I just talked to my Mom a little while ago...the doctor did a biopsy on Friday on what they thought was a "hematoma" between his neck and shoulders. They went back today to get the results and they were not good. It is a cancerous tumor. So now he has two tumors to battle with instead of one. The oncologist also told him that because it was a tumor and not a "hematoma", he is now in the Stage IV category, which means it has begun to spread and is the last and final stage of the large cell cancer. They are going to start him on radiation therapy this Wednesday and he will be going in for the radiation 5 days a week for 7 weeks, and see if that will shrink the tumor. I am not sure if they will be doing the radiation on both of them or just the one on his neck/back, but I would think that since they are no longer going to do chemo, they will use it on both tumors.
My mother is very upset (naturally) because this came as a complete shock because 4 doctors looked at the catscan and said "hematoma", and so naturally they did not think too much of it, since the oncologist told him on Friday that the "biopsy" was only a precautionary measure but he didn't think it was anything to worry about.
When the doctor gave this news to my Dad, my mother said it was absolutely heartwrenching when she saw the look of fear and panic on his face.
My Dad asked the doctor if this was the beginning of the end and wanted to know what the probable outcome was...was it hopeless? The doctor said, "No, it isn't. We are going to treat it very aggresively with the radiation." Thank God the next door neighbor took them to the doctor because there was no way my mother would have been able to drive safely after the visit. My Dad was sleeping when she called me with the news, and she said that he cried all the way home from the hospital and then when he got home, he just sobbed his heart out for about 30 minutes. He kept saying over and over, "I don't want to die. I'm not ready to die yet." He broke the news to my brother Joe, but he (my Dad) got so emotional after talking to him that he asked my Mom to make the rest of the phone calls and asked her to tell us that he didn't want to talk to anyone or see any of his children right now. He went into his room, shut the door and cried himself to sleep. He is thinking that he has already lost the battle. There is an organization of cancer patients that survived the worst of the worse, and they are going to go see my Dad tomorrow and will be his "support group" outside of the family. They've been exactly where he's at now and I think that even though we have been loving and supportive of my Dad, we cannot possibly imagine what he is going through, but these men can and my mother said the man from the Cancer Survivors support group will be there for him as long as he needs them...they will take him and my Mom to the doctor's, tell my Dad how they made it through and just give him some hope. Thankfully, my Mom contacted a Cancer Support group for the family, and she has been talking to her for the last few days.
I am still shocked and dismayed about this development, but I refuse to give up hope. My faith in God is all I have right now and I am hanging on for dear life, as are my brothers and sister.
If you would, please continue to keep my Dad and Mom in your prayers as you have been doing all along. Tonight I am scared, heartbroken and terrified, but I know what the power of prayer and absolute trust and faith in God can do, and no matter what happens, I'll make it through this ordeal.
Deej
/john
Don't doubt it for a moment: Prayers lifted.
Mr. M, it's amazing what distance can do for one's perspective and understanding.
The C.S. Lewis essay you mentioned the other day is a new one to me.
So I want to get ahold of it. Thanks!
Reminds me to go back and look at a collection of his letters to children which has been in my book pile for a few months.
My Dad asked the doctor if this was the beginning of the end and wanted to know what the probable outcome was...was it hopeless? The doctor said, "No, it isn't. We are going to treat it very aggresively with the radiation."
I have posted this before. But I want you to hear it. And tell your Dad about me too.
It was in August 1997 that I was dignosed with large cell cancer. My oncologist told me I had one chance in 3 of living until christmas. I had tumors the size of large grapefruit. I too heard that aggressive treatment line. I was certain I was dead. I slept most of the time. I did not want to see people. My wife, my children, every person I saw looked at me as if I was dying.
But then several weeks into the terrible exhausting treatments I was in the waiting room to see the doctor. It was terrible. Nurses who treated me never really looked at me. It was like they didn't want to know me... I was dying. I knew they couldn't stand to be my friend... and then have that friend die. I was dying. I could not be a friend or even a person they knew. I was a dying cancer patient. And Oh does that hurt.
I waited in the room when a nurse who never looked me in the eye came in. She winked at me and said. I am not allowed to tell you what your cat Scan shows... but you are going to like it.
When the doctor came in, he told me the cancer was shrinking. Slowly over months the cancer shrunk. Three months after I was supposed to be dead, I was still alive. The doctor said, after examining another of many catscan reports, you are cancer free. The cancer is gone.
Then came the warning about how it comes back and the real test would be if I could be cancer free 5 years from diagnosis. Well I am cancer free 5 years after diagnosis.
They have my piture on the wall at the hospital cancer center too. The nurses hug me when I go in for my check ups. They could be my friend when they knew I was going to live.
But for months I was at deaths door. Everyone in my family treated me as if I were dying. They did everything for me. I felt like a walking corpse. It is terrible when people look at you like you are dying.
Then a day came that I will never forget A day that told me I was well. That I was just husband and Dad again.. A living person that had faults and could be told about it.
Mrs tator came into the kitchen her hands on her hips and fire in her eyes. I was told in no uncertain terms what I was to do with my dirty underwear and socks. The bathroom floor was not a repository for my dirty clothes.. She was not my slave. I could dang(I think she said dang) well pick up my clothes, sort them, and put them in the proper baskets in the laundry room .... Do you hear me I am talking to you!!! She said.
It was the most wonderful thing anyone has ever said to me.
Don't give up hope. Help him fight. Help him keep his humanity. All is not lost. Faith does heal. It is a wondrous thing. But help him believe he is going to beat it. It is so very hard to fight the cancer when everyone thinks you are dying and you are the only one that thinks you may not.