thxmiker!!! How are you doing?

We made it home!  Woo Hooo!   The Van over heated in the desert.  Luckily it was at 6am.  We waited until 7am, added fluids and got rid of an Air lock in the engine cooling system, and on the road again.    We got lost in Chandler AZ. lol  Then we were wayward for home again.   

We beat a Lightning strike fire by a couple of hours.  The fire closed the only highway from the south to town.  Our neighbors were in Phonix and had to go around the fire an extra 130 mile. ughh,  (The only real issue with living in a small mountain town.  Fire closes the roads quite often.)

We came home to our garden just bursting with vegtables!  Our firend had been giving vegtables away and we still have a fridge full of veggies!  Life is good again.  Fresh food instead of hospital food.   

On the positive:  The Docs at UCSD went after as many tumors as they could get.  I had a "Cycst"  in my left pelvis.  It had been tested has benign.  Apparantly it was not benign anymore.  Dr. Lowy removed it and searched for one in the right pelvis.  Apparantly they grow in mirror image, and he removed a second tumor in my right pelvis.  Banner MD Anderon told us if they were cancer they were next to imposible to remove.  I have no difficulty walking and zero pain in the pelvis.  If I did not know they did surgery there, I would not know.

The main tumor found at the ostimosis, was obscured by the stomach in the CTs.  So, what they told us was 90% reduction was them mistaking a second tumor as the ostimosis.   They removed both tumors, and one on the galbladder.  (MD Anderson told us the galbladder one was also near impossible to get. If you do not get the reference MD Anderson is way over hyped!)  Several Mets were taken out, several Lymph nodes were checked. I had 2 in 7 lymph nodes test positive for cancer.  Adnocarcenomas.  (Not quite as aggresive as the Signet Ring Cell.)   Over 4 tiumors removed, 60% of the 30 met removed, and 7 lymph nodes removed.

I was DNA tested and my tumors and lymph nodes are being DNA tested.  We will hear back from Dr Lowy and UCSD in about 6-8 weeks. (about thehealing time.)  They have 200 clinical targeted trials currently going on. Hopefully I qualify.  I got a great rating as a patient from UCSD.  (Meaning easy to deal with and complient to exercise etc,,,)  y results are alsoo being forwarded to USC and hopefully between the two I will have some great news in 8 weeks.

Laurie, my wife had a collapse this morning.  She is stressed and exhausted from worrying about me.  I drove her to the Docs, and she passed out.  I then  ran her over to the ER.  Apparantly something we ate gave her a severe allergic reaction and just put her in immense pain.   Laurie is home now and feeling better. We both lost abut 10 lbs (4.5 k) in the last two weeks.   I am never sure if cancer is harder on me or Laurie.

When we got home, our dogs went nuts. I walked in the door and just sat down on the floor. Our beagle mix and Pekingese mix went all happy and licky on me.  We sat there for most of an hour. Our dogs were super happy and very gentle on me. They both sniffed my surgical site and then went supper doscile and sweet on me.  We call them our fuzzy children. We can not imagine our lives, with out the compassion that animals teach us.

Bottom line, Our trip went well. The surgery although not all we hoped went well. We are home safe and sound!  I will put pics up of our gardens in a couple of days.  (We are proud of them.  We can not have grass in our city, so we opted foor food to have green in our yard.)  

Thank You all for your well wishes and thoughts n prayers. Having the extra support makes rough times go easier.

Best Always,   mike

PS  It is Monsoon weather and the skies light up and rumble then we get a hard rain for 20-30 minutes. God can create a great show!

lp1964 said:

You Guys are...

...an amazing team. I can't believe you had all that done and you describe it as if you had your teeth cleaned. I congratulate you on your strength and attitude. I hope your wife is ok and stayes strong for both of you. She sounds like a great partner to you. But I know women are all over the emotional spectrum especially during difficult times. I'm blessed with my wife too: she stayes strong for me when I'm down and she makes me strong when she needs me.

Those vegetables sounds so good. You have to tell us more specifics. What are they and how do you eat them.

I have a tiny patch in the back yart (5'X12') so I'm growing some tomatoes and Hungarian bell peppers. The peppers are the best in the world and I'm not saying this because I'm Hungarian I wish I could send you some so you would agree with me!

It's crazy what's going on with these wild fires here in California too. You guys stay safe.

I am 2/3 trhough my radiation and Xeloda and thanks God almost no side effects so far. Actually I almost feel normal again. I had pretty intense pain when I started, blood in the stool, tough bowel movement. It's all gone. There was a patient here that had a very similar tumor and his totally disappeared and he chose not to have the opration. He is going through some intense chemo to "mop up". Secretly I'm hoping for similar outcome, but as you probaly know cancer patients have to be careful with unrealistic hopes although faith helps a lot.

