Today we had an appointment with Dr. Sombeck our radiation oncologist. It went so well! After reviewing Shannon’s PET scan Dr. Sombeck told us that there have been no changes and that the PET scan held no surprises. We will be able to do the less aggressive type of therapy to include radiation 5 days per week along with chemo every 3rd week for 7 weeks. Then we will do another PET scan and see if the treatment has helped. They began the treatment planning phase today by giving him a small scan that will enable them to aim the radiation machine. So, Shannon has some very fashionable little tattoos on his neck so they will be able to find the correct spot again on his treatment days. He’ll have one more appointment next Friday to finish up the planning and then the actual radiation portion of the treatment will begin on the following Monday.
We will be going to Dr. Grow on Tuesday next week to find out the drugs he plans to administer with the chemo and when it will be started.
Now that we are actually getting ready to begin, there is a certain amount of relief. The waiting was getting very hard for us both. It is also helpful that decisions have finally been made as to what exactly will happen. This was definately a good day.
To those who are reading here. All your prayers and well-wishes seem to be helping. We appreciate each and every one of you so very much. You all mean a lot to both of us.
To us the waiting in between procedures seems so long. Really things have gone relatively quickly from the time Shannon discovered the mass in his throat but it seems like things drag on and take forever. We have a million questions between us and yet whenever we get the next bit of news from any of the doctors we are so blown away by what we are hearing, we can’t remember to ask. I’ll be having to keep a list I think.
Our Radiation Oncologist (Dr. Sombek) sent us to see a regular Oncologist because they are considering doing radiation and chemo at the same time to try and shrink or maybe even completely get rid of the tumor and the swelling in the lymph nodes without needing surgery. When we spoke to that Oncologist (Dr. Grow), he was thinking of a more aggessive treatment that would entail 5 days of chemo in a very strong coctail of drugs and then moving forward with the radiation and once a week lighter chemo. Dr. Grow and Dr. Sombek are supposed to get togther and come to some conclusion and some choices by tomorrow when we see Dr. Sombek. They will both have the results of the PET scan by then and can make a more educated plan.
The waiting is so very hard for us but we want the doctors to come up with the very best plan of attack. So we wait. Maybe tomorrow will bring us some more information and a little bit closer to whatever treatment it will be. I think at this point both of us just want to get started so we can put something behind us in this long road we are facing. We try our very best to live in the moment and not get ahead of ourselves in our thoughts. It isn’t easy but we both feel it’s best to try and be that way. We can’t change the past, we can’t predict the future. We can only live in the here and now and try and be happy in it.
My husband had woken up with a bit of a scratchy throat and so he looked into the back of his throat. He saw some specks and odd colored flesh at the back of his throat where his tonsils would have been had they not been removed when he was a child. He probably wouldn’t have worried about this and just written it off as a cold starting but he also saw a mass back there beginning from that place on his tonsil to the back of his tongue. It didn’t look right to him so he called and got a walk in appointment with our Primary Care Physician. He didn’t like the look of it at all and sent him to an ENT doctor. We had an appointment for 2 weeks from that day. It seemed too long to wait for something this serious and this scary. We called and found a cancellation for a week sooner to see Dr. Baylor our ENT. He didn’t hesitate and gave us the diagnosis we had been dreading. Nasopharangyl Cancer. A biopsy was done the next Friday and confirmed Dr. Baylor’s suspicisions and our fears. He referred us to Dr. Sombeck a radiology oncologist at the Florida Hospital Cancer Center. We are looking at a squamus cell cancer in Stage III. This means while it’s still small it has spread to two lymph nodes in his neck.