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Seven and a half weeks after surgery

It has been a while since I have blogged. I’m writing this not only to provide status but also some tips for those that might also be going though this process. Naso-Gasto (NG) tube with suction was uncomfortable. Because I could not drink anything for 2-3 days after surgery my throat was dry and the tube really hurt when I swallowed. It also laid on the area where the ear drains so I felt like I had an ear infection. The pain swallowing went away quickly and was well managed. The issue gets to be that they had me on a pain pump and when I would sleep I would not use it. This lead to me swallowing and waking up with a sharp pain. For me the last two days with the tube were me just waiting to have it out. They will be reducing the amount of pain medication over time that you get when you press the pain button. So, if you feel more pain, you may not be getting worse, just not having as much pain. Walk as much as you can in the hospital and when you g...
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Update after last round of Chemo

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Everyone,  It has been two weeks since my last round of chemo. I wanted to provide some updates. For round 7 and 8 they took out the Oxiplatin drug as I was getting some nuropathy (numbness)in my left hand. It seems to be steady and or getting better. My feet are pretty numb. I was told that it could take a year for this to go away. I'm still experience the cloudiness of thought called chemo-brain. This gets more pronounced when I have low blood sugar or I'm tired. It seems to be getting better. I was told that it could take three months for recovery of this.  The best way to explain it is that the chemo drugs act as a neural inhibitor and this causes the nuropathy and also affects me cognitively. It seems that the steroid they gave me really bothered my stomach. I get hiccups because it irritates  a ulcer in my stomach. On my 7th round it was bad enough that I was throwing up blood and was admitted to the hospital. My red blood cell counts were not low enoug...
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How things a are progressing and some dates

How are things progressing: This last round of chemo really added to my fatigue. This is not something where I'm sleepy, just lack of energy.  I'm over week out from my chemo and I should have more energy than I do. It is hard to work more than 2-3 hours outside the house as I come home pretty tired. It does seem that after 4:00 I get more of an energy boost. I'm starting to get neuropathy in my left hand with it being numb and tingly.  I will be talking to the Dr. about this as I don't want this to be permanent. From a depression and anxiety dimension,  my depression seems to be getting slowly better.  I'm doing everything I should be to manage my serotonin levels.  I'm also having some days with little anxiety. Some dates: I talked with the surgeon and this lines up some tentative dates for the surgery. Seeing the seriousness of the surgery, It is a bit scary. It seems that it is far away but looking at the dates, and all of the things that ne...
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About 45 days left for chemo

I have completed 5 rounds of the 8 of chemo and I will complete my 6th round tommrow. It looks like I'm 45 days out of completing all of the chemo and my last infusion is about 30 days away. While this seems like a short time, time for me has slowed down.  It is a blessing that I can work half time as this gives me the ability to move though time faster by having something to focus on. It is hard because I'm balancing my inability to work vs. ,when I feel stronger, boredom.  This is difficult as it seems that my ability is more varied during the two week cycle.  As an example, I had a 3 hour meeting last week and did not think to bring snacks. I was wiped at the end of the meeting and did not feel better until after I ate.  In talking with my doctor, they are going to reduce the chemo drugs I'm on by 20% for the remaining three rounds. This is due to some of the cumulative side effects.  This won't affect my outcome. I'm also going to talk to some specialists...
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Good news on 1/8/19

Yesterday I received the radiology read on the PETscan. The radiologist stated that there were no indications of cancer from the scan and that the lit up section was indicative of a normal uptake of the dye. Now if there are small amounts of cancer, there can be false positives because of the uptake. Basically there is a chance that my cancer is functionally dead except for micro spots.  The radiologist correctly reports my acid re-flux. It also mentions the  thyroid  nodule and states that my spleen is a bit bigger. This may be because my spleen is also trying to make up for low blood counts. Here is a link to see the results of the PETscan: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1A7BEBOJ4TQj9XYZ6J8uurzUQzSSbNuew/view?usp=sharing In talking to the doctor the highest chance of a re-lapse and death is the spreading of these micro spots around my body. Therefore, it is the best course of action to continue on the additional four sessions of chemotherapy because I'm healthy and...
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Updates on 1/4/19

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It has been a long time since an update. I now have new information to share. Yesterday we had two important events. The first was a PET scan to see how effective the chemotherapy is progressing and the second was an appointment with my surgeon to discuss biopsy results. First, I don't have the formal results from the radiologist. I can compare the PET scan from November to the one yesterday. It looks like my tumor is much much smaller. You can compare it in the picture below:  These pictures are a cross section of my chest while I'm laying on my back.  The picture on the right is from November and the one on the left is from yesterday. A PET scan shows cancer in a glowing section. Because this is an esophagus there is a small dark hole in the center. You can see how much smaller it is. The not completely bright sections don't indicate cancer, just that other organs pick up the dye during the procedure. I circled the tumor in red. Second, we had an appointment w...
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Endoscopy and blood-work.

Today I had an endoscopy. The surgeon wanted to look around to see what percentage of my stomach needed to be removed. The preliminary results is that it looks like my cancer is limited to the top of my stomach. We won't know the true extent until the biopsy because looks can be deceiving. If this is true the surgery would possibly be done via a laparoscopic procedure (minimally invasive). This would reduce the chance of infection and make recovery easier. I also had my appointment for tomorrow's chemo. The good news is my Neutrophils number went up from 1.35 to a 4.86. While not as high as pre-chemo (7.6) it is in the range above 2. It means that we can continue on the path and I'm not as compromised as I was at the end of the last round. As for red blood cell counts, they are down from last time. The main number, my hemoglobin is down from 8.6 to 7.4. Before the chemo my number as still below baseline at 13.4 where anything less than 13.5 would be considered low and a...
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