HALF DONE!

Had my checkup at PENN this week and my oncologist was in a good mood. :-P I told him last time he was grouchy and it did nothing for my attitude. Teehee. He is usually very pleasant, really! Anyway he pointed out that I am half done chemo! HOORAH! I had wondered, as I learned recently that many folks take this poison for years. OH MY. But as I suspected, these are folks who have some small tumors that are not surgically removable, and the Sutent can keep them the same size or shrink them / hold them at bay for long periods of time (this is a good thing!). Thankfully I have no visible tumors so there is no reason for me to continue the Sutent after "only" four more rounds. Yippee! There is still the nagging reality that this cancer can come back and hit me anytime for years to come, but I am trying to dwell on the fact that the longer it stays gone the better chance it will stay gone or that better treatments will be discovered for me if it does come back. Guess this is how optimists think, huh? :-O

I sort of have the hang of the side effects now and ways to handle them or make them more tolerable, know when I have had enough and gotta crash in bed early (not that I listen to myself much) and generally I am handling it ok, so they cut out my next 6 week visit and I can just get the bloodwork done locally and talk to them by phone. Then I will get another CT scan in 12 weeks and go for a visit for those results. And by then I will only have TWO rounds left!???!!!! COOL!

My white count is running a bit low again, my blood pressure is all over the place (mostly low) after messing w/ my BP med a lot because the chemo shoots it up, my feet and hands and mouth still do weird stuff..... but generally I think I can make it through. Thank you all for holding me up in prayer. God is sustaining me through the rough spots. I am really hoping I can keep a good attitude and "look on the bright side" more often, cancel the pity parties and hope for the future. That worry thing is really a drag.

We have a friend just diagnosed with colon cancer and my heart is going out to he and his wife, as well as another friend whose almost 20 years ago brain tumor returned and now has spread to bone in his hip and spine. Please add them to your prayers.

Ethan is doing well post-op after about 36 hours of stupor from the anesthesia and a good bit of pain, but he is a great sport about it all and is doing much better now. He has 3 pins in his wrist and a big splint, which will then be 8 weeks of casts and another splint but we hope he is good as new by summer! Charles continues PT and is almost free of back pain now but has a lot of nerve weakness in his R leg still being worked on. The legal mess continues but our lawyer is working on some things to move it ahead a little faster than a snails pace, which I guess is some sort of improvement? Meanwhile we know God is with us and He is providing enough to manage day by day, for which we are so thankful.

Thank you so much for standing by us in the storm,
Karen