I know, it's been awhile. The season has turned and the cool air begins to permeate into bones and homes.
Today is a new anniversary for me in this journey. One year ago yesterday (Wednesday) was my re-diagnosis. And on this day (Thursday) I will have learned about the brain tumors. It was the beginning of a very difficult fall season.
I am beginning this fall with the results and consequent effects of my latest PET scan. This is number 14 (a particularly favorite number of mine), and still no superpowers. But... we did get some good results. The left hilar tumor that seemed to be non-responsive to the last round of chemo seems to have completely disappeared due to the one-two punch of radiation-chemo through the summer. The primary metastatic tumor in my right hilum has gone down in uptake from 7 last scan to a 3.6 now. That's a beautiful 50% shrinkage. Though it is still too high for our liking and my oncologist recommended that we continue with another chemotherapy round starting yesterday. So now I am equipped with yet another pump full of 5-FU through tomorrow. But that does mean that one session of six is "in the bag."
I struggled with the results from this PET yesterday. I really had allowed my hope for a cleaner scan to elevate to pedestal-like proportions. And the fall from that was a bit painful on the figurative tailbone. I was sad for the first small while, and then I tried to get mad. But anger is not an emotion that comes easily to me; it instead becomes some emotional overwhelming that just seeps out of my eyes. So I sat in that space and was significantly annoyed instead. Once the routine of chemo started I began to right myself. Chatting with my neighbor one chair over also helped to remind me of the reasons we slog and fight through this cancer crap. By the end of our conversation, and a wonderful greek salad delivery, I was nearly back to my chipper self.
I did have some nausea issues with this session. Woke up today feeling better, though still a little worn out. I expect the upturn will continue once I get the pump off tomorrow afternoon. This means we are back on the every two weeks schedule, and my next two are already scheduled (Oct 11 & 25). Which means... ! dun dunh da dun !... that I'll be blogging in a somewhat more regular way.
Since my last post I've done lots of course. Biggest of all being going to freaking Paris! And I leave this Friday for Southern California for a week. An update about Paris and the space between will have to come another day. Perhaps I will even do a bit of writing these next few days or in the week to come while I bathe in the warm California sun.
