Chapter 6

With each step forward we thought he had took, something else came up and he was set back 2 steps.  This ongoing battle just kept getting worse.  The anger inside me built over someone’s plain stupidity.  How could a surgeon NOT know what he was doing, and if he did not know what he was doing, why would he even attempt to screw around with it.  Could have been the end of his shift and he really wanted to go home to his family, and then the page came in for a consult in the ICU, so my dad was his victim.  Thankfully, the doctors in London who installed this drain were able to catch this mistake and we hoped there were no ill side effects from what had happened.  Even though dad’s blood work showed that his billy ruben count and liver enzymes were not what they should be, we were hopeful that now that the drain was working properly this would turn around.  All the while this went on we had to wait for results of this pet scan.  Try and live our lives like “normal” until dad went to London to meet with his oncologists to receive his results and discuss radiation treatments starting.  He was told that the petscan did not show any signs that the cancer had spread to other organs. Finally, something positive to go on, It seems that for the time being we just have this infection to deal with and once it’s cleared up things will go forward.  While in London dad also received his first radiation treatment on the brain.  “It was simple”, he told me, “it lasts just a few seconds, and then its done”.  Well that doesn’t sound hard.  One treatment down, and only 9 more to go on the brain.  He was a survivor and it was going to take more than this to keep him down!

It’s hard to explain what was going on in my mind over this first month, my dad had so many things going against him, and I was watching him change right before my eyes.  His head had been shaved for the brain surgery, and all the weight he had gained while on the steroids was slowly disappearing.  His skin had a tan/yellow tone to it, and the spark in his eye, was no longer there.  The journey had just begun, though dad looked like a worn traveler.  His blood counts were very low and his energy level too.  Slowly but surely dad’s vitals started coming back to normal, for the time being.  His elevated heart was finally beating normal after 2 weeks, and his blood pressure was coming back up.  His appearance was still very yellow but we thought it was improving as well, we were all very hopeful that sooner than later he would be back home. 

He was released from the hospital on Wednesday August 18 after his levels had all come back to normal.  We knew that the next few months would be difficult, he had to travel daily to London for radiation and chemo was set to start on August 19, (even though this would not happen yet) my dad had had a few treatments of radiation and was starting to feel the effects.  The decision was made to put the chemo on hold until the radiation on the brain was complete.  At this time, blood clots were discovered in my dad’s lung, which meant he had to be put onto yet another medication to thin the blood.  He would have nurses coming to check in on him while he was at home. 
Some news would surface at this point, that something was in fact discovered in the pet scan, that we would not be told about until this point.  There was some spots found on the kidneys that needed some further testing to see if in fact this was part of the cancer or not.  We knew that this type of cancer was fast spreading, but could it in fact spread this fast? If in fact these spots on the kidney were cancer, the course of treatment would change.   So now chemo was out the question until they could do another cat scan to determine what these spots were on the kidney.  The plan was to compare this scan to a scan they would do later after the first round of chemo.  If the spots reacted to the chemo treatment in any way, they would know that it was cancer.  The only other option was for another biopsy which was an invasive procedure that they did not feel necessary for dad at this point.  All this information made my mind reel, I could literally not handle anymore bad news.  I realize that this must sound extremely selfish to be thinking of no one but myself at this moment.  I just could not imagine what my dad was thinking at this point, and he was very hard to speak to about this.  He stopped expressing much feeling and we had trouble talking about the subject. 

The doctors explained that if the cancer had in fact spread to the kidney we would be facing yet another set back.  There would be 2 options, one would be to add another round of radiation attacking the kidney directly, the 2^nd option was to consult with a surgeon to see if part of the kidney could be removed.  We were told that it would be hard to find a surgeon who would perform surgery on someone with this advanced stage of cancer.  It seemed like this road just became a little longer, and a lot rougher.  The feeling of any hope seemed to diminish a little more as each day passed.  We just had to hope that once chemo finally started, these mystery spots would turn out to be nothing and we could continue on the original plan of treatment. 
Things were changing so quickly around me, it became confusing from one doctors appt to another, as we would hear such different opinions and there were so many people involved in his case.  There was times when I was frustrated with my family, for many different reasons but deep down I knew that we needed to stick together more than ever right now.  Emotion and frustration were wearing me down very quickly, and I know Mike and the kids were feeling it.  I had become a different person because I had no outlet to vent my anger.  I felt almost trapped, I had to try and be so positive around everyone, especially dad, but really I just wanted to scream most of the time.  This wasn’t fair, why was this happening to my dad,  To my family! To me it seemed there had to be someone else who actually deserved to have this happen to them, not my dad!