Thirteen Years NED

Reflections of my journey . Six days from today I will be 72 years young. Ten days later I will be a lucky 13 years NED. Back in 2002 I was a clueless newbie trying to learn my way around the bases. It started by doing some heavy yard work that spring and then peeing red. My GP thought I just broke a blood vessel, but sent me to a URO anyway. The URO sent me for a CT as a CYA medical procedure. What me worry? Not a bit.

Almost a week after the CT the URO's nurse called to schedule me for an appointment. Something was blurted out about Kidney Cancer. WTF. This does not sound good. Whoever heard of Kidney Cancer and than this part about major surgery right out of the gate. I tried to remember about getting my tonsils out at age 3.

And than the 2 month wait for the surgery. It was summer and the surgeons had to schedule things around their Tee times. My wife thought we should go to this nice B & B on the Canadian side of Lake Huron for the July 4th weekend. We went to this nice British Pub for dinner. They brought all of the traditional British dishes out on a tray for the diners to view. I did not order the Kidney Pie.

I needed to know more. I connected on something called the Internet with something called dial up. There was no Google nor was there a Divinci. When you searched for Kidney Cancer you came up with 20th century statistics that stated that half the people who get Kidney Cancer, die from it. The last thing I wanted to do was volunteer for this club.

My surgeon was the young guy in the URO office who had just finished a Fellowship in Laproscopic Surgery. I also thought he wanted to be a stand up comedian when he wrote on my Discharge Summary that I was discharged without pain. As a result of the passage of 13 years and the onset of Partsheimers I likewise do not remember any pain from and after the surgery, yeah right.

About 6 years later I thought it would be helpful for myself and the newbies to get on the Internet and teach them things like the secret handshake to get in our club and to otherwise help them with their journeys.

REFLECTIONS:

13 years from now as a result of better tests and surveillance, Stages 2,3 and 4 of RCC will be eliminated.

13 years from now Stage 1 RCC will be dealt with by procedures rather than surgery

Women 50, 60 and 70 look a hell of a lot better than they looked 50, 60 and 70 years ago.

13 years from now my 5 grandchildren, ages 13 thru 19 will all be married with families of their own.

13 weeks from now I am moving with icewoman ( my wife of 49 and 1/2 years) from Michigan to Royal Palm Beach, Florida.

While I may or may not be around for another 13 years my doctors are confident that any checkout will be from something other than RCC.

With that being said a neph. already.

May the best of health and life to everyone.