Anyway, You guys are good for now and we all hope and wish you strength and the best possible outcome down the road.

Take care,

Laz

I'm so glad to hear that it went relatively well at UCSD. I have to agree with you that our MD Anderson does not live up to the expectations that we all hear so much about. They are relatively new here and I think all the good things we have heard pertaining to MDA refer to the more established locations. It was a disappointment to us that they did not have various non-cancer specialists as part of their institution, but time was speeding by for Ron with all his other medical setbacks, so we chose to stay with them rather than waste more time trying to get a third opinion. Although it appeared that they were efficient in the limited treatments he received, it definitely felt like being in a herd of cattle. So, I'm happy that you were able to explore other options.

Please send some of that rain down to the valley, so I don't get a ticket for having a "brown" lawn from the city. It is clever how they charge an enormous price for your water bill with the fear of "brown" always hanging over your head. And then, if you manage to keep up with the water cost and your grass gets a bit too long, you'll get a ticket for that, too.  I just LOVE the city.  NOT!

Glad you made it home safely, but sorry to hear of Laurie's collapse. I can identify with that one also. Please remind her to rest if she can.

Luv,

Wolfen

thxmiker said:

We made it home!  Woo Hooo!  

We made it home!  Woo Hooo!   The Van over heated in the desert.  Luckily it was at 6am.  We waited until 7am, added fluids and got rid of an Air lock in the engine cooling system, and on the road again.    We got lost in Chandler AZ. lol  Then we were wayward for home again.   

 

We beat a Lightning strike fire by a couple of hours.  The fire closed the only highway from the south to town.  Our neighbors were in Phonix and had to go around the fire an extra 130 mile. ughh,  (The only real issue with living in a small mountain town.  Fire closes the roads quite often.)

 

We came home to our garden just bursting with vegtables!  Our firend had been giving vegtables away and we still have a fridge full of veggies!  Life is good again.  Fresh food instead of hospital food.   

 

On the positive:  The Docs at UCSD went after as many tumors as they could get.  I had a "Cycst"  in my left pelvis.  It had been tested has benign.  Apparantly it was not benign anymore.  Dr. Lowy removed it and searched for one in the right pelvis.  Apparantly they grow in mirror image, and he removed a second tumor in my right pelvis.  Banner MD Anderon told us if they were cancer they were next to imposible to remove.  I have no difficulty walking and zero pain in the pelvis.  If I did not know they did surgery there, I would not know.

 

The main tumor found at the ostimosis, was obscured by the stomach in the CTs.  So, what they told us was 90% reduction was them mistaking a second tumor as the ostimosis.   They removed both tumors, and one on the galbladder.  (MD Anderson told us the galbladder one was also near impossible to get. If you do not get the reference MD Anderson is way over hyped!)  Several Mets were taken out, several Lymph nodes were checked. I had 2 in 7 lymph nodes test positive for cancer.  Adnocarcenomas.  (Not quite as aggresive as the Signet Ring Cell.)   Over 4 tiumors removed, 60% of the 30 met removed, and 7 lymph nodes removed.

 

I was DNA tested and my tumors and lymph nodes are being DNA tested.  We will hear back from Dr Lowy and UCSD in about 6-8 weeks. (about thehealing time.)  They have 200 clinical targeted trials currently going on. Hopefully I qualify.  I got a great rating as a patient from UCSD.  (Meaning easy to deal with and complient to exercise etc,,,)  y results are alsoo being forwarded to USC and hopefully between the two I will have some great news in 8 weeks.

 

Laurie, my wife had a collapse this morning.  She is stressed and exhausted from worrying about me.  I drove her to the Docs, and she passed out.  I then  ran her over to the ER.  Apparantly something we ate gave her a severe allergic reaction and just put her in immense pain.   Laurie is home now and feeling better. We both lost abut 10 lbs (4.5 k) in the last two weeks.   I am never sure if cancer is harder on me or Laurie.

 

When we got home, our dogs went nuts. I walked in the door and just sat down on the floor. Our beagle mix and Pekingese mix went all happy and licky on me.  We sat there for most of an hour. Our dogs were super happy and very gentle on me. They both sniffed my surgical site and then went supper doscile and sweet on me.  We call them our fuzzy children. We can not imagine our lives, with out the compassion that animals teach us.

 

Bottom line, Our trip went well. The surgery although not all we hoped went well. We are home safe and sound!  I will put pics up of our gardens in a couple of days.  (We are proud of them.  We can not have grass in our city, so we opted foor food to have green in our yard.)  

Thank You all for your well wishes and thoughts n prayers. Having the extra support makes rough times go easier.

 

Best Always,   mike

 

PS  It is Monsoon weather and the skies light up and rumble then we get a hard rain for 20-30 minutes. God can create a great show!

Sounds like you have a really good surgical team. I am glad you made it home safely