So This is Christmas......

And what have you done?
Another year over
And a new one just begun.

I received an early Christmas present on the 11th of this month. My PET Scan has come back clean...again. That's two in a row folks! Time to rejoice and give thanks. Thanks to the Lord up above, my family and friends that have been on this journey with me, and also to the great nurses and doctors that have treated me.
My fight with the "Big C" is hopefully over but will never be forgotten.


Thank you all again for the support,

Steve

Where has the time gone?

The radiation treatment at the beginning of the year has proven successful. I have had two PET scans, with my latest on July 9th. Mary and I went in to the doctor's office this morning(7/10) and were bracing ourselves for the worst. Dr. Chen said she would show us the scan even though there wasn't anything to see. It was clean. We asked her if she had the right disc and report. She read off my name and date of birth and it was mine. The scan looked great. After Dr. Chen did her exam I asked that one pressing question. Yes folks she gave me the answer I was looking for. I can finally have a cocktail! Woo hoo!!! A couple of milestones have been achieved over the past few weeks. A haircut, being cleared to have a beer, what's next? I know, the Cubs coming back from 17 games down to win the World Series! Yea right, I'll stick with the haircut and beer. Next appointment is in 3 months with my next scan in 6 months. Thank you to all for your prayers and support. Steve

And the Saga continues...

Yes folks it does. Hopefully next week I start my SBRT treatment at Arizona Oncology at St.Joseph's Hospital. SBRT stands for Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy and it is a high dose of radiation to a specific target. There will be treatments on 5 consecutive mornings and I will go in to work afterwards. The immediate side effects will be fatigue(been there, done that, have the tee shirt), the long term would be scarring on the lung and there is a good chance of breaking a rib if I sneeze or cough hard. The cure for those is medication. Slowly but surely the fingernails and hair are growing back from the last treatment. It would be nice to have a full head of hair for once but I may have to wait for that wish to come true. After The SBRT is finished I'll start back on the joy juice for 6 to 8 sessions. You didn't think I was going to get off that easy did you? I'll keep everyone up to date once the carnival begins. C YA Steve

Happy Holidays, well sort of.......

The holidays were great, filled with good food and family fun. Hope everyone that looks in on the blog had the same. Elton John sang "The Bitch is Back" and guess what, it's back. I received the news from my latest PET scan, a couple days prior to Christmas, and a small tumor has appeared on the base of my right lung. If there's any good news coming out of this it is that the tumor is about the size of a dime and little to no activity. Treatments start this Wednesday the 9th. The chemo will be less invasive than previous chemos. Looks like the peach fuzz will fall off the melon again. The Kojak look is back. Peace and love to all! Steve

Gone but not forgotten

Well it's been a couple of months since my last post and I apologize for that. As of the 6th of this month my chemo cycles are over with. About two weeks prior to that I had a CT scan of my chest to see how things were going and it came back favorable, the tumors were gone but I had some fluid on my lungs. This was due to my treatment and also to my lung surgery in January. Dr. Chen is not too worried about this. If she's not worried then I'm not worried. On Friday the 24th I had my PET scan to see exactly how my treatments were working. That was a long weekend waiting to hear what the results were. Well I'm here to tell you that after 17 chemo treatments, 35 radiation doses, and 1 lung surgery I am cancer free!!! Woohoo!!! I have started a maintenance program which consists of premeds and only 1 chemo drug. This will be our ritual every 3 weeks for as long as.............. Liquor is not an option to celebrate anymore. The liver needs to be working properly in order for the chemo drug to do it's job. A small price to pay to stay above the ground instead of below it. Mary and I would like to say thank you to all for their well wishes and prayers. As of now this will probably be the last post. Peace Out! Steve

And now it is two......

drugs that is. Yes Dr. Chen decided to take me off of the 5fu pump and I am happier than a pig in you know what. Some of the side effects of the 5fu were mouth sores, nausea, heartburn, drying of the skin on my hands causing them to peel. The tumors were chemo sensitive (a good thing) and appear to be gone. I will be going for a Pet scan towards the middle of July to see how much progress I have made. I mentioned that I had a little soreness, like tugging, in the area of the tumors and she assured me that was normal and it was the scar tissue from the dead tumors. I have to say one thing for the tumor between my ribs, it seems to have helped my golf game. I am keeping my right elbow in to my body so as to not over stress the area of the ribs and it seems to help straighten my shot and smooth out my swing. As always thanks to all for their prayers and well wishes. Peace out!

Some Uplifting News

Dr. Chen confirmed at my appointment this past Monday that the tumor that was between my ribs and the tumor just below my shoulder blade seem to be gone after one cycle. Woohoo!!!!! Now we are looking at 4 cycles and probably going down to just 2 drugs for cycles 5 and 6. We will keep everyone up to date.