Dr. Appointment and his Next Steps ~

Michael and I went to his doctor’s appointment on Friday. His counts are ok; his white count is at 2.4K. While we were at his appointment, we did not get to see his PA this time. I think this is the first time we’ve missed her. We asked Michael’s nurse where she was. She was over at the Jackson building admitting another patient and that she was going to be sad that she missed Michael because she tells everyone that Michael is her baby. He is like that, has all the women calling him their baby…

After having a good discussion with his oncologist, our next step now will be more chemotherapy. These rounds will also be inpatient. The doctor did say there are a few other options but due to the amount of travel time we would have going back and forth, he would feel better with impatient chemotherapy. These rounds will only have 2 chemotherapy medications instead of 3. He will still get the ifosfamide, but will now begin receiving etoposide. He will continue with all of the preventative meds as well. His oncologist wants to start pretty soon. He said he will do all the “staging” the first day he admits him and then begin the chemo that evening. This will allow us to have all the scans.

He told us to go home and work out a schedule. We have some pretty big dates coming up that we want to make sure Michael is at the high points. Both our beautiful children will be gradating high school June 1st, which means we will have a few weeks of family and friends coming in from out of town. We also need to work around our son’s freshman college orientation in June.

Michael’s feelings on all this, he is done. He doesn’t want to do any more right now. Radiation really didn’t have many side effects on him. He has had 2 “good” weeks, well better weeks, even though he has been having pain in his legs and back, he has been able to enjoy being out in the shop around cars. His hair has started to grow back. He just wants to go back to a normal life. He wants to work on cars again, he wants to be able to do things he could do a year ago. Over the last 8 months, so much has changed and as he says “I am done”. When he says this, I just give him time and then we will discuss our next step that we will fight together. If you know Michael, he is a fighter, but he also does not like being down for any amount of time. He always has to be up and going.

The doctors concern is that Michael’s counts have not climbed up where he would really like them. We will have to closely monitor his counts. His other concern is he is not sure how long his body will be able to take the chemotherapy. Our goal the first time was 6 treatments, but he stopped him at 5.

Michael and I still have a lot of discussing to do. We will update you when he has made his decisions.