Since we last met with the radiation oncologist so much has happened. I'm not very good at keeping up to date with these posts but I feel like I really need to do better since we have such a support system and many of them are quite far away. So I will do my best. A couple weeks ago we headed back down to the Huntsman to meet with our medical oncologist. Dr. Grossmann is a very respected and well know oncologist. We really liked him and feel like we are in good hands with him. We really didn't like all he had to say though. He gave us a lot of information and statistics which didn't look very good for us. Having stage III is good and bad. Good because it hasn't spread to other major organs in your body yet, bad because they have spent all their resources and time researching stage IV and that is where most of the advancements have been made. We don't have a lot of good options for treatments. He told us we had basically three options. First, do nothing wait and watch. That makes me have major anxiety. I for one can't sit back and just wait for his cancer to move from stage III to stage IV with out at least trying to stop it. Dr. Grossmann also thought that this option wasn't what he would recommend either where Steve is young and healthy and has a young family at home to take care of. Second, is a treatment called Interferon. We have heard nothing but horror stories about this one since being diagnosed. It has been the treatment for the last 20 years and hasn't had good results. It goes on for 12 months and you are super sick. You lose your hair and lots more ugly side effects. Third, is Biochemo therapy. This is what Dr. Grossmann described as nailing a nail in with a sledge hammer. It's a 3 month treatment with Steve having to stay in the hospital for a week then home for two weeks then back in the hospital again. Doing this for 3 rounds. On week 2 he will also receive interferon as part of this therapy. He will most likely lose his hair and be really sick for the full 3 months. Both the interferon and the Biochemo therapy only improve your survival rates buy 5-10 % at a 5 year mark. For all that heart ache and pain it almost doesn't seem worth it unless of course you are the 5-10%. The difference with interferon and biochemo is that the studies show that by doing interferon, it pushes the rate of a recurrence out a year longer and biochemo will push a recurrence out for an additional 2 years. The hope we have as well as the doctors is that if we can postpone a recurrence long enough then maybe in the next few years we may have some better options for treating Stage III. Sounds really frustrating to me and that frustration came out a little while talking to the doctor. I asked him, "Is this the best you have to offer?" It just seems that with all the research and developments being made there could be something that would improve our odds better than that. But after thinking and praying we are going to move forward with the biochemo option. We figured he would be really sick for 3 months or a year. 3 months seemed better than a year. Hopefully, we can just hunker down and make it through 3 months then get our lives back a little. Steve's main concern, besides thinking of the poison they will be putting in his body, is trying to figure out how his office will survive with him gone that long. We are hoping that he will be able to work for part of that time but I really think it will be time to put our trust in the Lord and trust He will provide a way for it all to work out. Our Start date is May 11th. Steve wanted to take a quick trip back to Kansas to see his family before he started this next part of his journey. Last weekend Steve and I flew out to Kansas. We got to see his sister and brother-in-law, who we never get to see, and many of his aunts and uncles. He has such a cool family that are really close. I would say his extended family is close like my immediate family is. It was really good to spend some time with them before we started our 13 hour drive home. I really enjoyed that weekend and the time I got to spend with my husband just one on one. We don't get a lot of that with 4 very active kids. But it seemed that as soon as we got home it was back to reality. Today we had to go get CT Scans of his neck, chest, abdomen, and pelvis. They want to make sure the cancer hasn't spread before they start the biochemo. On Friday he has to get a heart test done then next week will be his lung test. All these have to be done before we can get started on May 11th. It seems to give me great anxiety when it comes time for these scans. I just hold my breath and can't seem to breath until we hear that all is clear. Hoping to get that news sometime today or tonight. I can't even begin to express my gratitude to so many people in our lives that Heavenly Father has put there to help us through this trial. I know many people are much worse than we are but going through this seems pretty tough for us. It seems that with the support of our families and some very dear friends, that it makes life much more beautiful. We see the Lords hand in our lives and are so very grateful for the many blessings he continues to bless our family with. He answers our prayers always. Just not always the way we want them answered. But he knows best what we need to grow and become more like Him. It's just our job to allow Him to work his miracles in our lives as hard as it is at times. We then will look back and see all we have become because of the trials we go through.
