This morning I did the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. I said good bye to my husband Steve. He peacefully passed away at 6:20 am and is no longer suffering. His soul is free from cancer, so he won!
Thank you all so much for your prayers, friendship and love over these past 2+ years.
I knew it had been a while since I updated this site, but I didn’t realize it had been 6 months! The reason I haven’t updated in the past 6 months is there hasn’t really been a significant change….. which isn’t a bad thing when you are stage 4! This past week, Steve had his last follow up for the year so I thought it was a good time to share how he’s doing. His CEA number is holding at 11, which is low and good. He had a bone scan earlier this month because he was having some back pain and his last scan still showed a spot on his vertebrae. I won’t lie, this scared me. I was more worried than Steve was. …
I haven’t posted in a while. Sorry about that. I’ve talked with most of you in person rather than updating this site. The reason why I haven’t updated, honestly, is because it hasn’t been news I wanted to share. The news I want to share is “The tumors are shrinking!” or ” the tumors are gone”. But I haven’t been able to share that news because that’s not what has happened. Two months ago when Steve had a CT Scan there was a little bit of growth in his lungs. The doctor believed that at the beginning of the year when he changed drugs and went a couple of cycles without one of them, the growth happened. At the same time his CEA number went…
Steve finished his 4th round of chemo today. He feels this one went the best so far. However, the tingling in his fingers from the cold came much faster this time. Almost immediately when he got home on Wednesday. But other than that it went well. He still feels fine, he even had more of an appetite than he has the last few times so that’s good! Four down, many more to go! Next time the doctor will check his CEA number again – the tumor marker number. We are hoping it’s lower again. He said mid September he’ll send him for a scan to actually see where the tumors are now or more importantly where they are not! We are looking forward to that. …
Steve saw his Oncologist today and his CEA is still going up, slowly but it’s going up. Today it was 20. In March it was 17 and in February it was 12. So it’s moving up but that’s not the direction the doctor wants to see it go. That means the cancer is also growing. So it’s time to change chemo treatments. We are going on another family trip this month, this time out to California to Disneyland!! The girls are VERY excited. The doctor is going to wait until after our trip to change his chemo. Tomorrow will be his last one on this type of chemo and then he’ll take a break so he’ll feel great on our trip. It’ll actually be a…
I had to take Steve to the hospital today. His breathing hasn’t been very good and I just knew it needed to be addressed. I’m so glad we went because his oxygen level was VERY low. They did a CT scan to check for a new blood clot, but found nothing. There is a little fluid in his lung but the doctor thinks it’s old and doesn’t believe it is related to this. They did hear some crackling in one of his lungs so perhaps it’s a little collapsed but again, he didn’t think it would cause this much distress. There is some progression of disease in his lungs so it could be a combination of everything. They admitted him and have him on oxygen…
Yesterday Steve finished his 2nd round of chemo and he did well. No real big side effects except he feels really tired. But this morning he’s still feeling good. 2 down, many more to go! Let’s hope it’s working!