1.20.12

Had a CT scan last Wednesday (routine- it's been about six months since I began chemo and four since my last scan) and got the results today- very good! Nothing new showed up, no new tumors, growths, etc... and the existing tumors had all shrunk by around/little more than half since September. According to the docs this really was/is the about the best results they could hope for or expect; they'd have been satisfied if things had remained status quo from the September scan, so to see that level of continued shrinkage is encouraging. Equally, they seem pleased with my response to and tolerance of the chemo regimen; from what I was told many patients receiving this regimen have a difficult time making it through as many rounds as I've been through- yeah, I'm tough as hell! (Much if it probably has to do with my age- relatively younger than the average colon cancer patient- I have no other health issues, and I do take decent care of myself, diet and exercise, etc... Tho' I have had to resign myself to running on an indoor treadmill this winter, dammit.)

Obviously I am very pleased with what they told me but at times it's still a bit of a conundrum as well; how can I feel this well, this healthy, this normal yet have what, by everything I've heard, read, been told, etc... is a pretty advanced cancer (stage 4 is as high as they go)? Feeling well definitely beats the alternative, and I don't obsessively dwell upon it all but it does cause some confusion, a kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop mentality. It is something always in the back of my mind.

But anyway, pretty good news- now if we get just as good news around 6pm or so this coming Sunday, with a Pats win over the Ravens!

1.05.12

2012- Apocalypse now? Isn't that what the Mayans said (when they weren't inventing television- gratuitous Repo Man reference!)

One thing I'm still having a difficult time accepting- and I must be driving my medical people crazy badgering them with by now- is that there is little, nothing really, I can pro-actively do to thwart, or at least keep at bay, my cancer. I've referenced it before; if I had a sports or other injury or something like that I could pro-actively rehab it, heal it. If I had high blood pressure, diabetes, or were (still) excessively overweight I could tweak/change my diet and eating regimen to positively affect those conditions. You get the idea. My doctors and all tell me that by maintaining a healthy diet and by running and working out that these strengthen me and help me better tolerate chemo treatments as well as reduce other potential health issues (thereby helping me to- hopefully- live with this longer, with fewer intolerable side effects from the chemo, and I do believe the docs on this) but they, nor anything else, cannot/do not effect the cancer itself. And that is difficult for me to accept; that there is something going on within my own body that I am powerless to directly affect, improve, change, that the only thing I can really do that actually affects the cancer is to sit in a Barcalounger for five hours every other week and get pumped full of chemicals. There are a lot of things that we cannot control in life but it is still difficult for me to accept that I cannot control- through my own efforts- something that is going on within me. Again, perhaps I'm more of a control freak than I thought I was. Though I guess bottomline where I still feel fine almost eight months out now from first being diagnosed that is something.

Beyond that... I still have concerns about the Pats in the playoffs. I realize they've won 13 games and that the offense has been clicking and all but I'm still concerned about the defense. Yeah, they aren't giving up points when it counts (helped by an offense that seems almost able to score at will) but as they get deeper into the playoffs and face teams solid on both sides of the ball (specifically, Pittsburgh and Baltimore defensively, should the Pats face either/both of them) will the Pats O be able to put up enough points on those defenses to offset their own defensive deficiencies? It should be interesting...

"As you go through life, whatever your goal, keep your eye on the doughnut and not on the hole."