Busy week, new treatment update

It’s been a busy week filled with blessings and confusions. I have received many wonderful and heartfelt messages from friends. Each contact sends me into a reflective stage wondering how and why these friendships developed. I spend a lot of time thinking about each relationship. I recall things that passed as meaningless at the time, but now bring both tears and joy to me. Snippets of conversations, memories of support and sacrifices from all fronts. I find irony in some of the conversations where friends are telling me how much I have helped them with this or that situation, while as I recall it was really them who provided the means. I often recall how proud I was that they would just trust me enough to allow me to comment or offer support (though I know I was usually pretty pushy). But it was always their will, their commitment that brought about the result. I accept that this is probably the definitive definition of ‘friendship”, when two people agree to trust each other and work together to resolve a situation, accepting that the outcome will be what it is and not effect the sincerity of the relationship. Perhaps it is just my current situation that allows me to reflect in this manner (do you think?). But as time passes, I hope to share with my friends one final message; how to recognize the blessings of true friendships. I am in the process of building such a “lesson plan”. I will share it with all of interest very shortly.


Last Wednesday I went in for my second round of “new” treatment. This time they gave me two bags of “refreshing” liquids. One is called Avastin and is designed to block the building of new blood vessels in the brain. Cancer cells have a sneaky way of spreading; they build these roadways out of new blood vessels and then travel to new areas. The Avastin is supposed to retard the “construction” process. I hope it works as well as Obama’s stimulus program. I might live for another 3-5 years.

The second fun bag is a chemo called Irinacan (sp). Somehow it is suppose to take the fight directly to the cancer, kind of like sending in platoon of Navy Seals. Going in I didn’t notice anything, but for the past days my insides feel like someone pumped an aquarium full of goldfish into me. I’m not sure what to feed them, I never know when they are going to sleep or perform their “Sea World” act. I’m told that things should settle down in a few days. I’m just hoping that the Navy “goldfish” are taking this fight seriously. I have to wait six more weeks before they do the next MRI and get a body count to see who is really winning. My money is on the Seals. (sorry for the reference to goldfish, I was only kidding!)