This is my last post probably through the end of the year. I leave early Tuesday for my week–long trip to Yosemite that will keep me from both my parents and computer through January 1st.
I thank those who volunteered for my call list to provide physical assistance to my parents during my absence. The information has been e-mailed to my mom, who accepted it gladly.
May your new year be happy, healthy and full of love.
Brian
Monday, December 25, 2006
See Saw
Today is another bad day. My dad looks haggard and is moving more slowly than just a couple of days ago. He did manage to come downstairs in the morning, which facilitated the consumption of the delectable pancakes my mother made for breakfast. Aside from a short stint at the tree, to receive my present to him (the wonderful and noteworthy biography of J.D. Rockefeller, Titan), he spent the bulk of the time I was there sitting in the ‘TV room’ (the small room just off the kitchen).
My mother and I took a walk around the block after eating. We’ve done this for years. As is most common these days, today our topic was my dad. Specifically his appearance and substantive decline. What was unspoken, but I know was in both our thoughts, was whether we’ve seen the high point. Have the expected palliative or retardant effects of the chemo been exhausted? Or is this just a temporary swing to the worse, to be followed by another one back to the better. Maybe we’ll know on the 7th. For now, the uncertainty is more than frustrating.
My mother and I took a walk around the block after eating. We’ve done this for years. As is most common these days, today our topic was my dad. Specifically his appearance and substantive decline. What was unspoken, but I know was in both our thoughts, was whether we’ve seen the high point. Have the expected palliative or retardant effects of the chemo been exhausted? Or is this just a temporary swing to the worse, to be followed by another one back to the better. Maybe we’ll know on the 7th. For now, the uncertainty is more than frustrating.
Anderson, Begin Again
Several times I’ve written about the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center of the University of Texas. It is one of the two best clinical oncology facilities in the United States and one of the very best in the world. As I wrote before, I’ve wanted my father to go to Anderson since he was first diagnosed. Because of its special FDA status, Anderson has clinical trial treatments unavailable anywhere else.
Their latest is the proton beam. Yes, it sounds like some fictitious weapon from an episode of Star Trek. But it’s real, in use, and to great effect. And it’s at Anderson—and apparently nowhere else (at least in the States).
Is my father a candidate for such treatment? Who knows!? (Oh, for an interrobang!) So far he has squirmed out of every argument I’ve made in favor for going to Anderson, using ill–conceived claims and counterclaims. He seems convinced that UCSF is just as good. Well, maybe now he will give that belief further consideration.
Merry Christmas.
Their latest is the proton beam. Yes, it sounds like some fictitious weapon from an episode of Star Trek. But it’s real, in use, and to great effect. And it’s at Anderson—and apparently nowhere else (at least in the States).
Is my father a candidate for such treatment? Who knows!? (Oh, for an interrobang!) So far he has squirmed out of every argument I’ve made in favor for going to Anderson, using ill–conceived claims and counterclaims. He seems convinced that UCSF is just as good. Well, maybe now he will give that belief further consideration.
Merry Christmas.
Christmas
We had a big dinner last night. There was turkey, stuffing, creamed onions—all the good stuff. It was delicious. The food was planned for ten. Eight people sat at the table. One of the missing was my good friend Sean, whom, like many people I know, is suffering through a winter cold. (I had one last week). The other absentee was my dad, who “had a bad day” yesterday, to quote my mom, and, stayed upstairs, just like at Thanksgiving. As then, I sat at the head of the table. And as then it made me feel strange, a usurper.
By “had a bad day,” my mom meant that my dad had little energy and was feeling generally poorly, including a bit nauseous. Neither she nor I want to yet accept these symptoms as anything other than transient, especially in light of his recent upswing. Hope springs eternal. But time will tell. It will be interesting to see how he is today.
As we did at Thankgiving, we took our deserts upstairs, to eat them in the company of my dad. He really enjoyed the attention and proceeded to cheerfully hold forth, as is his wont.
Later, I walked one of our guests to his car. A dear family friend, he has known my father literally for decades. I’ve known him probably thirty–five years. He remarked on my dad’s remarkable strength and will to live—which I cannot dispute—and that those may be the edge my dad needs to become an outlier, as opposed to a routine statistic. God, I hope so. I can think of no better Christmas gift next year than to have my dad still with us.
By “had a bad day,” my mom meant that my dad had little energy and was feeling generally poorly, including a bit nauseous. Neither she nor I want to yet accept these symptoms as anything other than transient, especially in light of his recent upswing. Hope springs eternal. But time will tell. It will be interesting to see how he is today.
As we did at Thankgiving, we took our deserts upstairs, to eat them in the company of my dad. He really enjoyed the attention and proceeded to cheerfully hold forth, as is his wont.
Later, I walked one of our guests to his car. A dear family friend, he has known my father literally for decades. I’ve known him probably thirty–five years. He remarked on my dad’s remarkable strength and will to live—which I cannot dispute—and that those may be the edge my dad needs to become an outlier, as opposed to a routine statistic. God, I hope so. I can think of no better Christmas gift next year than to have my dad still with us.
Saturday, December 23, 2006
Present Present
What do you give your terminally ill father for Christmas? Something he can enjoy as soon as he removes the wrapping paper. In other words, right away.
Holidays and celebrations are hard.
Holidays and celebrations are hard.
A Weighty Topic
At his maximum, at least as far as I know, my father weighed approximately 190 lbs. I think he said he was 185 lbs. early this summer, just as the cancer was beginning to grow. Admittedly, he was clearly overweight, both visually and by his body mass index. But not anymore. Now he weighs 154 lbs. and his weight continues to fall, although the rate has declined and my dad has professed a recognition of a need to eat better, to stabilize his weight. We’ll find out on January 7th whether there will be any real benefit to his pursing that goal.
Countdown
My dad will receive his third chemotherapy treatment next Thursday, December 28th, whilst I am away in the High Sierra. With her sister, Gloria, back home, my mother again will be left alone for several hours as my dad dozes through the infusion.
Then we will wait ten days.
My father will have another CAT scan on January 7th to assess the progress of the cancer and whether the chemo is having any impact. Then we’ll know for sure if his apparent resurgence is in fact because of a diminution of his tumors and/or a reduction in their metastases, or simply the consequences of the palliative effects of the treatments. The odds are vastly for the latter. At the very least we may get a timeline.
I await with morbid curiosity.
Then we will wait ten days.
My father will have another CAT scan on January 7th to assess the progress of the cancer and whether the chemo is having any impact. Then we’ll know for sure if his apparent resurgence is in fact because of a diminution of his tumors and/or a reduction in their metastases, or simply the consequences of the palliative effects of the treatments. The odds are vastly for the latter. At the very least we may get a timeline.
I await with morbid curiosity.
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