need sounding board, advice?

billswife
billswife Member Posts: 33
edited March 2014 in Caregivers #1
I'm new at this so please bear with me. In Nov. 2003 my husband was diagnosed with a rare form of nasal/sinus cancer( the Dr.s didn't even give it a long fancy name:) He was treated with radiation & chemo and in June 2004, the tumor was gone.
This past March , a routine pet scan detected a tumor about 1/2 inch in diameter in his lung. Our oncologist and everyone else who looks at the results keep saying it's so small and don't seem particularly alarmed. My husband won't ask what kind of tumor is is-- he doesn't want to know and of course the privacy laws won't let anyone tell me. He's has started chemo again ( carboplatim & Gemzar)
The problem is that, he had his 1st treatment on April 1 and has not been able to have any since. His blood cell counts have been too low, so now they want to do a transfusion on Monday and try again on Friday.
Is this unusual? To me, anything involving blood and the lungs is really scary.
I 'm a type A kind of person and this just sitting around doing nothing is driving me crazy.

Thanks for letting me vent.

Comments

  • AuthorUnknown
    AuthorUnknown Member Posts: 1,537 Member
    #2
    Hello,

    You may want to consider contacting the American Cancer Society's National Cancer Information Center. Cancer Information Specialists may be able to assist you with your questions. They can be reached at 1-800-227-2345 or by using the "Contact ACS" link at the top of this page.

    Take care and be well,

    Dana
    CSN Dana
  • jenruth02
    jenruth02 Member Posts: 6
    #3
    I know way more about breast cancer since that is what my mom had, but I have a very close friend who has had lung cancer twice. He has gone for long periods of time between his treatments because of low blood cell counts they never did transfusions but low blood cell counts are something that happened a lot.
  • Judylynn
    Judylynn Member Posts: 1
    #4
    Dear Billswife,

    Hey, it sounds like we are sisters----my husband was diag. back in 2004 with a rare form of cancer...espically since he never smoke and didn't drink much...(not for a sailor anyhow..;-)
    anyhow...he had naso-pharygenal-cancer---in operatable...and he went thru grueling rounds of chemo and radiation...for a while, I didn't know what would get him first, the cancer...or the treatment!!! He had the max dosage of radiation the human body could take...6,000 rads....darn near killed him...but...Praise God...he's curretnly in remission---every six months, he goes in for a p.e.t. scan...next one is comming up next month...he gets scared...but who wounldn't...how has your husband delt with the changes in his body (before the cancer came back)...mine has mood swings, memory losses....he had the remainder of his teeth removed a few weeks ago...so, now he has to go back to eating 'gruel' though, the only food he can eat is extreamly soft, over cooked stuff anyway. He eats like a pig, dosen't gain much...he lost 100lbs during treatment...and has gained 5lbs back....I too need to sound...I love the man...but there are days...he drives me crazy...

    They told us if it comes back...the nasty stuff always showes up in the lungs...(I'm on edge everytime he sneezes, or coughs....do you find your self also going thru that? ) He was advanced stage III almost stage 4----it was a pretty large tumor and it had spread to his neck lymphnode....
    I can't offer much advice..but...I am here to talk to ...caregiver to caregiver...

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