Sorry I didn’t update the site yesterday but to be honest, physically I am hurting pretty good right now. My surgery to remove the new mass went as well as expected. I am a man who considers himself “up with technology” but the ability for a doctor to pull me in for surgery, cut me open, remove body parts, close me up and have me home for lunch is simply amazing. It takes me longer to fix most computer problems then it took this doctor to perform his surgery on my body. I couldn’t believe that I was home in less than 6 hours. They checked me in, prepped me, knocked me out, cut me open, did the surgery, closed me up, woke me up, and sent me home in less time then a day of work.

Yesterday and today I have been hurting, and I mean hurting, a lot. Today has been one of the toughest days, physically, for me. Personally, I have been in more pain these last couple of weeks but especially yesterday and today than I ever care to be in. Today went well beyond discomfort; it out and out hurt, and hurt bad.

I’ve taken a lot of time to make sure I thank every one helping out my family in this time and there are quite a few people lending their hand from dinners to helping out around the house. But a couple of people who I might not have given the just desserts are my wife, Rebekah and my sister, Theta. I don’t know what I would have done this morning if my sister wasn’t here. She has been helping out with the girls when Bek has been working and running around; basically keeping our world spinning. Theta also has been looking after me and I really needed her today. I will never be able to completely let her know how much she is appreciated. And then there’s Rebekah. Like I said she has been doing everything to try so hard to keep things as normal as possible. She’s been working and then coming home, taking care of me, getting normal errands done, and still managing to spend time with the girls. And the girls themselves, Emily and Alyssa, have been absolutely wonderful. Although we are trying to shield them from a lot of the things going on they are smart kids and know there is more to the situation than they are being told. So much of our life lately has been “out of the normal” routine and the girls have been great about it. From staying with friends, to respecting an Aunt they hardly knew, to not being able to jump up and down on Dad they way they normally do, the girls have been great and continue to be wonderful. Bek and Theta are working so hard to make sure they have a normal summer vacation.
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Well, I’m back home and I couldn’t be happier. Humm, I guess that’s not totally true. Let me apologize for the confusion and emotional up and down roller coaster ride of the past week. We were simply relaying information as we got it.

To make sure we are all on the same page, let me break down the various diagnoses of the past couple of weeks.

Going into my surgery last Friday, the diagnosis was that I had a very rare cancer called Sarcoma. This sucked but was very treatable. The key thing was getting the tumor itself out of my body in one complete piece. This was the best diagnosis with the test results and small biopsy that they had. If the tumor was taken out completely then I was going to have to move on to radiation treatment and the lovely plastic pants but after that I would be done and hopefully cancer free.

After a very long surgery on Friday, the lead surgeon who specialized in Sarcoma Tumors told us that he was confident it was not a Sarcoma Tumor but was in fact this “Mediastinal teratoma” that Bek posted about earlier. As far as additional treatment, there was none; the surgery was it, I was done after that. No cancer at all. Just needed to heal from that and I was back in the game. Now understand, the surgeon wasn’t shooting from the hip to make a family happy, as I mentioned earlier there were several “lead” surgeons in for this operation and they all shared in the findings. As a matter of fact a few of the surgeons and other doctors whom I had been seeing over the past few weeks were happy to drop by and share how relieved they were to find the teratoma and how it must have be a huge weight of my shoulder.
The tumor itself was sent off to Pathology just to make the findings “official” and the only other thing there was to focus one was my recovery.

Then yesterday, the doctor made his normal stop off at my room as he had been doing all week but this time he pulled up a chair and sat down; I knew there was a problem. He started off with an apology; this wasn’t going to be good. He explained how they had been running multiple tests on the tumor and discovered it was in fact a Yolk Sac Tumor and that I was back to having cancer only this time it wasn’t as easy of a cancer to treat and cure. Matter of fact, there will not be a way to tell if I am ever completely cancer free.

Unfortunately, the Lead Surgeon who performed the operation and had been checking up on me everyday, chose to defer any cancer questions we had to our Oncologist. On the one hand this really concerns me and on the other hand I can totally understand this. So we find ourselves in a familiar position of not really having enough information to relay any type of full details to everyone. For now I am just happy to be back home and with all the women in my life. I am pretty tired right now so I will post more information of what we do know over the next couple of days. I would also like to thank all the people who have taken the time to post comments, emails, phone calls, and drop by; especially my sister, who flew out here from the east coast last week and has been helping out a lot. Thank you also to all the friends who have been helping out by watching the girls as Bek and I ran to different multiple doctor appointments, and supplying wonderful dinners to help lighten our very hectic schedules. It is really comforting to know how many caring people we have out there thinking and praying for us. Thank you again for all the support you are providing.

OK family and friends alike, this is my last entry for a while. Have no fear, Rebekah was given a crash course in blogging and hopefully she will be able to keep the website up to date on my progress.

My family came into town today and it’s nice to have them here. Including my sister whom I haven’t seen in a few years. I am hoping for the best, and expecting better. Thanks again to everyone who has taken the time to call, email, and post comments to the website. It was great catching up with everyone; I do wish it were under better circumstances. Everyone who has been helping out, a big thanks goes out to you. And thanks for all the prayers and well wishing, I will be thinking of everyone tomorrow.

I’ll be blogging, programming, networking, playing baseball, and chasing my girls again real soon. Talk to everyone again later.

E

It was a marathon day of getting poked, scanned, x-rayed, and marked up for my surgery on Friday. Of the 6 hours I spent at the various medical facilities today, I have to say that the PET Scan was among the more interesting tests I have had to go through in these recent weeks. PET stands for Positron Emission Tomography and what they do is inject a radioactive substance into you. Which needless to say, is a little concerning when you are lying there thinking about what they actually just put into your body. It’s funny because they get your IV going, then they open this lead box and pull out a lead syringe which has the radioactive stuff in it, and inject it into you vein. You then have to lie still for 45 minutes to let the radioactivity make it’s way through your entire body. Then they stick you in a machine much like a CAT Scan and start scanning for glowing parts. You see what happens is the radioactive stuff finds cancer cells and lights them up. So glow is bad.

Obviously, as with all these tests, the techs that run the test won’t tell you anything about the results. That is left up for the doctor. But I took it as a good sign that the tech didn’t have the need to put on sunglasses to look at my results. I have to admit while I was laying there waiting for the radioactivity to make its way through my body, I had thoughts of grandeur that there would be one of those freak indoor storms and while the radioactivity stuff jets through my body I would get struck with lighting and end up with some freakish mutant super power. But alas, no great mutant power, but I have noticed since coming home from the hospital, every time I walk into my kitchen, my microwave beeps. No sure if it’s related or not.

I think that’s about all I have for tonight. I don’t really have that much going on until the actual surgery. But if I come up with more to talk about, or if there are any changes, I will be sure to post the information here.