This is Shannon’s last week of radiation… hooray! It has been very rough on him but having the end in sight helps a little bit. He is unable to eat any solids at all and keeping his weight loss to an acceptable level has become difficult. The doctor wasn’t very pleased with his weight loss this week. He is still over the acceptable total of weight loss but he is losing weight too fast right now. Five pounds a week for the past 2 weeks. We are working on raising his calorie intake and he’s been doing better with it the past couple of days. The combo of chemo and radiation together have taken a bit of a toll on him and he is weak and tired. Still fighting though and that’s what matters most. He and I are both still very hopeful that all this is going to be worth it in the end and he will have a good outcome.
The radiation oncologist has scheduled a CT scan for him the first week of January and we will see him again in the second week of January to go over those results and see where we go from there.
After our big scare last week, we have been in touch again with the chemo oncologist. He would like to do more chemo but doesn’t feel Shannon is quite up for it. We will be going back to see him again on December 19 and it is likely he will have at least one more treatment of chemo starting that day most likely. We will see that doctor first though and he can assess how Shannon is doing and make a better decision then. For right now the plan is to let Shannon rest and heal a little from the treatments, get his strength back up a little and then go from there. The chemo alone will probably not be as hard on him as the chemo radiation combination he’s been doing. They have assured us that waiting to continue the chemo will not hurt his outcome in the long run and it is much better for him to wait until he is stronger.
For now, we are waiting for Friday… the last day of radiation. We may not go out dancing but we will celebrate quietly and look forward to a time when he is well and feeling better. One day at a time is what we are trying to do but we are also trying to look forward to a better time. We know this is all going to work out and so we are still hopeful and determined not to let this rough patch get us down.
Well, this ends Shannon’s short treatment week. Now there is nothing until next week. Five more radiation treatments and he is finished. Even better is that there are 4 days between those last 5 and now that he can use to heal up a little and get rested without having to go out to the hospital for a treatment of any sort. Not our traditional Thanksgiving but something to give thanks for all the same.
Monday, we saw the radiation doctor. Shannon has been feeling pretty bad and didn’t bounce back over the weekend as he usually does. The doctor saw that and said that in case we hadn’t realized Shannon is in the worst part of the radiation treatments now. The best news he could give us was that now they have begun dialing back the radiation and are giving a smaller beam over a smaller area. This means he should start to feel better. He’s pushing through the worst now. That is good news and I know he can do it if this is the worst. Another thing for us to give thanks for.
Yesterday was chemo. We saw the doctor there too but not our regular one. He was out of the office so we saw one of his partners. She confirmed that it was the last chemo and I asked a second time just to be sure… and to hear her repeat that good phrase again. It felt so good to be doing that for the last time. Not that the chemo felt good to either one of us but knowing we don’t have to go back did feel great.
Then, as we were leaving the scheduling desk shoved a paper in my hand and didn’t say anything. I looked at it and thought surely it was for follow-up blood testing or something but Shannon wasn’t feeling very well so I put it in my bag and brought him home. Once he was resting, I called to see what it was about and the woman at the scheduling desk said it was the doctors order and there would be 4 more chemos ending on December 19. It was a horrible, sinking feeling that really hit me hard right in the pit of my stomach. I said that the doctor had told us it was the last treatment so they forwarded my call to the doctor’s assistant. That phone was on messages only so I had to leave a message and as it got past 5 pm I just knew I wouldn’t hear back yesterday. I saved the news so Shannon could rest better and told him this morning when we were on the way to radiation. He took it much better than I did.
Since Shannon’s appointment for radiation was very early this morning, the chemo doctor’s office wasn’t open yet so I couldn’t check with them. I was going to call but needed to get out to run some errands before it got too late. So I got Shannon settled and left him here taking a nap. When I got home the message machine was blinking so I listened and got the very best news I’ve had in a very long time. It was the chemo doctor’s assistant saying there was a scheduling problem. They had pre-booked some extra chemo treatments to save his space in case he needed more but no, he doesn’t need more. He is finished with that! So, another thing to give thanks for on this very different sort of Thanksgiving. I cannot even begin to say how relieved we are now. We are all smiling this afternoon. 
