Home Away From Home

So I had my first session at the Fertility Clinic. I won’t go into any details, but the session went as expected. No need to add anything more than that.

I checked into the Red Lion Inn in Tukwila. Part of the hotel is under construction/renovation, so I was able to get a great rate to establish my “home away from home” for this week. I had a little issue with their internet service, but they were very helpful, even to allowing me to go from room to room to find the “perfect” room.

I watched the Wings lose in Game 3 to San Jose. I really don’t like our chances in this series, which is unfortunate, as I really thought we had a legitimate chance to win the Cup this year.

I have plans to go to the Mariners/White Sox game on Tuesday, and I am going up to Bellingham to visit TJ on Thursday, so I will certainly be able to stay busy.

A Partner in Crime

Overall, I felt pretty good this week, though I have definitely felt more tired than usual, especially today. I made reservations to stay at the Red Lion Inn in Tukwila while in Seattle for the sperm banking next week, and I am certainly looking forward to “getting away” for a week, as the stress of the whole situation has gotten to me a bit.

I haven’t mentioned it yet, but some of you are aware of an eerie coincidence. My boss Tim Story’s 22-year-old son TJ was diagnosed with Nodular Sclerosis Hodgkin’s Lymphoma about a month before I was. It has been nice having the support structure of someone going through the same thing I am.

TJ lives in Bellingham in the Seattle area, so I will be able to visit him next week and see how he is doing. Everyone should visit his blog at http://omgcancerbbq.blogspot.com/ and send him support as well. Plus he has a great sense of humor, and his recanting of his trials and tribulations are funny and honest. It’s good to see how my experiences have paralleled his.

Arranging to Save the Little Guys

I went to Kadlec Medical Center to have a port installed in my chest. This is basically a little bubble that the oncologist will use to inject the chemotherapy into my body.

After a nice three-hour wait at the hospital, I was drugged up and had the port installed. Dr. Saravanan Kasthuri performed the procedure.

I came home about 2:00 PM, and went to sleep for a bit. I woke up at 3:30 PM, feeling some pain in my neck and shoulder. Vicodin took care of that, though.

After discussing with Dana, as well as my parents, we thought it would be wise if I “banked” some sperm, as a potential long-term side effect of chemotherapy is infertility. So I placed a call over to Pacific Northwest Fertility Facility in Seattle to arrange to store some of the little guys.

The process is actually a three-day event, spread over a five-day period. I made arrangements to be in Seattle the week of April 30 to get this process rolling.

I called Dr. Sierra’s office and rescheduled the start of my chemotherapy for Wednesday May 9.

Bigger Than We Thought

I met with Dr. Sierra in the afternoon, and he first let us know that the cancer cells had not spread to my bone marrow. He then showed my mom and me the PET Scan. This showed the mass in my chest was actually 11 cm x 8 cm (!). It also revealed the cancer had spread to two more lymph nodes in my diaphragm. In addition, there is an “area of interest” in my nasal passage that showed up on the PET Scan, but not on the CT scan. This area actually classifies me in Stage IV instead of Stage II, though that would have no effect on my treatment.

He put together a game plan of 4 four-week cycles of chemotherapy (that's a treatment every two weeks for 16 weeks), followed by another PET Scan to check the progress. We scheduled for chemotherapy to begin on Wednesday April 25.

I went to the dentist to have my teeth cleaned. It pays to be dating a dental hygienist.

Sexiest Man Alive

I met with Dr. Cordero again to check on the incision from my biopsy. I had concern that it was infected, but luckily it was not. That being said, it was not healing as quickly as he would have liked. He determined that the wound was too moist, and perhaps I was not drying it off after showering as thoroughly as I should have.

He removed the strips, and didn’t put any more on. He advised keeping the incision open and dry, even to the point of going shirtless at home.

On a related note, I declared myself “Sexiest Man Alive.” My mom nearly choked on her coffee at this statement.

At 9:45 AM, I went over to the Medical Imaging Center for a CT Scan and a PET Scan. They fed me four Xanax to relax me, and then injected me with radioactive sugar that the cancer cells would feed on. The scans would then be able to show how far the Lymphoma had spread.

The CT Scan and PET Scan went off without a hitch, and I headed home, still quite relaxed from the Xanax.

Drew and Meals Tie the Knot

Dana and I traveled to San Francisco for Andrew and Meals’ wedding. We had a fantastic time, and the ceremony was absolutely beautiful. I am so happy for them, and I wish them all the best.

I felt great for most of the trip, though I did have some back pain the second half of Sunday. Vicodin fixed that, though…

Bone Marrow Biopsy

I worked in the morning, and then went back over to Dr. Sierra’s office for a Bone Marrow Biopsy to see if the cancerous cells had spread into my bone marrow. I was very nervous about this test, as I had heard that this is a very painful procedure. Luckily I was wrong.

The test was not very painful at all. Of course I was completely drugged up. My mom drove me home, where I proceeded to call Dana, though I don’t remember the conversation at all. Then Adam called, and I didn’t remember that discussion either. I went to sleep around 2:00 PM.

I woke up at 4:00 PM, feeling surprisingly well. I watched the Red Wings beat the Flames in game 1 of their series, then packed for my trip the next day.

Getting the Ball Rolling

We never heard from Dr. Cordero, so we kept our appointment with Dr. Sierra at 8:30 AM. He proved to be a very good doctor – good bedside manner, very knowledgeable, and very concerned with my ability to go to Andrew and Meals’ wedding this coming weekend.

That being said, he did want to progress fairly quickly with the staging of the Lymphoma, and scheduled me for many tests over the next week and a half, starting with an Echocardiogram this afternoon.

I headed over to Kadlec Medical Center for the Echocardiogram, which was basically like an Ultrasound an expecting mother would have, except it was on my heart. It was quite interesting to see my heart in this test.

I had lunch in the deli in the hospital. Of course I had Cream of Tomato soup.

Nodular Sclerosis Hodgkin's Lymphoma

At my appointment with Dr. Cordero, he gave me the full diagnosis nodular sclerosis Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. This is the most common kind of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, and is treated with a very high success rate.

He checked out the incision from the biopsy. He said it wasn’t healing as quickly as he thought it would, but it certainly isn’t anything to be concerned about. He changed the strips covering the wound, and made plans for me to come back in two weeks.

Dr. Cordero also offered to call Dr. Rado and/or Dr. Weeks and see if either of them can get me in any sooner. We’ll see what he can do.

Stupid Baseball

I woke up in the middle of the night with tremendous back spasms. We are not sure if this is related to the Lymphoma, or just a side effect of throwing a baseball around the previous day with Dana's son Brandon. Either way, I drugged myself up with Percoset, and was feeling much better.

I was able to get an appointment with Dr. Sierra for Wednesday April 11.