What Was The Point?

As I'm sitting here, I'm trying to understand.

I'm confused.

Boggled really.

And I'm thinking to myself, "What was the point? What was the point of those last 2 months then?"

The results were not as I expected. At all. We were hoping for a miracle and a Swiss cheese looking liver, with results of, 'The cancer is gone,' or at least, 'The tumors haven't grown at all - the chemo is working.' But what do we get instead?

The results: The chemo didn't do anything. The tumors didn't shrink. They didn't even stay at the size they were at previously. In fact, they grew. GREW! I don't even know what to say. I don't know whether to be in shock or disbelief or confused or what. 

So let's look at the pros and cons (yes there are some pros, but I think there may be more cons)

  
Cons

• The tumors kept growing without being affected by the chemo.

• The experimental trials are all phase one trials – not much known about the drugs.

• I have 30+ tumors sitting just inside my liver, plus 3-5 large tumors sitting in the free space of my abdomen.

• There is a mass that is mildly compressing my kidney.

• The same mass that is mildly compressing my kidney is near a renal artery; it isn’t compressing it yet, but it could (that’s kind of some scary stuff…basically, the mass could keep squeezing my kidney and that artery and rupture the artery causing me to hemorrhage again, like I did in Dec. 2012).

• Surgery may not be an option to just remove everything – recovery is 6 weeks. Six weeks of not doing anything but possibly letting more tumors grow in replace of what was taken out.

Pros

• My body won’t be hit with 4 of the strongest chemo drugs 4 days in a row each month.

• I can try experimental trials of chemo – there are three different types.

• My blood labs and vitals are all healthy.

• I’m not getting sick or feel the effects of the chemo.

• (My favorite one) I will start to see hair growth in 3-1/2 weeks! Hello hair and long showers, here I come! I can’t say I haven’t missed my hair, but it does help with the feminine factor a bit. Granted, I've loved taking 2-3 minute showers and being the fastest ready(always was though, now I’m just waiting around longer for everyone else), but when I want to go get dressed up and look nice, it would nice to have my hair to do as well and get 100% dolled up

Now some may ask, what about your vitals and blood work? They didn’t drop or anything? And here is my answer. Yes, they did drop. They actually dropped pretty drastically, but they also bounced back up drastically as well. For some of my counts, if they were to drop any more, they would have had to hospitalize me until my levels were a little more stable. And because they did drop so much and my doctors wanted to be on the safe side, for a week after my second chemo treatment, I gave myself a daily injection of growth factor.

The exact brand of my lidocaine cream

Growth factor is a naturally occurring substance capable of stimulating cellular growth, proliferation and cellular differentiation. (Say what?) First off, I don’t have to be hooked up to anything to get this injection. I got to take the injections home with me and do it myself. I didn’t have to access my port. I had the choice of injection into the back of my arm, like most shots at a doctor’s office are, my thigh, or my stomach. I also had the benefit of having a lidocaine cream that I apply an hour before my injection that numbs the surrounding area. Basically, it takes the edge off when I have to ‘stab’ myself. I also use this cream every time I had chemo or I have a blood draw. It comes in handy. 

Anyways, I always injected the growth factor into my stomach, at night, because an effect of it can be sore muscles, so I thought, why not inject it at night and sleep the soreness away? Worked pretty well for me. It didn’t keep me down. You also have to keep the injection in the fridge to stay cool, but take it out a half hour before injection, because it flows easier if it’s at room temp. 

Back to what it does, sorry, I end up getting on bunny trails with all the information that  I have, when you inject the growth factor, it goes to the bone marrow and produces more white blood cells. Gives my body an added boost for my immune system essentially.

My vitals, after the low 2 weeks after chemo period end, bounce back up close to a normal person’s vitals. My hemoglobin is still lower, but first off, I’ve always ran low, and second, I do have chemo running through me. But I keep my energy level up by eating and staying active. My white blood cells bounce to close to normal, my platelets and everything else. So yes I have stage 4 cancer, but I LOOK and FEEL healthy.

So now all we can do is consult the doctors, talk about our options so that we fully understand them, pray and make a decision.