Now we are going to have a short rest and then the final week of treatment. At last it looks like it will be over. I just know all these treatments have helped him. We’ll have to wait a few weeks for him to heal from radiation. The burns and damaged areas will have to heal or they will show on the scans and the doctors won’t be able to see what is cancer and what is burns. That’s ok though. We don’t mind waiting to find out if it means a chance for Shannon to start feeling better first. I firmly believe that the scans will show he has healed and the cancer will be gone. I know these treatments have done him some good… just something I feel.
In other news… it snowed last night. In Florida where it never does that! I think that was just nature’s way of letting us know there was good news on the way. They say it might do it again tonight. More good news? I bought a lotto ticket today maybe I’m going to get some numbers right. 
I hope all of you that are reading this in the US have a wonderful Thanksgiving tomorrow. Enjoy your families that is the most important thing. We won’t be having a traditional Thanksgiving here but we will be giving many thanks for many things and enjoying each other.
Out of 37 total radiation treatments, we are now down into the single digits. Nine more to go! One more chemo to go. Little things like that tell us we are getting there. Shannon is beginning to have burns on his neck from the radiation. I have been rubbing aloe vera gel on those burns and he says that helps very much. I hope it will keep his skin in good shape. It’s just like dealing with a very bad sunburn. He’s had burns inside for quite some time. Not much we can do for those except give him a liquid pain killer. Seems to be working pretty well but I know it’s not easy for him. As painful as those burns are for him, they are the thing that is telling us the treatments are working. It would be so wonderful if they could find a treatment that would kill the cancer without making the patient so ill but I am just happy that they have treatments that work as well as they do. We can get through this I am sure.
Chemo went ok this week. Shannon spent the whole afternoon and night in bed that night and still wasn’t feeling very well the next day. It was hard for him to get up and go to his radiation the next afternoon. He is doing a little better today but still didn’t feel like sitting up to watch TV this evening. It’s all part of the treatments and perfectly normal. Disconcerting to me a little bit becuase it always took so much to get him down before this. Still, as I said in my last post it is all worth it. This time next month, he will be on the mend. That’s the only way we have found to get through all this… looking forward to a time when it’s all finished.
Shannon is determined to drive himself to and from all of his treatments. It’s getting difficult for him but he is still driving safe. Guess it would be easier for him to let me drive but he doesn’t look for the easy way. To him it’s a matter of having at least a little control over the disease and the treatments. I’m proud of him to tell the truth.
We keep praying that all this is going to do the trick. I have great faith that it will and he will be cured. Some day in the future this will all be a memory and we will be off living our lives as we want to. I know we won’t be taking things for granted anymore. We’ll enjoy things and each other much more than we had been and not just take for granted that we have years and years to be together.
Take care everyone. Thank you all again for all the well wishes and the prayers. It’s so important to us and we are so grateful. Please keep those prayers coming. They are working and we need all we can get to make Shannon well again.
In thinking about Shannon’s treatments I think we have both come to the conclusion that it is worth it. That’s easier for me to say than it is for him. He is the one that is going through it and fighting this fight. I am the one watching it and seeing what the treatments are doing to him and just hoping that what I do for him is enough…. but it really is worth it. It’s worth it for the chance for him to be cured. It’s worth it to get our lives back. It’s worth it for the promise of getting back to normal. I can tell you we’ve both learned some things. Neither of us will be taking things for granted as we did before. This is a huge life lesson learned.
Friday was radiation treatment 24 out of 37. Thirteen to go… a much better number than 37. When we were in for the treatment two of the other people who are there every day at the same time Shannon gets his treatment had their last one. It was nearly a celebration and it must feel great to them to be finished. There are 3 people all together we’ve seen finish their treatments and Shannon and I are looking forward to his last day. That will be December 1st. It’s really odd to say goodbye to people we’ve come to know and hope that we won’t be seeing them again… at least not in the same situation.
There are also two more chemo treatments to go. One on this coming Tuesday and the last on the next Tuesday. Those treatments are a bit harder on Shannon but it’s a combination of the two that are making him feel tired and weak. It’s hard watching him go through this but we both know that it’s something that has to be done. As I said before, it is worth it.
He’ll have his weekly check by the doctor on Monday. We are hoping there has been more forward progress. So far, there has been some progress each week.