More Rest Needed

Today, the Hospice Nurse told me that a blood transfusion would not be in my best interest. She said that at this point it could possibly do more harm than good. I have been prescribed medicines that are supposed to help me rest easier. After a weekend of taking these medicines, I will notify the hematologist and give them an update and they will decide whether or not a transfusion is an option.Thanks again for all the continued prayers and please continue to send them up.

Happy Belated New Years !!!

Happy New Year!

I apologize, for taking such a long time between posts. This holiday break just flew by. At the beginning of December, I had just learned that I was anemic on top of having cancer.There was a two month period were my blood counts were dropping each week and no one knew why. I was able to locate a hematologist, who will be able to work with me on getting my blood work under control. His office also performs out patient transfusions. For the last three weeks, my counts have remained stable, which is a blessing. The stress of travel may have caused the drops.


I am currently feeling pretty good physically, other than some swelling in my left leg (toe to mid thigh). A few months back, I had some swelling in my arm, lower leg and foot. My wife, Maranda, learned and applied some lymphatic message therapy. Maranda was able to stop the swelling using the therapy. There's substantially more swelling this time and so far therapy hasn't been as effective. 


Today, I will begin taking medicine for the swelling.  A massage therapist will be coming out once a week as well, so we will see what happens. I think I have fixed the problem that prevented some from leaving comments. Let me know if you have any more trouble.                   

Happy Holidays!!!!

Happy Holidays everyone! The last few weeks I have just been focusing eating better and spending time with family. I was able to meet and start seeing a local hematologist for my anemia. I couldnt imagine dealing with my anemia problem and an aggressive chemotherapy at the same time. In that way, God answered my questions as to what to do next. For now, I am going to just focus on getting stronger and getting a better handle on my anemia. if it's God's will i'll get another chance at cancer treatment. I currently feel good and i'm just going to take it one day at a time. Thanks everyone for the great prayers, treats and foods. God Bless R.B.
s

Prayers and strength needed

Sorry for the long break in posting. I have been using the time to determine which path to take. I also had a friend and a relative pass away during the Thanksgiving holidays.

My new oncologist wants me to exceed the lifetime limit for Adriamycin. Doing so will cause heart damage and possibly heart failure (4% chance). He feels adriamycin was the reason i went into remission from 2001 to 2010. MD Anderson doesn't follow chemotherapy lifetime limit guidelines. They supposedly exceed the limits all the time.

Well my old longtime oncologist feels that Adrimycin wasn't very effective at all. He gave me 6 cycles of it in 1999 and the tumor actually grew. He also feels that  I'm not physically strong enough for Adriamycin. He feels that proceeding with this chemo will definitely kill me. It could deplete my bone marrow reserves  and or increase my chances of getting pneumonia.

My new oncologist is hoping that over 10 years, the cancer may have lost its immunity to Adriamycin. So pretty much I would be definitely hurting myself, for the chance the cancer may be slowed or stopped. I'm not thrilled about the possiblility of decreasing my quality of life or shortening my life for what isn't a sure thing.

Another option I have is to have a procedure where they get a small sample of the tumor and send it off to a lab where they expose it to different types of chemo to see which chemotherapy drug is the most effective. The only drawback regarding this option is that my nerves are shot and i've begun to experience panic attacks. I dont't think I could pull this off mentally.

I'm still praying on what to do next and I know that regardless of the choice I need to step out on faith. Thanks for keeping me in your prayers.

UAB

I met with my long time oncologist in hopes of being able to do my chemotherapy at UAB. After reviewing the information from Houston, my UAB oncologist decided that he could not order my chemotherapy because he feels that my body isn't strong enough to handle the aggressive chemotherapy regiment that Houston prescribed. He even went on to say that the regiment itself could be fatal. He gave me three scenarios where the treatment could do more harm than good.

At this point, I have several concerns regarding this plan and I plan to try and go over each one with my Houston oncologist. I have a great deal of respect for my UAB oncologist, so I definitely plan to take his warning seriously. I will most likely now be doing my future treatments in Houston. My hope is that we can start chemotherapy soon. I have my doubts about the current chemotherapy regiment, I'm hoping that the Houston doctor has something else I can try that is a little safer

Clearer Picture

I recently had to make quick
trip to Houston. My oncologist wanted me to be evaluated by his hematologist. The test result revealed that I have anemia. I'm either not asorbing the iron properly or my body is just not using it efficiently.

I have an appointment next week to meet with my local oncologist at UAB. At that time,  my local oncologist will order my chemotherapy drugs and  schedule my chemotherapy infusion appointment. I am going to try and schedule the procedure to have a main line port put in, for the same day to try and cut down on the trips to Birmingham.

I opted to continue my treatment at UAB/Kirklin Clinic because the staff there is really nice and I know the facility really well. I'm hoping that my chemotherapy is scheduled for next Thursday or Friday. The oncologist in Texas will direct and guide my treatment plan.

I'm looking forward to finally getting chemotherapy and hopefully starting to feel better. I also will need to start drinking at least 3 liters of water each day. It will be tough but I have to do it to protect my kidneys. I feel blessed to have the opportunity continue treatment and I'm praying everything goes as planned.

A week in Texas and thereafter

The two tests that I mentioned in the last post came back normal. My blood work also showed that my Hemoglobin was dangerously low, so it was necessary that I get a blood transfusion right away. The day of the testing we had to get to the hospital at 8 am. We ended up not leaving the hospital until almost midnight that same day.  We learned that a transfusion was needed around 11 am. We were hoping that they would be ready to start the transfusion by 2pm and it ended up not starting until 6:30pm. It was a long day. Luckily, the next day's tests didn't start until noon and my parents were there, to watch our son so my wife and I could sleep.

My chemotherapy that was supposed to start last week was postponed. The doctors want me to meet with a hemotologist first to try and figure out why I have needed so many transfusions lately. This most recent one, would be my third in three months. The earliest the could get me in with their Hemotologist was early this coming week. I'm praying that this appointment goes well and that we can quickly move forward with chemotherapy
I have to give my wife a lot of credit . In the midst of taking care of me she's been able to take care of the kids in a way that the kids haven't really missed a beat. She has:

- provided the kids with two great birthday celebrations

- just finished potty training our just turned 3 year old

- made sure our daughter has made it to all of her extracurricular practices and games

- made sure our daughter has continued to stay on the honor roll

My wife has been nothing short of amazing and I hope that she knows that I really appreciate all that she does each day.

While I was in Texas for my appointments, I got a surprise visit from my cousin Deborah. She is my dad's first cousin. She is from Carson, CA. She made a special trip Texas just to visit with us for a couple of days. I really enjoyed it. It has probably been about 10 years since I last saw her in person. I really learned alot from talking with her those two days. Including the importance of knowing and documenting your family medical history. Deborah has spent alot of time putting together the genealogy of my dad's family. She was able to trace our history back into the 1800s and maybe even further. She shared some information with me regarding the cause of death of my great-grandfather and great-grand mother that I wasn't aware of.

Before talking with her, I didn't know that my great-grandfather had passed away from stomach cancer. I also didn't know that Deborah's brother also passed away from cancer. Deborah's mom is currently receiving cancer treatment. When I was first diagnosed back in 1999, I really didn't know of any relatives that had dealt with cancer. Since then I had an aunt and uncle have battled cancer. So now, I have a better picture of my medical history and can say that there was most likely a hereditary factor in my diagnosis. I think having a complete medical history is really important.