I thought I'd start a new thread for updates on my cancer treatments and whatever else is going on, since the bad news thread title is misleading now.
My last treatment went better than the previous two and my chest wound is still closed up, which is a good thing. My arm is getting slightly stronger and I hope to resume lifting dumbbells next week. I need to build up my strength again, because I am going back to Denmark in May and I am extremely pumped about that! I'd like to be able to schlepp my own checked bag and not have someone else lifting it for me.
It's going to be a fabulous trip, 6 weeks and a couple of days for me. My brother is going along as well as my friends Chipp and Rod. Chipp is staying close to 3 weeks and has not gone with me over there since 2006 so he is also very pumped to be going. It will be Rod's first trip and he will be there for 2 weeks. I will get to be a tour guide. Also, I am throwing a party in my favorite pub of all, the wonderful, ever-magnificent Irish House in Aalborg on May 7th. The owner and I are friends and he will give me a little discount. We'll have Irish stew and brews in the cellar and I hope to have around 25 family and friends there. I might bill it as the "Fu** Cancer Party." A few months back, I was not sure I'd ever be able to go over to Denmark again or if I'd even be alive, but the cancer hasn't gotten me yet. I'm doing a number on it, instead.
Some other cool things I plan to do when I am back in my ancestral lands include a wine tasting in a castle, touring another castle and the northernmost manor home in the country, and visiting Skagen, the top of Denmark, where you can stand on a little patch of beach and have one foot in one sea and one in another. They also have a brewpub up there I am wanting to check out. I will start and end my trip in Aalborg and spend 5 weeks in an apartment I rent that is very close to the beach. I can hardly wait for May 4th to roll around! [Reply]
I came so close to hurling those anti-nausea meds back up the way they came. Mercy, they are foul! My gut felt like it swelled from each side. I quickly popped two white tic tacs, started to sweat, burped and kept them down. Can't they just add some cherry or orange flavor to the damned things?
Some good news today, for a change... My LDH was very high when I got back from my trip, at 463. Now it is 307, after just one treatment, so my body must be working to fight the cancer as well. That suits me fine. I've been fighting this stuff for almost two years now and I am about tired of it. Get lost, Cancer, I have other things to do now! It's time to move on and for you to get out of me and go back to hell where you came from.
My nurse practitioner doesn't want me to lose any more weight. I am down to 210 from 220, and I really don't want to be over 205 so that my pants and shorts button up without threatening to send the button flying across the room. I imagine since I am no longer averaging 5 beers a day, I would lose weight. My face has shrunk from the almost perfect sphere it was over there to where I can see cheekbones, so I don't mind that a bit. If do start dropping more weight, I'll go to Minsky's and have a large pepperoni pizza with extra cheese. If that doesn't halt the weight loss, then I will know there are new problems going on. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Lonewolf Ed:
I came so close to hurling those anti-nausea meds back up the way they came. Mercy, they are foul! My gut felt like it swelled from each side. I quickly popped two white tic tacs, started to sweat, burped and kept them down. Can't they just add some cherry or orange flavor to the damned things?
Some good news today, for a change... My LDH was very high when I got back from my trip, at 463. Now it is 307, after just one treatment, so my body must be working to fight the cancer as well. That suits me fine. I've been fighting this stuff for almost two years now and I am about tired of it. Get lost, Cancer, I have other things to do now! It's time to move on and for you to get out of me and go back to hell where you came from.
My nurse practitioner doesn't want me to lose any more weight. I am down to 210 from 220, and I really don't want to be over 205 so that my pants and shorts button up without threatening to send the button flying across the room. I imagine since I am no longer averaging 5 beers a day, I would lose weight. My face has shrunk from the almost perfect sphere it was over there to where I can see cheekbones, so I don't mind that a bit. If do start dropping more weight, I'll go to Minsky's and have a large pepperoni pizza with extra cheese. If that doesn't halt the weight loss, then I will know there are new problems going on.
Getting started on anything is going to be the challenge. It used to be a neutral tasting food would not trigger my salivary gland freak out in the back of my jaws. Not so much now. I bit into a pear that was not quite ripe, but not that sour and I had to spit it out. I was groaning and stamping my feet and it felt like someone punched me in the left side of my jaw. I had a cheeseburger earlier for lunch and about fell off the bench at DQ. It's a sudden hard tingling and clenching of the back of the jaws as if I had three or four of the sourest lemons ever in there. I do not taste lemon, just whatever it is that I ate. My mouth just reacts as if there were lemons. The cold sensitivity is in full swing now, too. Even room temperature water ends up feeling like I've swallowed a few burrs. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Lonewolf Ed:
Today marks two years to the day since a doctor called me and said the dreaded "C" word. The next three weeks were quite the surreal roller coaster ride as my life got turned inside out, upside down, and more. I decided to go out in the heat today and prune some trees by the barn, since I rather dislike being raked by thorns when I am on the riding mower. As I was lopping merrily away, I heard a strange groaning noise and looked over my shoulder. A raccoon was lying about twenty feet away, breathing very hard and making "errrrh, errrrh, errrh" noises. I went back to the house, cleaned off the old .410 which I have not shot in 25 years or more, and went back out to the raccoon to put it out of its misery. It must have been poisoned. I shot it and didn't bear it any ill will since I know it has been plundering my peach and pear trees. What a strange irony today, when I was going out to do things to feel alive in spite of this cancer, and I ended up having to kill something.
Ed, your description of every day chores intermingled with introspection of your own mortality has touched me deeply. I wish I had better words to express how much I continue to appreciate your honesty and bravery as you face this struggle. Carry on! [Reply]
Ed I've been following your battle and pulling and praying for you. I've been where you are, diagnosed with Hodgkins in HS, battled it into remission and went through it all again in college and despite what the doctors said beat it back again. After what was supposed to kill me 30 years ago, I married, raised a family and ran a successful business. I've had a few tense moments along the way, cancer of the thyroid a couple of years ago due to treatments I received when younger but I'm still here and feel blessed everyday. You show amazing courage by meeting this head on and still talking about it on here giving progress reports etc. I'm glad you took your trip, there will be more! If you ever need anything PM me and thank you for being an inspiration. God Bless You. [Reply]
