Drugs are Delightful! Scary Test Results.

Drugs rule! At least the right ones do. The vicadin that the radiation doctor had prescribed for Graham didn't do squat for his back pain. But Dr. Advani prescribed him some slow release morphine today that really helped. Yay!!!!

The idea is to maintain a steady dose of morphine throughout the day so the pain never gets out of control, and if it "breaks through," take a little more morphine and it should respond right away. And that's exactly what happened tonight. It is so good to know that Graham has something now that can very quickly take away his pain.

TEST RESULTS

The scan results were mixed. The MRI of the brain showed that the radiation treatment helped reduce the cancer in the brain. That's the good news.

The bad news is the PET-CT scan showed that in the past 3 weeks, the cancer spread tremendously throughout the rest of his body, including more of his bones, which is the probable cause of his back pain. The doctor actually used the phrase "riddled with cancer." There were so many new cancer spots to report, that the scan people hadn't even been able to finish typing the report in time for our appointment. We'll learn all the details on Friday when we can see a copy of the report.

The doctor advised against any further treatment, because she didn't think the small potential benefit outweighed the pain and discomfort involved. But Graham wants to fight to the end, to stay with us as long as possible, just in case some new drug or treatment might come along in the nick of time.

So Dr. Advani agreed to let him try a chemo combo that he hadn't tried before, and to try to do it weekly. But, further bad news...today's blood test revealed his white blood cell neutrophil count (not sure if I have that right) is scary low, 300, so he's not even able to have the first part of the chemo treatment, because it would completely wipe out his white cells. But he was able to have the second part.

Starting tomorrow, he will get Neupogen shots for 5 days, to encourage his white blood cells to grow. And if they reach 1000 by Wednesday, he'll get the other part of the chemo combo then.

Graham and Micki are snoozing away right now, hopefully having some sweet dreams.

Letting Our Friends Know about Graham's Cancer

We struggled with when and how to tell friends about Graham's cancer. Graham doesn't want people to treat him differently or think of him as sickly, but at the same time, we don't want to present a false front to our friends. Here's the email we sent:

Hello Friends!

We hope you are doing well.

It's been a while since we updated you in much depth on our latest California adventures. We wanted to let you know that we've hit an obstacle in the road of life that we hope will be just a large puddle that we need to slowly but steadily wade through, rather than a giant sinkhole.

Shortly after we moved to California two years ago, Graham was diagnosed with cancer. He was told he had a slow-growing kind of leukemia called CLL, and that he should "watch and wait" before getting any treatment. He felt pretty good, continued to work and ride his bike 100 miles a week, and even completed the 400 mile Ride Across Utah.

Because the cancer didn't really affect his life in a significant way, we didn't tell very many people about it, other than immediate family. Graham didn't want people to worry when he was feeling basically very fit.

But then a few months ago, very suddenly, his spleen became huge and he developed tumors all over his body, and it was determined that he actually had non-Hodgkins Large B-cell Lymphoma.

My spleen is thiiiis big.

At Stanford Hospital's Cancer Center, he received treatment with a drug made by Genentech (the company Graham works for) called Rituxan, along with chemo (the CHOP protocol).

Immediately, his spleen reduced in size and his tumors went away. He felt soooo much better and was able to breathe, eat and walk normally again. Yay!

Unfortunately, after a short while, some of the tumors came back, so it was determined that the treatment had helped, but not enough. Two weeks ago, the doctor told Graham that he needed to take six months off from work to concentrate all his energy on getting well.

Now he is going through a more rigorous chemo treatment called ESHAP that is taken along with Rituxan. It requires that every 3 weeks, Graham goes into the hospital for 6 days to get chemo through a continuous IV drip. It's not painful, but it does do a number on his digestive system for about 10 days, and it's a long time to be in the hospital getting woken up every couple of hours.
Graham's beard was getting sparse, so he shaved it off.

Graham has completed his first round of R-ESHAP and the tumors have reduced in size, but not all the way down. It took about a week for Graham to snap back, but now he's feeling quite good and is enjoying gardening...



visits with friends and family...

Forsan in our front garden

Graham and his brother Gary at Filoli Gardens

Gorgeous flowers at Filoli

Time to smell the roses!Graham is also enjoying doing projects around the house, like assembling a storage shed.

We're very upbeat and hopeful, and are doing our best not to worry about bad things that may never happen.

He may have 5 more R-ESHAP treatments, and/or he may need to have some kind of bone-marrow transplant. We'll know more in about a month when the doctor reassesses his progress.
I'll keep you informed.

In the meantime, though, I know he would enjoy hearing from y'all. He loves getting funny cards or just talking on the phone, catching up with everyone, and hearing about what's new with you.

And don't worry, there's no wrong/awkward thing you could say or write. We'll just be happy to hear from you.

Prayers are certainly welcome too! For those who would like to say a Mi Shebarach (prayer for healing) for him, his Hebrew name is David ben Zev ve Leah (David, son of Zev and Leah).

Hugs,
Lee