What Cancer Cannot Do
Cancer is so limited...
It
cannot cripple love.
It cannot shatter hope.
It cannot corrode faith.
It
cannot eat away peace.
It cannot destroy confidence.
It cannot kill
friendship.
It cannot shut out memories.
It cannot quench the spirit.
It
cannot silence courage.
It cannot reduce eternal life.
With that said, this is a post I started before Easter...
With Easter quickly approaching, I find myself thinking back to last year at this time and how my life, and my families, was so unbelievably different. I was just beginning my new career as a nurse, our family consisted of one less child, my parents still lived in a 2-story house that had way too many rooms for the two of them but had plenty of room for pretty much anyone to stay with them, and probably the biggest difference of all.... my dad had yet to be diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. Although Easter was on April 24th last year, the holiday itself brings back a flood of memories that are difficult to think about. I still have a hard time looking at any pictures from last years egg hunt in Nebraska. To think that we were all running around, care free, while my mom was living a nightmare with my dad seizing, and neither one of her children there to help take away some of the sting when the doctors told her that the CT scan showed a mass in his brain. I can still feel the way that my heart sank and then jumped up into my throat when i read the text that conveyed this information as I sit many miles away feeling completely helpless.
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As I sit to blog last night to give an update, my mom called and said one of my dad's doctors wanted him seen for possible small seizure activity and increased neurological symptoms... so off to the hospital we went. I'll post more about that in a bit, but first I need to get my blog up to speed.
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Once again, I was interrupted... Today is my Dad's 58th birthday. Last year at this time, we were still unaware of his cancer, but in just one week's time, his diagnosis would hit us square in the face. I can't remember where exactly I left off with my last update, so I'll do a brief "year in review" until the point where I know I haven"t written about...
April 24th, 2011: Dad has his first tonic clonic (grand mal) seizure
April 26th, 2011: Dad has his first surgery to remove the tumor
April 28th, 2011: We learn of Dad's exact diagnosis; Stage 4 glioblastoma
May 20th, 2011: Dad starts his radiation treatment and chemotherapy (the pill form)
(this is the point where I stopped keeping track of exact dates and just know general time frames...)
June 2011: Dad gets an infection at this surgical site and has to have a 2nd surgery. Radiation is put on hold until his infection is healed. Dad is put on IV antibiotics at home for a couple weeks.
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| the incision after the first surgery, prior to the second |
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| After the 2nd surgery. This time they left the bone flap off for fear that it had part of the infection on it... leaving an indentation on the side of his head that wasn't previously there. |
July 2011: IV antibiotics are done and the remaining 3 weeks of chemo are started back up...
August 2011: radiation is done!
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| It's tradition for the patient to ring the bell after they have received their last radiation treatment |
July - September: C Diff (nasty infection in the GI tract) develops and dad's weight loss magnifies (he would eventually get down to 137lbs)
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| His first and only beer in the last year... at the Division Championship game for the Cardinals in 2011 |
November 2011: Dad has another tonic clonic seizure after being seizure free for 6 months; develops status epilepticus by having 2 tonic clonic seizures without regaining consciousness and ends up on a ventilator. He recovers and is sent to rehab to regain strength and physical ability. While in rehab, he has yet another tonic clonic seizure and heads back to the ICU. Tests prove that he now has epilepsy and his seizure meds are upped and adjusted. Dad gets out of the hospital just after Thanksgiving.
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| Zach is wearing my Dad's old boy scout shirt. My dad was explaining all his badges and how to wear the uniform correctly |
December 2011: Just before Christmas, dad had a routine MRI to see how the chemo is working. (he has been getting them since radiation ended). The MRI showed new tumor growth, when up until this point, all his scans showed no new cancer and an empty space where the first tumor was removed. So now what? Surgery is not an option this time... the head isn't something that you can keep going back into surgery for, nor was it ever going to make his cancer go completely away. A new form of IV chemotherapy started a few days after Christmas and the pill form was discontinued. It was set that he would continue the routine MRIs and receive chemotherapy every other week and we are told it will continue until it is no longer working. They also increased his steroid dose to help minimize swelling.
Jan-March 2012: Chemo continues and dad returns to work full time. Two MRIs following the start of the Avastin (new chemo) show that the tumor is shrinking and the medicine is doing its job. The steroids increase his appetite and his weight gain commences (we are talking somewhere in the ballpark of 60 lbs). He also shows signs of Cushing Syndrome, which people can get when they are on long-term steroid use.
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| The first picture I have of my dad holding Henry. He never wanted his picture taken around this time because of the hair missing and he thought it was going to grow back, as well as the scar. |
April 2012: New neurological symptoms develop. Dad's balance is way off, his mind seems to be much slower to "connect the dots", more seizure activity is becoming apparent (but this time its blank stares - a type of focal/partial seizure). This brings us to the post I had started previously... This particular hospital stay was only one day long and all that was needed was to increase his antiseizure medicine. Dad came home on Good Friday night. Then, one week after Easter (just 3 days ago), he went back to the hospital with severe, sharp, shooting head pain and ankle pain. While he was in the ER, he lost the ability to walk. He said he couldn't make his legs move... This time they decided to do another MRI and the results weren't as good as the previous ones. It showed that there was slight tumor growth and quite a bit of swelling. He doesn't go back to see his oncologist until Wednesday next week, when he is scheduled for his next chemotherapy treatment. We aren't sure at this point what they will do. It is possible that there is another chemo they can add to what he is currently receiving. Initially they told us that once the Avastin stopped working, that was the end of the line. But now we sit at a stand still until his doctors tell us the next step at his next appointment. He was in the hospital about 2 days this last go round just to get his pain under control and regain his strength. By his discharge, he was walking again - with a walker, and he was pain free. They increased his steroid dose once again. He went from being on 4mg in the morning, to 4mg every 6 hours. If we thought he was hungry and irritable before, I can only imagine what he will be like now.
So that sums up the last year. And my conclusion is this.... Cancer Still SUCKS... Make the most of the time you have with your loved ones; nothing is promised. Today is my Dad's 58th birthday. We went to his house this evening and here was his comment about the day: "I got my present this morning about 7:00... when I woke up".
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| My dad with all my kids on his 58th Birthday tonight |
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