going on but, hey that goes with age and the
drooling, right? :)